“The excitement surrounding these tools does not come from the design itself. It comes from the collapse of the distance between description and interaction. An interface appears immediately, behavior responds instantly, and possibility becomes visible before structure exists. That is genuinely new. What is not new is the gap between something that looks finished and something that is.”

Vibe coding is accelerating the erosion of design authority →

How top UX & Product Design teams level up →
[Sponsored] Designlab helps UX and product teams build practical capability in AI workflows, Figma, business thinking, and more. Hands-on training designed around real tools, real constraints, and real product work. Learn more.

Editor picks

We didn’t mean to build this →
How well-meaning designers became complicit in broken systems.

Who are we really designing for? →
The individual User and the collective Customer.

We are perpetuating our own burnout problem →
The job market is brutal.

The UX Collective is an independent design publication that elevates unheard design voices and helps designers think more critically about their work.

Shot on iPhone in black & white →

Make me think

Should designers “code”? →
“There’s a question that never goes away in design: should designers code? My answer has always been yes. But for a decade or so, the complexity of front-end development made it impractical for most. Thankfully, AI coding agents have reopened the door.”

AI fatigue is real and nobody talks about it →
“I want to talk about it honestly. Not the “AI is amazing and here’s my workflow” version. The real version. The one where you stare at your screen at 11pm, surrounded by AI-generated code you still need to review, wondering why the tool that was supposed to save you time has consumed your entire day.”

The machines are fine. I’m worried about us. →
“The discourse around LLMs in science tends to cluster at two poles that David Hogg identifies cleanly: let-them-cook, in which we hand the reins to the machines and become curators of their output, and ban-and-punish, in which we pretend it’s 2019 and prosecute anyone caught prompting.”

Little gems this week

Beyond the user: why design needs to widen its circle →

Falling apples and crumbling algos →

Taste.md: the new tech buzzword →

Tools and resources

Data models →
The shared language your AI and team are both missing.

Designing for the invisible customer →
Are consumers’ Openclaw agents becoming the real consumers?

Design challenges →
You’re not supposed to get it right.

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“To have a perspective is to say ‘no’ to things that are technically possible but strategically wrong. Most products fail not because they lack features, but because they lack a clear stance on what they are not. Every feature added without a clear perspective dilutes the ones that actually matter. Design is an editorial act: the more you leave out, the more weight you give to what remains.”

Perspective →

5 design links a day, curated by the folks from UX Collective →
For people who still believe in the web as a platform for knowledge sharing, long-form writing, and community.

Editor picks

The ground is shaking →
Why designers must flip the script on AI.

Designers finally have a say in the product they design →
AI gave desugbers back the decisions that were always theirs.

Rethinking design awards in an AI world →
Why design awards are still relevant and what needs to change.

The UX Collective is an independent design publication that elevates unheard design voices and helps designers think more critically about their work.

Ban Ray: Your face is not inventory →

Make me think

Your ticket is a prompt →
“The agents are behaving like the tickets they learned from. The scope-narrowing, the deference to small pieces over whole outcomes, the instinct to fragment before thinking.”

Why are executives enamored with AI but ICs aren’t? →
“Here’s my current posit for why there’s such a big divide: executives have always had to deal with non-determinism and focus on nondeterministic system design, while individual contributors are evaluated by their execution on deterministic tasks.”

Take my job, AI! →
“On the personal side, I’ve become more and more disillusioned with product design. It can be a shit role where you’re stuck between product managers on one side, engineers on the other, “the business” above you, and your actual users below you. What remains is an increasingly cramped space for decisions we actually “own”, which is basically which color lip stick to put on the pig.”

Little gems this week

Every designer on my team ships the same quality now →

AI is rewriting the rules; Language is following →

The long and short of telephone progress →

Tools and resources

Context matters… A lot →
Building intuitive AI products requires designing for context management.

The many paths in the life of a designer →
Way-finding in the work/life journey.

The rise of synthetic users →
The future of consumer research?

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“Despite the title proliferation, there is a shared DNA. Design Engineering lives at the intersection of visual design and front-end development. Not simply being good at both, but a distinct discipline focused on the space where design decisions meet technical implementation.”

The design engineer symptom: what a rising job title reveals →

AI for UX Design — Nearly 1,000 Designers Trained →
[Sponsored] Join designers from companies like Google, Microsoft, Adobe, and LinkedIn who have taken Designlab’s AI for UX Design program. Learn practical AI workflows across UX tasks, continuously updated as tools evolve. Next cohort starts April 17.

Editor picks

Who can actually afford AI tools now? →
They keep arriving with open arms and leaving with your wallet.

The mirage of UX Design’s demise keeps coming back →
Why do we declare endings when we don’t understand transitions?

Sorry, designers, we don’t decide the future of design →
How AI is forcing a renegotiation of what being a designer actually means.

The UX Collective is an independent design publication that elevates unheard design voices and helps designers think more critically about their work.

Fran Sans Essay →

Make me think

So where are all the AI apps? →
“So, skeptics reasonably ask, where are all the apps? If AI users are becoming (let’s be conservative) merely 2x more productive, then where do we look to see 2x more software being produced?”

The political use of operating systems →
“Choosing an operating system means not only choosing the stack of our virtual life, but it also means adopting a particular perspective, prioritizing certain needs and choosing the way we interact with technology.”

Some things just take time →
“Trees take quite a while to grow. If someone 50 years ago planted a row of oaks or a chestnut tree on your plot of land, you have something that no amount of money or effort can replicate. The only way is to wait. Tree-lined roads, old gardens, houses sheltered by decades of canopy: if you want to start fresh on an empty plot, you will not be able to get that.”

Little gems this week

What AI exposes about design →

When AI experiences fail, who is held accountable? →

You can’t design what you won’t maintain →

Tools and resources

Design career: The three thirds →
A third say it got better. A third say it got worse. A third aren’t sure.

Design systems in the age of AI →
What happens to the design system when AI changes the product?

Forget your “lovable” products →
The real leverage point was always learning.

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“I woke up this morning to see Figma stocks had plummeted by nearly 12% as a result of Google formally launching its Google Stitch AI design tool. I was in a 1:1 call with my manager today, and she was telling me about how she thinks something big is brewing. She was there during the rise of Figma when the majority of the design market was still using Sketch.”

Google says “Vibe Design” is here, but it didn’t pass my vibe check →

Introducing Mobbin for Animations →
[Sponsored] The world’s largest mobile & web design reference library just got better. See how world-class apps use motion to guide, delight, and create seamless experiences - now live on Mobbin.

Editor picks

The hidden cost of AI design tools →
What we’re outsourcing without noticing.

Forget your “lovable” products →
The real leverage point was always learning.

Could AI do designers a favour? →
The subtle ingredients behind “AI obsession.”

The UX Collective is an independent design publication that elevates unheard design voices and helps designers think more critically about their work.

Matchbook Book: the archive keeping a lost design legacy alight →

Make me think

How to make sense of AI →
“During times of upheaval, the attention economy creates large incentives for people to prey on fears in order to advance their followings. You should expect to see plenty of content that are perfectly tuned to go viral. All such content is for the author’s benefit, not yours.”

The 49MB web page →
“I went to the New York Times to glimpse at four headlines and was greeted with 422 network requests and 49 megabytes of data. It took two minutes before the page settled. And then you wonder why every sane tech person has an adblocker installed on systems of all their loved ones.”

The last quiet thing →
“Your thermostat has opinions now. Your television requires a login. Your car updates itself overnight, and sometimes when you start it in the morning, the interface has rearranged itself, as if someone broke in and reorganized your dashboard while you slept.”

Little gems this week

Are games really “dumbing down”? →

A designer’s field report on the Iconic blind spot in AI world models →

The first fruit of the Google-Apple AI pact →

Tools and resources

Design maturity guide →
How to level up design across your entire organization.

Context engineering →
A repeatable AI workflow for product designers.

Livable products →
Building digital products people want to live in.

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“At the end of February, a report by Citrini Research caused major shockwaves through the software industry, sending the stock prices of heavyweight SaaS organisations like Atlassian and Slack to nosedive. The Citrini Report follows AI’s current trajectory and projects that 2028 will bring a self-inflicted corporate doom loop: AI makes software so cheap to build that SaaS companies will cannibalise themselves out of business.”

The last interface →

Call for Entries: UX Design Awards – Autumn 2026 →
[Sponsored] Show the world what you’re made of! Submit your best work and earn international recognition for standout UX design. Get your projects in front of top industry experts and spotlight the creativity, craft, and impact of your design team.

Editor picks

Leading design teams is easy, but we made it complicated →
Presence, impact, and issues in tech companies.

Sycophancy: the emperor’s new clothes →
Why AI’s real danger isn’t hallucination—it’s agreement.

What we’re outsourcing without noticing →
The hidden cost of AI design tools.

The UX Collective is an independent design publication that elevates unheard design voices and helps designers think more critically about their work.

Grainrad: Free WebGPU-powered ASCII, dithering, and retro effects at 60fps →

Make me think

Designing AI experiences people actually use →
“For decades in SAAS, products reduced ambiguity. Users supplied constrained inputs, and the system handled the output. It’s never been Minority Report cinematic, but it was predictable. AI-first interfaces invert that sequence.”

Do AI-enabled companies need fewer people? →
“So something real is happening: startups are genuinely smaller than they used to be, even as they’re raising bigger seed and series A rounds. They’re also hiring more slowly as they grow, and in some cases they’re shrinking.”

I don’t know if my job will still exist in ten years →
“In 2026, I’m not sure the software engineering industry will survive another decade. If it does, I’m certain it’s going to change far more than it did in the last two decades. Maybe I’ll figure out a way to carve out a lucrative niche supervising AI agents, or maybe I’ll have to leave the industry entirely. Either way, the work I loved is going away.”

Little gems this week

The color statistic that’s been wrong for 80 years →

What happened to the car designed for women, by women? →

Design is not just how it works. Design is how it wins. →

Tools and resources

Accessibility testing takes more than a scan →
What automated tools can’t catch.

Things that don’t matter when you write →
Extensive experience and “new” ideas are among them.

Building digital products people want to live in →
Good UX decisions can still add up to bad experiences.

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“In the last week of February 2026, something unusual happened. A sitting US president took to social media to brand a private technology company a political threat. The Secretary of Defense designated that same company a supply chain risk, a classification previously reserved for foreign adversaries. And hours later, a rival AI lab swooped in and took the government contract that had just been refused.”

Product ethics have never mattered more →

Introducing Mobbin for Animations →
[Sponsored] The world’s largest mobile & web design reference library just got better. See how world-class apps use motion to guide, delight, and create seamless experiences—now live on Mobbin.

Editor picks

The designer’s dilemma →
Made to create, learning to curate.

The AI adoption theatre →
When innovation becomes performance.

Designing at the edge of AI harm →
A call to reclaim our practice.

The UX Collective is an independent design publication that elevates unheard design voices and helps designers think more critically about their work.

Obys’ Design Books: titles that show design in ways the screen never could →

Make me think

Nobody gets promoted for simplicity →
“I think there’s something quietly screwing up a lot of engineering teams. In interviews, in promotion packets, in design reviews: the engineer who overbuilds gets a compelling narrative, but the one who ships the simplest thing that works gets… nothing.”

A design turn →
“Designers are anxious. Layoffs have not let up, AI has seemingly trivialized our magic skill of making things, and practicing designers describe the assembly-style nature of software design as soul-crushing.”

Are AI productivity gains fueled by delivery pressure? →
“That gap between “looking done” and “being right” is exactly where the extra professional pressure begins to mount. This is really caused by the way we still measure knowledge worker productivity - by the sheer number of artifacts they produce, rather than the outcomes of the work.”

Little gems this week

You’re still designing for an architecture that no longer exists →

The world’s cheapest compliment →

When design teams get rid of writers, nobody wins →

Tools and resources

User personas of consequence →
Using the ICF framework to improve your user personas.

How to show value →
Want people to pay for your stuff?

Integrating UX into capacity planning →
How to take control of your workload.

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“I’m a firm believer in Josef Müller-Brockmann’s principles of designing with intentionality. At the same time, I’ve watched the same demos Shumer has. I’ve felt that initial rush of adrenaline when viewing the insane capabilities of each AI model, with each release dropping my jaw to the floor.

But after hundreds of hours of actual implementation, the reality looks a lot more like a shifting burden.

We are mistaking the speed of generation for the speed of completion.”

Something big “might” be happening →

Introducing: Industry’s First Agentic AI Search for Research →
[Sponsored] Your company is sitting on years of customer feedback and research. Getting answers from it shouldn’t take weeks. Marvin’s Agentic Ask AI sends specialized agents to investigate, debate, and return cited answers in minutes. Get a demo.

Editor picks

When building is free, what’s worth building? →
AI coding tools are rewriting who gets to make software.

No, VR can’t make you walk in others’ shoes →
The shallowness of the “empathy machine.”

Surveillance by default, consent by assumption →
The challenge with consumer security products.

The UX Collective is an independent design publication that elevates unheard design voices and helps designers think more critically about their work.

Letters to a young creator →

Make me think

Design docs considered harmful →
“Ask yourself how many design docs at your company get updated after implementation starts. If the doc were genuinely useful as a design tool, you’d update it as you learn. Nobody does. The doc’s job was never to guide the implementation. Its job was to get sign-off.”

How I’m dealing with the pressure to adopt AI as a designer →
“You wouldn’t adopt a new approach or tool without being sure it had a positive outcome for your work. AI is no different, and it doesn’t get a free pass just because the discourse is louder.”

If code is cheap, intent is the currency →
“When an agent can produce hundreds of lines in minutes, and the engineer driving that agent can have fairly minimal involvement in the actual writing of the code, the intent of the change becomes the most important factor in communicating what that code is for, why it exists, and how it fits into the larger project.”

Little gems this week

Field study: prototypes over mockups →

The craft of the instruction →

A love letter to the Pokédex →

Tools and resources

Building for agents →
Your users aren’t human anymore.

UX questionnaires →
Is it rocket science?

Agentic UX →
7 principles for designing systems with agents.

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“Prototypes are no longer as special as they once were. They’re now the bare minimum.

But this speed comes with limitations. Many AI-generated prototypes are never meant to survive past the moment they’re validated. They do their job in a meeting or a user test, but then they’re rebuilt by engineering or even trashed. But the prototypes didn’t “fail,” they were just created with a different intention and outcome.”

The hidden cost of AI prototypes that are made to die →

Introducing Mobbin for Animations →
[Sponsored] The world’s largest mobile & web design reference library just got better. See how world-class apps use motion to guide, delight, and create seamless experiences - now live on Mobbin.

Editor picks

Escaping the ennui in UI →
How vibedesign created a vicious slope of AI slop.

Your research tools got smarter… Did you? →
Which side of the line you’re standing on.

Get behind me, AI writer →
A reverse-engineered drafting process that keeps humans in charge.

The UX Collective is an independent design publication that elevates unheard design voices and helps designers think more critically about their work.

Li Wang captures life, love, and longing in color →

Make me think

Life after Figma is coming (and it will be glorious) →
“As engineers speed up the bottleneck in any given product team is being felt further up the stack in the design team. In modern teams it’s no longer acceptable for a designer to spend 2 weeks in their mind palace creating the perfect UI.”

Design systems are today’s cure and tomorrow’s cause of shitty software →
“A new kind of claustrophobia has kicked in now. Software ships across countless platforms and device types. UI frameworks are all but considered mandatory. There are layers and layers of complexity that make 2005 feel like a kindergartner’s naive daydream. Managing the complexity of “modern” software takes considerable focus. And focus doesn’t grow on trees.”

Design is dead, it’s all evolution now →
“There was a time when products were designed with intent. Sections were organized into a hierarchy, features were given logical places. You could feel a system behind the product: what parts it consists of, how screens are organized, what kinds of data it has. Users didn’t analyze it consciously, but it helped them navigate and gave them a sense of control.”

Little gems this week

OpenAI: from ads to content →

Getting carried away: When intelligence is replaced by compliance →

The tribal myths of leadership →

Tools and resources

How design leads are using AI →
The 80% job.

Including citizens in the design process →
Field notes on trust and shared agency.

Prototypes over mockups →
A practical guide to designing with code in 2026.

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“It might be a sign of changing times and of our industry, it might be a marketing push from the companies betting big on AI. I don’t know. But there seems to be a sort of urgency for something new. For speed. For freedom. For paving a new path. For simplicity. For flexibility. A push for something else rather than Design Thinking as the standard design process.”

The natural design process →

What 200+ designers revealed about AI in 2026 →
[Sponsored] Designlab surveyed 200+ UX and product designers to understand how AI is shaping real workflows — from research and ideation to prototyping and delivery. See which tools are gaining traction, the biggest challenges teams face, and what’s actually working in practice. See the full findings.

Editor picks

When AI passes the capitalist Turing test →
AI was meant to augment human intelligence.

Innovation is not magic; it’s technique →
Will your product change the world?

The design vibeshift →
Code is becoming our new canvas.

The UX Collective is an independent design publication that elevates unheard design voices and helps designers think more critically about their work.

David Jonathan Ross’s glyph navigator →

Make me think

Saying “no” In an age of abundance →
“But wait, we have AI now. We don’t have to say no to 1,000 things. We can say yes to all the things — generate them all, simultaneously!”

The software sovereignty scale →
“Digital sovereignty depends less on where software comes from and more on who controls it. This post introduces a scale showing which technologies can never be taken away.”

Is there too much design in design systems? →
“Which raises an uncomfortable question: if the industry is hiring three designers for every engineer, who’s actually implementing all this design work?”

Little gems this week

AI’s text-trap: Moving towards a more interactive future →

Bringing buttons back: rethinking how smart your smartphone should be →

Jony Ive, Ferrari, and love of design →

Tools and resources

Designing useful ads →
AI utility + digital advertising.

What design leaders must unlearn →
The path to designing for AI.

Emotional design →
Let’s design for silence.

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“You likely know, or at the very least know of, a designer who just gets it. I’m talking about the designer who solves complex problems with elegant, user-centered, buildable solutions without breaking a sweat. Or maybe that designer who turns everything they touch into something genuinely beautiful. Or even the one who gets up on a stage and says what we’re all thinking more clearly and eloquently than we can. Maybe all three. Love or irrationally hate them, there they are, making the things that you struggle with daily look easy. You look skyward and wonder, What is it they have that I don’t?”

The return of the intuitive designer in the age of AI →

Introducing Mobbin for Animations →
[Sponsored] The world’s largest mobile & web design reference library just got better. See how world class apps use motion to guide, delight, and create seamless experiences - now live on Mobbin.

Editor picks

Specialize or generalize? →
Design careers in the age of AI.

Why your brain rebels against redesigns →
The redesign tested well. Users hate it anyway.

The safest decision is rarely the right one →
Trusting judgement without ignoring evidence.

The UX Collective is an independent design publication that elevates unheard design voices and helps designers think more critically about their work.

Alt text selfies →

Make me think

How to shoot a screen using a board of keys →
“Everybody who routinely takes screenshots on a Mac knows very well the motor memory heaven and hell that are the screenshotting shortcuts: ⌘⇧3 to grab the whole screen, ⌘⇧4 to grab part of it, hold ⌃ ahead of time to put the result in the clipboard, press space at the right moment to select a window, hold ⌥ at a different time to remove a shadow, and so on. (Yes, there’s more.)”

The displacement of purpose →
“When work begins to vanish, what disappears first is not income—it is rhythm. The small rituals that gave shape to a day—waking, commuting, exchanging fragments of conversation—are not merely logistical. They are choreography, a social heartbeat that affirms one’s current place in the collective. Even unfulfilling work provides orientation; it punctuates time.”

Why am I doing the thinking for you? →
“I got a Slack message the other week, just “What do you think?” with a link to a Notion document. No context or indication of what this person actually believed. Just a link and a question mark. I stared at it for a minute, trying to decide if I was annoyed or just tired (both, probably). What’s this message is actually saying is: “I haven’t figured this out yet and I’d like you to do the thinking for me.”

Little gems this week

Lost for words: why text in AI images still goes wrong →

Nothing is certain — not even the “right” design process →

The art of unnecessary story →

Tools and resources

The new UX Toolkit →
Data, context, and evals.

Test smart →
How to navigate through dilemmas as QA?

The AI delegation matrix →
What parts of your UI shouldn’t exist?

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“Hey team, can we use AI to help here?

The question dropped into the Slack channel before the user research summary. Before the problem was clearly defined. Before anyone asked if users actually needed this feature.

Your product manager already generated three interface options in ChatGPT. Now they’re asking which one to build. Not whether to build. Not why to build. Which.

And when you slow the conversation down to ask those questions, you’re about to discover that strategic thinking now reads as bottleneck behavior.”

When design stops asking why and starts asking: can AI do it? →

The Sidebar Newsletter: 5 design links a day, nothing else →

Editor picks

Vibe prototyping is a double-edged sword →
It’s so fun we forget what prototypes are for.

Going analog in 2026 →
Can UX coexist with analog living?

Beyond the waterfall state →
Why missions need a different decision-making architecture.

The UX Collective is an independent design publication that elevates unheard design voices and helps designers think more critically about their work.

Visualrambling: just a place to ramble visually →

Make me think

Sometimes your job is to stay the hell out of the way →
”I have tried and completely failed to build a Wolf-like role within two different companies. I used different approaches and different framing in each attempt, but each was a failure. Existing Wolves were, at best, distracted from their work and, at worst, left the company because they felt like I’d forced them into management.”

CTA hierarchy in the wild →
“Hyperlinks are subversive. Big Tech must protect themselves and their interests. But now it seems like everywhere I go, software is increasingly designed against me..”

Privacy is a value we can lose →
“Sometimes, I think about the fact that society at large could just stop caring about data protection and privacy, and there goes everything that I worked towards and am passionate about. Humbling.”

Little gems this week

Giraffe, muppet, or human? →

The rise of the Orchestrated User Interface (OUI) →

The quiet normalization of dark patterns →

Tools and resources

AR/VR vibe coding →
Prototyping immersive reality with AI.

Are we doing UX for AI the right way? →
How chatbot-first thinking makes products harder for users.

Designing AR that listens →
A longer tale from the camera front lines.

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“This is simply a mismatch between how UI is generated in AI tools and how products are actually built. So instead of avoiding constraints such as branding and data, they need to be integrated into the generation process. This way, the UI becomes more valuable and can be used to continue to iterate past a demo or proof of concept (POC) phase.”

What makes generated UI worth keeping? →

Introducing Mobbin for Animations →
[Sponsored] The world’s largest mobile & web design reference library just got better. See how world class apps use motion to guide, delight, and create seamless experiences - now live on Mobbin.

Editor picks

What if AI lies about you? →
How do we correct misinformation before it spreads?

Building a ChatGPT app →
Field notes from a non-technical builder.

A thinking problem →
Today’s organisations don’t have an AI problem.

The UX Collective is an independent design publication that elevates unheard design voices and helps designers think more critically about their work.

The hardest working font in Manhattan →

Make me think

Software as clay on the wheel →
“Why? Because carrying everything with you all the time is a great way to stop getting anywhere. If you’re going to work on a problem for hundreds of iterations, things start to pile up. As tokens accumulate, the signal can get lost in noise. By flushing context between iterations and storing state in files, each run can start clean.”

On coding agents and the future of design →
“Recently, many non-developers, myself included, have found that using Claude Code with files locally can be an incredibly effective way to get work done. My social feed is filled with people sharing their use cases: setting the agent to work on an Obsidian vault, managing email and calendars, finally getting value from smart home devices.”

Creating your own opportunities →
“Two things, though. One, complaining about it probably isn’t going to change much. Two, even the best manager in the world can only do so much for you. And sometimes, they just have a big, boring project that you need to do that won’t do much for your career, but it needs to be done anyway.”

Little gems this week

Feelings are the new features →

How I stopped worrying and learned to love the terminal →

Why Instagram’s ad breaks feel worse than ads →

Tools and resources

How top companies use AI →
Using AI in UX design, Interactions, Motion, & Marketing.

Hyperlegible Sans →
A free, open-source font for accessible design.

Design tokens with confidence →
Why the W3C design token standard is your new foundation.

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“In 2025, AI-assisted building closed this chasm. Translating how software should work was never the hard part for designers. Translating that understanding into code was. AI didn’t lower the bar; it removed it.”

Designers as agent orchestrators: what I learnt shipping with AI in 2025 →

AI Prototyping Camp — Starts Jan 27 →
[Sponsored] Learn to prototype faster with AI in this hands-on workshop series for designers and PMs. Explore AI-assisted flows and rapid iteration using tools like Figma Make and Lovable.

Editor picks

The case for the uncertain AI →
Why chatbots should say “I’m not sure.”

We made it all complicated →
Building technology products is easy.

Why design systems fail to resolve disagreements →
How design lost the ability to evaluate work.

The UX Collective is an independent design publication that elevates unheard design voices and helps designers think more critically about their work.

Very Good Components: a curated collection →

Make me think

Software as fast fashion →
“This is exactly where we are with software now. We are turning software into fast fashion. Because “AI”. (…) This is often framed as liberation: Every human being can now have the software tool they want. Without having to learn to code or without having to ask someone else. You think it, you get it.”

The invisible work →
“I am generally curious about the concept of legibility of work. Look around in your workplace. You can find documents, messages, presentations, design files. Evidence of people’s work. While it may look like a lot, there is a whole other type of work that is very hard to see. The invisible work.”

Don’t fall into the anti-AI hype →
“It does not matter if AI companies will not be able to get their money back and the stock market will crash. All that is irrelevant, in the long run. It does not matter if this or the other CEO of some unicorn is telling you something that is off putting, or absurd. Programming changed forever, anyway.”

Little gems this week

A green book for AI apps →

Usability heuristics and competition in games →

How reading patterns have changed →

Tools and resources

Cursor: the new design tool →
Designing with AI-readable design systems.

Beyond chat →
8 core user intents driving AI interaction.

How UX directly impacts P&L →
Converting product value into business revenue.

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“AI is now omnipresent in our workflows, but it’s come at a cost: a sea of sameness. Lately, products have begun to look and feel homogeneous & indistinguishable, leading to diluted brands and increasingly sterile interactions. Big tech paves the way for others to follow; It’s time to stop settling for “good enough” and blindly following established conventions. Let’s continue to solve user problems and challenge the attitudes of an MVP (Minimum Viable Product) through the use of craft.”

Escaping AI sludge: why MVPs should be delightful →

Introducing Mobbin for Animations →
[Sponsored] The world’s largest mobile & web design reference library just got better. See how world class apps use motion to guide, delight, and create seamless experiences—now live on Mobbin.

Editor picks

When your best work gets tossed →
Why do we still lose every budget fight?

How the tools we use change the products we design →
The medium is the message.

Why you can’t fix your iPhone →
And how the entire tech industry learned to profit from it.

The UX Collective is an independent design publication that elevates unheard design voices and helps designers think more critically about their work.

Itshover: static icons feel dead now →

Make me think

The Moylan arrow: IA lessons for AI-powered experiences →
“The Moylan arrow is such an obviously useful idea that it was immediately implemented by Ford and widely adopted by other manufacturers. It’s also an excellent example of good information architecture — and one that provides important lessons as we navigate the AI age.”

Ideas are cheap, execution is cheaper →
“Remember when coming up with a great idea was the easy part? Ideas were worthless. What was valuable was the commitment. The grit. The planning, the technical prowess, the unwavering ability to think night and day about a product, a problem space, incessantly obsessing, unsatisfied until you had some semblance of a working solution. It took hustle, brain power, studying, iteration, failures. LLMs have shattered this long-held truth into a million pieces.”

It’s hard to justify Tahoe icons →
“Fast forward to 2025. Apple releases macOS Tahoe. Main attraction? Adding unpleasant, distracting, illegible, messy, cluttered, confusing, frustrating icons (their words, not mine!) to every menu item.”

Little gems this week

UX in board game design →

Beyond conversations: natural language as interaction influencer →

The Apple-Sony special relationship →

Tools and resources

Figma Make prompts, with real examples →
What actually goes into a good prompt.

UX Research safety →
Post‑COVID user research needs a revised safeguarding plan.

UX Research in the age of LLMs →
Define quality, guide prompts, and shape the value of AI outputs.

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“To understand this moment, we must contextualise AI within the history of artistic tools and conceptual shifts, while simultaneously confronting the very real socio-economic and ethical challenges it poses to the creative ecosystem.”

The algorithmic atelier →

Learn to Vibe Code in 2026 →
[Sponsored] AI tools are changing what it means to be a builder. In this hands-on workshop series, designers and PMs learn to prototype and ship faster using tools like Cursor, Supabase, Vercel, and more. Save $100 with the inaugural cohort.

Editor picks

What I learned from Don Norman →
From HCD to HCD+.

Reliability by design →
Designing trustworthy AI for healthcare products.

The UX Collective is an independent design publication that elevates unheard design voices and helps designers think more critically about their work.

Vibe coding a bookshelf with Claude Code →

Make me think

My role as a founder CTO: year eight →
“There are courses promising millions if you learn to build apps, turning app development into what drop shipping was a few years ago. We were forced to quickly adapt and expand our definition of developer. We went from helping developers make more money, to helping apps make more money, and eventually to helping vibe coders make more money.”

Fall in love with your new reality →
“Sometimes our role in life isn’t to judge something – it is to figure out how to fall in love with it, especially when it becomes part of our new reality. The other day, I was in a conversation where someone was describing their new commute. The question that came up was, ‘Do you like it?’ And of course, the natural instinct is to evaluate it: I don’t like this part, I don’t like that part, etc.”

How to design for (and with) Deaf people →
“Deafness spans a broad continuum, from minor to profound hearing loss. Around 90–95% of deaf people come from hearing families, and deafness often isn’t merely a condition that people are born with. It frequently occurs due to exposure to loud noises, and it also emerges with age, disease, and accidents.”

Little gems this week

Escaping AI sludge →

Design for the nose →

The history of radial menus in video games →

Tools and resources

Vibe code for PMs →
Leveraging AI to build stronger product requirements.

A NanoBanana with color theory →
Using Gemini to build an Accessible Perceptual Uniform Triad.

10 UX design shifts →
Trends you can’t ignore in 2026.

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“I never decided to go all in on AI, it just kept showing up. (…)

I wasn’t forced. I didn’t plan it. It was just inevitable. When you get a sharp knife, you don’t keep cutting with the blunt one. But somewhere along the way, I started noticing that this knife could slip.”

A sharp tool can still ruin the cut →

Start 2026 with practical AI skills for UX Designers →
[Sponsored] Learn how real UX and product designers are using AI in this 4-week, mentor-led course built for working designers. Our January 2026 cohort has a few seats remaining — download the syllabus for more info.

Editor picks

Stop worrying so much about AI →
Worry about how to work with people.

Technology as a design material →
Designing with sensors.

Design leaders need to jam with their teams →
How business management killed craft apprenticeship.

The UX Collective is an independent design publication that elevates unheard design voices and helps designers think more critically about their work.

A sound wave typography system for Maple’s voice AI research →

Make me think

A year of vibes →
“It’s also important to know that some of the vibes come with intentional signalling. Plenty of people whose views you can find online have a financial interest in one product over another, for instance because they are investors in it or they are paid influencers. They might have become investors because they liked the product, but it’s also possible that their views are affected and shaped by that relationship.”

You can’t opt out of accessibility →
“Accessibility is everyone’s responsibility, always. It should be baked into every part of the process. From the initial concepts to the design to the development, through to testing, it is as much a part of building something as ‘building something’. Accessibility should be ingrained in every fibre of every step, process, and output such that it is inseparable. You can’t bake a cake without flour and expect to add it later.”

They have to be able to talk about us without us →
“That vital task of communicating to a large group gets even more daunting when you inevitably realize that, even if you were to find the perfect wording or phrasing for your message, you’d still never be able to deliver your story to every single person in your target audience by yourself anyway.”

Little gems this week

A product manager’s 48 reflections on 2025 →

A UX carol →

Contrails and tiny text will probably kill us →

Tools and resources

Error messages →
A guide for people who never write.

The designer’s playbook for AI products →
Research, case studies, and experiments.

Leaning into the quiet →
Healthier conversations, meetings, and collaboration.

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“In our current AI hype cycle, there is a feverish hope that AI will save us. The point of view is that AI will make us more efficient, effective, and resilient, and in some instances, this will be true. On the other hand, the pessimist (bearish) point of view is that AI is also reducing human input, eliminating thinking roles, and concentrating wealth and power. The sentiment that AI will kill us all.

How bearish or bullish you are with AI depends on your focal length. So let’s focus on what makes it all work.”

Keep making (AI will not save you) →

Sidebar.io: 5 design links a day to keep the doctor away →

Editor picks

Why AI is exposing design’s craft crisis →
The technical literacy gap that’s been eroding us for a while.

So your AI wants a personality →
Emerging personality patterns that drive differentiation.

What is design when you barely have time to do it? →
A brief reminder and a hard reset during existential times.

The UX Collective is an independent design publication that elevates unheard design voices and helps designers think more critically about their work.

Designing Gotham →

Make me think

Ideas aren’t getting harder to find →
“Fifty years ago, productivity growth in advanced economies began to slow down. Productivity growth — the component of GDP growth that is not due to increases in labor and capital — is the primary driver of rising incomes. When it slows, so does economic growth as a whole. This makes it an urgent trend to understand. Unfortunately, the most popular explanation for why it’s happening might be wrong.”

What’s going on here, with this human? →
“My goal in this essay is to help others make better decisions on a potential hire, business partner, or even life partner as quickly and as accurately as possible. It’s made up of suggested action steps and some of the ruminations that underlie them. At the end I include my own assessment of different personality assessments and some of my go-to interview and reference questions.”

What actually makes you senior →
“People love to describe senior engineers with a big checklist: architecture, communication, ownership, leadership, etc. But if you strip away the title, the salary, and the years of experience, there’s one core skill that separates senior+ engineers from everyone else: reducing ambiguity. Everything else flows from that.”

Little gems this week

Designing the 3 layers of AI context →

Design wrapped 2025: a year of meaningful friction →

The most undervalued skill in product: knowing when not to optimize →

Tools and resources

3 color contrast mistakes →
WCAG color contrast is more than just text.

Product delighters →
The UX moments people remember and share.

Lowering the surprise →
How to apply the free energy principle to UX.

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“To navigate is to read the world in order to move through it, whether it means scanning a crowd to find a familiar face, deciphering the logic of a bookstore’s layout, or following the stars at sea. This ability has always been mediated by tools (many of them disruptive and transformative). Still, the rise of artificial intelligence presents us with a radical promise: a world where we no longer need maps, because the information or the product ‘comes to us.’

Faced with this transformation, this essay begins with a central question: Is AI truly eliminating navigation, or is it simply shifting its agent and its form?”

A new navigation paradigm →

Collaborate better with your Design System →
[Sponsored] Low adoption, scattered teams, unclear ownership? Learn how to unify designers, PMs, and engineers with Netguru’s Design Systems Ebook — a practical guide to scaling systems across your organization.

Editor picks

Silicon clay →
How AI is reshaping UX design.

Most AIUX is just search with extra steps? →
AI products are still a fancier text box.

The business is the only stakeholder →
UX and Market Research should start working together.

The UX Collective is an independent design publication that elevates unheard design voices and helps designers think more critically about their work.

The barcode as a design object →

Make me think

Public design systems are worth it →
“Now let’s fast forward. The marketplace went bankrupt. Sharing ideas for the sake of sharing? How quaint. We’re very much in the, “what’s in it for me?” phase of the web. I’m not mad–I’m disappointed. Ok, fine, I’m a little mad. But this seems to be the cycle. To quote Eric Hoffer: “Every great cause begins as a movement, becomes a business, and eventually degenerates into a racket.”

What does it mean to be a designer in the age of AI? →
“The scope of what designers, developers, and product managers do is expanding, and the boundaries between them are blurring. As workflows shift, a bigger question emerges: What happens to job titles—and the ways of working and sense of identity that comes with them?”

Holes in the web →
“For many people, GenAI is becoming their primary way to learn about the world. (…)These systems may appear neutral, but they are far from it. The most popular models privilege dominant epistemologies (typically Western and institutional) while marginalising alternative ways of knowing, especially those encoded in oral traditions, embodied practice and the languages considered ‘low-resource’ in the computing world, such as Hindi or Swahili, both spoken by hundreds of millions.”

Little gems this week

ChatGPT talks too much and it’s ruining learning →

The dark pattern that cost Amazon $2.5 billion →

Is there such a thing as mindful scrolling? →

Tools and resources

AI coding tools →
Addressing the design-engineering gap.

The slow death of magic →
Why feature bloat kills products.

Building a haptic feedback vocabulary →
iOS Haptics system from design to code.

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“We have a big choice to make: we’re about to jump into a new era of technology — meaning different values, expectations, and powers — and we need to choose what it looks like.*1 The transition itself is unavoidable, but the details are up to us.

Today we must choose between a) a future where our software environment has a thought-shaped interface on top of all the old kludge, or b) a future where software is built from the ground up to represent our thoughts, not twist or control them.”

We are entering the era of thought-shaped software →

Scale without chaos: Penpot’s native token workflow →
[Sponsored] Penpot is the only design tool with fully native design tokens—no plugins, no workarounds—plus real interoperability for design systems. Scale with confidence, and speed up design-to-code workflows across every product in your organization.

Editor picks

Unfit for uncertainty →
Rethinking decision-making for missions.

Designing for signals →
How intent & instrumentation shape AI experiences.

Sigma (Σ) shaped designers →
Why the AI era requires a different type of skillset.

The UX Collective is an independent design publication that elevates unheard design voices and helps designers think more critically about their work.

A dozen years of Work & Co →

Make me think

We should all be Luddites →
“For the past two centuries, invoking the term “Luddites” was shorthand for technological backwardness or fear of innovation—a sneer aimed at anyone who dared question the march of progress. But the real Luddites weren’t afraid of machines; they were afraid of the social and economic impacts of the new technology on people—and of who controlled the terms of technological change.”

Own a graph →
“One of the quickest ways to get better at your job is to own a graph. There are many ways to do work that don’t matter and there are many ways to do work that matters but fail to articulate that value well. Owning a graph solves both of these problems.”

Systems, stables and stars →
“You know how large organizations with very mature systems and talent distribution still end up pulling in the same top 5 or 10 people to work on their most pressing problems?”

Little gems this week

Biophilic design is the wellness revolution happening all around us →

The UX behind screen time guilt →

The product designer’s lens →

Tools and resources

Figma’s new DS features →
What do Figma’s updates mean for Design Systems?

Design maturity →
Why you need it and how to get it.

Designing decisions →
Behavioral psychology that moves users.

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“A critique is not a governance mechanism, nor is it a group brainstorming session. It’s a necessary collision. It’s the intentional application of adversarial thought to something that isn’t finished yet. Its sole purpose is to pressure-test the underlying assumptions. Ultimately, critiques are about injecting constructive doubt into a designer’s premature certainty before they build too much or go too far.”

Critique: on elevating craft through critical thinking →

office.to.design - Import any office document as fully editable Figma designs →
[Sponsored] Convert Word docs, PowerPoint presentations, Apple Keynote and more office documents into Figma designs.

Editor picks

Human engineering →
Doing the right thing should be easy.

Is there such thing as Product Design? →
The value of Design in a product organization.

Mandated screen addiction = undemocratic design →
There is a contradiction in digitalization.

The UX Collective is an independent design publication that elevates unheard design voices and helps designers think more critically about their work.

Color palette pro: customizable palettes in advanced color spaces →

Make me think

Is AI really eating the world? →
“Generative AI appears to be the next platform shift, or it could break the cycle entirely. The range of outcomes spans from “just more software” to a single unified intelligence that handles everything. The pattern recognition is smart, but I think the current evidence points more clearly toward commoditization than Evans suggests, with value flowing up the stack rather than to model providers.”

The Rosetta Stone of design engineering →
“I’ve always imagined design and engineering as two rails on the same track. They run in parallel, supposedly toward the same product, but they rarely sit at the same spot. Design debt on one side, tech debt on the other, shifting priorities somewhere ahead, and the occasional giant ‘wait what are we building again?’ boulder in the middle.”

To be a leader of systems →
“Firstly, you need to hold in your head the knowledge that you will probably–no, almost certainly–fail. You will need to hold that uncomfortableness in your heart and carry it with you always. Never to share, but always to hold. Ground yourself in the impossibilities of what you’ll attempt, lest your hubris lead you to ruin.”

Little gems this week

Locksmith stickers are annoying, but kind of genius →

Florence Nightingale on vanity metrics →

Dawn of the undead peripheral →

Tools and resources

A conversation on HMI design →
A series of thought pieces on UI design beyond mobile phones.

Accessibility lessons →
What an accessibility conference taught me about designing for all.

Invisible users →
The people our design processes forget

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