5 Things UX Engineers Can Do that (Most) Regular UX Designers Can't

UX engineers are an emerging hybrid in the tech world, blending a UX designer’s creativity and intuition for great user experiences with the technical acumen of a developer.

You might ask, why opt for a UX engineer when you simply could hire specialized UX designers and developers?

It might seem logical to prefer dedicated specialists for their depth of knowledge in their respective fields, but the value of a UX engineer lies in their ability to navigate both worlds and the bigger picture, offering solutions that neither traditional engineers nor designers can foresee on their own.

Here are five things UX engineers can do that your average UX designer can’t:

1. Ensure the Dev Team Correctly Implements Design Requirements

When designs transition from concept to implementation, the nuanced details of design and user experience can sometimes get lost or altered due to technical constraints or misinterpretations. When a UX engineer is on the team, they can switch over from the design to the dev team during the hand off. Their ability to understand both the language of design and the specifics of coding allows them to communicate effectively with developers, clarifying the design requirements and making sure the final product stays true to the original design vision.

2. Integrate Technical Considerations Like Query/API Architecture and Auth into the UX Design Process

UX engineers have a deep understanding of the technical landscape that impacts the frontend user experience. Integrating an understanding of queries, APIs, and auths into the UX design process ensures that the design aligns with the underlying technological frameworks for optimal performance and security.

A UX engineer who has already worked with his company’s database and APIs knows when a design proposal is technically feasible and when it pushes the boundaries of the current system’s capabilities. If it is the latter, they can work with the dev team to rework and strengthen the current API’s abilities, making it more robust and flexible.

3. Bring a Deeper Understanding of Responsive Design

Let’s face it, you don’t truly understand responsive design until you’ve spent hours struggling with a difficult layout and begging the CSS gods to get your alignments just right. While UX and graphic designers grasp the importance of tailoring designs for different devices and understand the foundational principles, bringing these designs to life is a whole different ball game.

Unlike auto-layout features in design tools like Figma, which provide a simplified simulation of responsive behavior, UX engineers tackle real-world responsiveness issues. With this knowledge, UX engineers can preempt many developer headaches by piping up early in the design process and saying, “X will be a CSS nightmare, let’s do Y instead.”

4. Implement and Test Designs with Real, Interactive Prototypes

While UX designers use tools like Figma, Sketch, or Adobe XD for creating high-fidelity prototypes, UX engineers can build interactive prototypes using real code. Prototyping in this fashion allows for testing with the company’s actual product technology, providing insights into how designs will interact with the system’s architecture, data, and functionality.

These coded prototypes can provide a more accurate representation of user interactions, transitions, and overall feel of the application or website, making it a valuable step in the design and development process. Using real code instead of prototyping tools can also identify potential technical challenges early on and address them before they become complex issues, ensuring the final product is both feasible and aligned with the original design vision.

5. Conduct Front-End Performance and UX Audits

How many UX designers are familiar with navigating the “Network” tab in Chrome dev tools, or know how to interpret a Lighthouse score evaluation? Probably not many, and yet, these performance issues have a huge impact on the user experience. It doesn’t matter how user-friendly the layout, copy, and forms are, if they take forever to load, users will inevitably become frustrated.

This kind of analysis is perfect for UX engineers who love to delve into the technical aspects that influence user experience like loading times, resource loading priorities, and server response efficiency.