Prototyping is a crucial part of the process of turning ideas into designs. Designers often ask, “Which prototyping tool is the best?” This is actually the wrong way to ask the question, especially in an environment where there are so many prototyping tools that have advantages for different needs. On the designer’s side, it’s more about “Which prototyping tool is best for my current goal”? Here, I’ve put together a list of recommended prototyping tools that are most appropriate for three common scenarios.
First, design low fidelity, fast interface prototype
Mid – and low-fidelity prototyping generally refers to limited functional and interactive prototyping. They are more commonly used to describe ideas, designs, and interface layouts. These prototypes are created primarily for the initial presentation, communication, and demonstration of ideas. The best tool for this scenario is one that can be done in a short amount of time and visually illustrates the entire experience flow.
Scene features:
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Initial presentation of ideas (APP/ applets /Web/ HTML5)
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Rapid production
Recommended tools:
- Balsamiq
Mainly used for making lo-fi, wire-frame sketches. Balsamig is particularly popular in the low-fidelity prototyping world, especially in Web prototyping design. Balsamiq’s prototypes are all hand-drawn images that look beautiful and clean. This product is built for lo-fi prototypes, and the experience is unmatched by any other product.
If you want a complex interaction, forget it. Balsamiq’s interaction is basically a “link to another page.”
2.POP (Prototyping on Paper)
For an alternative product, you can sketch by hand, then take a photo and feed it into the software. You can add interaction by setting hot areas in the photo. Surprisingly handy when designing lo-fi prototypes. Its mobile-based gameplay stands out among the apps I’ve listed. Obviously, being mobile is both a strength and a weakness. This product is sure to surprise you in specific demand scenarios.
Second, build responsive experience design
When your prototyping projects and designs need to be applied to different project sizes, you need prototyping tools that support responsive layouts. Implementing responsive layouts has always been a challenge for prototyping tools. Most prototyping tools use multiple drafts for different screens, but the following two products have unique responsive layout capabilities that can help you quickly and easily implement a design while simultaneously satisfying your prototyping needs for different platforms.
Scene features:
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Prototype multi-platform products (APP, applets, Web, HTML5, Pad)
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Time saving and efficiency
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Ability to create complex interactions (most of these projects are required)
Recommended tools:
- UXPin
When prototyping with UXPin, you can set your own breakpoints and style each breakpoint interval. During preview, you can also toggle breakpoints to see the effect at different sizes. In addition to responsiveness, the software also provides programmable components, state and logic, version control, and is a very comprehensive mid to high fidelity prototyping tool.
2. Copy the RP
Mick RP is a new prototype design tool launched by Mick, a domestic tool manufacturer. It combines fast design, powerful interaction, vector editing, and is completely free!
Compared with Uxpin, Copy RP is more powerful and intelligent in responding to the layout function: just open the response of the drawing board/group during production to automatically open the responsive layout. When turned on, the components contained in the artboard/group also automatically turn on the responsive layout, making it very easy to “use more than one draft”.
High fidelity prototype design
What is a hi-fi prototype? Simple to understand: similar to the actual product of the prototype design.
It requires three elements:
A. Realistic and detailed design;
B. Fill in the content as realistically as possible;
C. Interactive effects as rich and comprehensive as real products.
This type of prototype is mainly used for professional explanation, user measurement and other scenes. With the development of prototyping tools, the cost of time to produce high-fidelity prototypes is getting lower and lower, and I’m going to list three prototyping tools that are the best of the best.
Scene features:
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Requires extremely high fidelity
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Comprehensive functional support and efficient output capacity
Recommended tools:
- Axure
The most well-known prototyping tool, it is loved and hated by many product managers as the earliest and most authoritative prototyping tool. Comprehensive and powerful features make it unrivaled in the industry, but the high price and complexity of operation have put off many product managers or designers. Of course, if you’re a product manager looking for strong interaction and detail, it’s a great choice.
2. Copy the RP
The copycat RP appeared again. No surprise, as a prototype design tool tailored for product development teams, Copycat RP can achieve fast production and fine design at the same time. In terms of hi-fi design ability, Copy RP performs very well:
A. Copy RP preset thousands of icon resources and components, you can choose at will, its components have interactive properties;
B. Support 13 interaction modes, almost covering all interaction requirements, truly realizing “WHAT you see is what you get”;
C. Own professional vector drawing function, support pen tool and Boolean operation, with responsive layout, 256 magnification and pixel level alignment and other design features, you can easily handle high fidelity design.
In addition to the above advantages, Copy RP support flow chart, PRD document production, product manager can one-stop deal with writing and creation requirements. Best of all: it’s unlimited, unlimited pages, unlimited duration, and absolutely free.
3.Flinto
Among many foreign design tools such as Framer, Principle and Pixate, Flinto is the prototype design software I recommend the most. In terms of interface design, you have to admire its design team: simplicity, atmosphere and delicacy will come to your face when you open the software. However, compared with the previous two tools, Flinto has a small user base in China, lacking learning materials and template resources, so it is only recommended for users with strong hands-on skills.
Conclusion:
As Facebook Design Director Julie Zhuo predicts the next decade: “The future of design thinking is product thinking.” For designers, focus more on design than tools. What needs to be communicated, demonstrated, and tested during the design process? What modules do you need to build? What level of fidelity is required? When you focus on the goal of your design, you know what tools to use.
It is recommended that all designers have extensive exposure to the current mainstream prototyping tools and use them as needed. At the same time, I believe that the best tools should be “faster” and “simpler” to serve the design thinking and make the designer less encumbered by tools.
For those of you who need to quickly prototype and express design ideas, do you have any ideas now?