Critique is a foundational part of design education and professional practice.
In one sense, design critique is simple: it’s just the process of evaluating others’ work and ideas. However, there is definitely an art to giving and receiving a meaningful critique.
When it comes to UX Design, providing constructive feedback on UI/UX wireframes, mockups, and more can be an invaluable tool in helping teams achieve their desired goals and objectives.
In this article, we're sharing a few tips to help you give (and receive) feedback in a way that's constructive and moves the project forward.
To help you give effective design feedback, we have created a 10-point UX design critique checklist covering topics ranging from usability and navigation to accessibility accommodations and aesthetics. With this checklist in hand, even those new to UX Design can be sure not to miss important details when giving feedback on UI/UX designs. Read on to learn more about our 10-point criteria for giving constructive design feedback.
- Why Design Critique Is Important for the Design Process
- Who Should Give Design Critique?
- How to Receive Feedback Gracefully
- Tips for Delivering Design Critique
- 10 Point Checklist for UX Design Critiques
- Key Takeaways
Why Design Critique Is Important For the Design Process
Feedback is an essential part of the design process, as it provides an opportunity to critically evaluate a product or service from multiple perspectives.
As a UX designer, your focus in any design project typically revolves around pairing user research findings with usability best practices.
Who Should Give Design Critique?
Your work as a designer doesn't exist in a bubble: the initial ideas, marketing, selling, and even customer retention depend on other teams and professionals whose focus might be on other areas of the user journey or business needs.
A few of these other individuals or teams who you might regularly receive (or ask for) comments and feedback from on your design solutions include:
- Stakeholders, from multiple teams across the business
- Collaborators, from writers considering copy needs to developers looking at technical requirements
- Design colleagues, who might be looking at anything from information architecture to UI elements, or interaction design finesse
- Your mentor/team lead, who might offer feedback that pertains to your personal career growth as well as overall cohesion within the product
- Yourself, perhaps considering how well you've taken other perspectives into account to empower your work, in addition to your own UX expertise
- Users, who may ultimately be your harshest critics
How to Receive Feedback Gracefully
When you pour your heart into a design and put forth your best work, hearing critical points of feedback—especially from non-designers on the team—can be incredibly challenging.
When you’re the one in the hot seat, here are a few helpful reminders for how to handle a critique.
- Practice active listening: During a critique, you should be focused primarily on understanding what the person giving the critique is trying to communicate. Take notes, and repeat their words back to them to be sure you understand what they’re saying—and ask clarifying questions, if necessary.
- Thank the critique-er for sharing their thoughts and time: Even if someone’s feedback never makes it into your design (whether because it’s a lower priority or perhaps misses the mark altogether on what this particular design project is focused on), you’ll want to make sure that each person giving feedback feels heard and valued. Some of the best insights tend to come from unusual sources, and it’s important to ensure that each person on the team is empowered to share their thoughts and insights candidly during feedback sessions.
- Reflect on each piece of feedback: Often, critiques are delivered imperfectly. It’s up to you, as a designer, to get to the heart of what they’re trying to say, as well as determine whether it’s relevant to your design work.
Tips for Delivering Design Critique
On the flip side, learning how to deliver design critique in a constructive way can be a way to increase the value that you add to your team.
Here are a few tips:
- Focus on the design: Even the most thoughtful critique can trigger defensiveness in the person who’s presenting the design. To help your feedback feel impartial, try to ensure that you phrase your comments so that they refer to the design rather than the designer.
- Be clear when you’re playing the devil’s advocate: One of the most helpful phrases when delivering design critique is the phrase, “I’m going to play the devil’s advocate for a bit…” This semi-disclaimer helps the person receiving the feedback to embrace a state of mind where they can easily take in more confrontational, rapid-fire questions without feeling attacked or triggered. Asking questions through different lenses is also a great exercise, in general, for reviewing and considering your design work.
- Dig into the why: It’s easy to make an assumption about someone else’s work. Take the time to ask for more insight into the thought process behind a design decision to uncover some elements that you might not have thought of—or to help realign an assumption about goals and expectations.
Read more: How to Give And Receive Design Critique Well