What's in my UX toolkit?

Firstly, what is a UX toolkit? It’s a compilation of the tools you use to help undertake your job more efficiently and effectively. You won’t necessarily use everything in your toolkit on every project, but it’s a great place to find the right tool for the job at hand. The tool you choose will go some way to shaping the final product.

I like to think of my toolkit as a buddy who is there to remind me of processes and methodologies as much as providing me with the tools I need. My toolkit is made up of checklists, research, design and collaboration based tools.

Checklists and guides:

UX checklist – the best checklist out there!

18F method cards – use these ideas to kickstart and develop your project

Mozilla’s open innovation toolkit – as above – lots of ideas to kickstart and develop

Research & Analytics:

Google Analytics – goes without saying

Crazy Egg and Mouseflow – heatmapping tools

Ethn.io – a great way to recruit users and manage user research

Whatusersdo and Loop11– remote user testing

SurveyMonkey – survey software

Optimizely – A/B and multivariate testing made simple

Optimal workshop – tree testing, card sorting, first click testing and so much more!

Dovetail - research repository

Design:

Pen and paper – in my opinion, it’s the best and quickest way to get an idea across

Sketch - design and quick prototyping

InVision - design and prototyping

UX Pin - design and prototyping

Axure – design and prototyping

Marvel – quick, simple interactive prototyping tool

Principle - animation and interaction

Collaboration:

Face to face – it’s easy to forget the best way to communicate requires no software

Trello – an excellent planning tool with a super simple workflow

Slack – messaging, file sharing, search, video calls, archiving and way more!

Jira – software development tool often necessary when integrating with your tech team

Cover image credit: Annelies