What is Interaction Design?

This is a question that a lot of people ask. Interaction design focuses on designing our everyday interaction with apps, websites and various systems. An interaction is what happens when you open the door or hit that Browser icon on your smartphone. It is a huge part of the overall user experience. 
 

Interaction designers are often confused with graphic designers because both tend to work on user interfaces. Interaction design is however more concerned with how apps, websites and systems work and communicate with users; instead of looks or aesthetics. It is the interaction designer’s job to design systems so that they feel intuitive to whoever is using them.

For this they use a wide variety of different design methods. Popular methods include card sorting, storyboarding, prototyping and user testing.

Interaction can happen with a wide variety of signs, texts, sounds, gestures and figures; and also with devices such as mice, keyboards, controllers and different types of screens.

There are a lot more possibilities out there, but these are perhaps the most common ones. Interaction is always a two-way street. It can happen both from users to devices and vice versa.
 

Why interaction design is needed

The goal of interaction design is designing systems, apps and websites that are stress-free, natural and intuitive to use. Great user experience lets users concentrate on their main goals when using them, be it for work or entertainment.   

Usually interaction designers are in charge of the user experience, but there are also cases where the role of an IxD is handled by a graphic designer or even a developer.

It is not uncommon to see interaction designers fill other roles. Our interaction designers all have different backgrounds and depending on the project they might also be in the shoes of an information architect, accessibility and user testing specialist, user researcher or a graphic designer.

If you want to learn more about interaction design then make sure to read our other articles. You can also join our UX meetups. Follow us on Facebook to get the freshest news about our events and conferences.