Designers: 15 UX & UI Tools To Increase Your Productivity

If you find yourself spending way too much time prototyping your next big design, you may need to take a step back and evaluate the tools and resources you have at hand. There is no reason to stick to the same wireframing or prototyping tool when new and improved UX tools and UI resources are added ever so often on the Web. Work faster, better and smatter with more powerful tools and fresher UI kits.

To help you with that, we have here 15 UX and UI tools that are great for prototyping. Some of them carry drag-and-drop functionalities and powerful team collaboration features, while others contain great resources for testing your design’s usability within the development phase and in some cases, in real-time.

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Proto.io

You can create your prototypes on the browser via drag-and-drop and zero-code with Proto.io, and on top of that apply multiple touch and mouse events to any UI element. Proto.io also carries one of the most realistic and useful interactive UI libraries you will find in any prototyping tool. Test your prototype on an actual device and discuss your design-related info with team members with its collaboration tool.

Pidoco

Create clickable wireframes quickly and easily with Picodo’s drag-and-drop feature, then create, edit and share an unlimited number of wireframe mockups or prototypes with team members and clients in real time. Its powerful feedback and discussion functions makes for great and easy collaboration. Save your customized templates for reuse later on, and test your prototypes on your favorite mobile devices.

Vonn Mobile Material Design UI Kit

The Vonn Material Design UI Kit by Visual Hierarchy features 100 beautiful drag-and-drop UI templates in 8 categories, all perfect for creating Android apps. The templates are designed at 1920×1080 pixels to provide a perfect fit on a mobile device. No coding needed. The Vonn UI Kit is fully compatible with Google’s material design guidelines for style and layout.

AppCooker

With the advanced features AppCooker brings to the table, you will save time, money, and impress your clients, while designing and sharing beautiful iPhone and iPad mockups through the use of native iOS widgets. Don’t have the time to create a mockup from scratch? Then, AppCooker is the app for you.

Firefly

Firefly is a highly practical app development tool that features a useful combination of design, data management, and collaboration functions, great for organizations with widely dispersed development teams. With Firefly, it is possible to upload mockups, app designs, images, and even entire web pages during the design process. This tool has the ability to manage multiple design versions, while allowing collaborators to be brought into the picture at any time during the design process for information sharing purposes.

InVision

InVision provides a prototyping, collaboration, and workflow platform suitable for applications in a design-driven environment. It easily and rapidly transforms static screens into interactive prototypes. Its drag-and-drop functionality makes rapid prototyping during any development phase. The information features that have been incorporated into this tool make real-time design presentation, collaboration, and conveniently-displayed feedback a reality.

User Testing

User Testing is a user research platform that can be used to test either released or unreleased mobile apps on iOS and Android devices. User Testing will design a test for you, or you can design a test yourself. You can run the test in minutes, and have the results within an hour. The cool thing about this is that feedback is not only in the form of metrics but also videos of real people commenting on the usability of your app.

Prott

Prott is a powerful rapid prototyping and collaboration tool especially designed for creating mobile apps. Graphics, sketches, and images can easily be animated, screens can be sync’ed together, and the resulting prototype can be previewed on a real device and shared with team members for collective feedback. iOS and Android screen resolutions and sizes are fully supported.

Optimizely

Optimizely is an optimization platform offering fast and powerful A/B testing for mobile apps. A visual editor allows visual changes to be made to your app in real time and on the fly without waiting for App Store review, no matter how customized it may be. A single line of code, generated by Optimizely, and inserted into your HTML is the only coding that is necessary.

Notism

Notism features a UX capability that allows design events and progress to be shared with remarkable ease, and in real time. This translates into more rapid design iterations, less time required for sign-offs, and a streamlined usability testing process. The most significant feature Notism brings to the table is the capability to collaborate with others by video, a feature regarded by some as a true game-changer.

PowerMockup

PowerMockup is a useful prototyping tool that features a unique twist. This tool provides the necessary wireframing templates and functionality, but it enables the actual wireframing to be done on PowerPoint. This makes it possible for end users and non-technical participants to more easily follow the design process. PowerMockup iterates and redefines designs in real time, while remaining focused on the usability of the end product.

Usability Tools

Usability Tools provides two sets of useful tools to test the usability of your app. One set identifies usability issues on the fly, and tells you which features of your app draws the attention of your visitors and which features that are ignored. The second set provides user feedback relating to the look and feel of your app. Both sets offer a variety of testing options.

Antetype

Antetype was developed by UI designers and provides all the tools you need to design rich, hi-fidelity prototypes. More than 400 widgets are available for all major platforms, but you still have the option to add additional widgets, including your own. Integrated interaction and annotation features allow you to demonstrate ongoing design work, and make comments and feedback available to team members and stakeholders.