◆ Design

What a ux designer
really does.

22 tasks, each one witnessed by the sources that watched the job — and behind every one, a prompt you can use tonight.

22evidenced tasks
113,330in the US (2025)
$104,000median pay / year
11systems it runs on
See the 22 tasks ↓Open in the atlasThe full career map →
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Troubleshoot website issues
Find the recurring layout and interaction bugs on the corporate site, …3 sources agree

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The work, task by task

22 tasks
Hands on the work14
Troubleshoot website issues+
Find the recurring layout and interaction bugs on the corporate site, reproduce them with steps and screenshots, list affected pages and components, prioritise by impact and frequency, and prepare a one-page fix plan for the engineering lead by Thursday.
escojdonet3 agree
when the reply comes backPush once: ask it to sharpen the weakest part, and to say what it assumed. Helpful?
Align the client's web presence with its business strategy+
Audit the client's public site and competitor touchpoints, map where content and features fail the business goals, propose three strategic alignment changes with expected KPIs and a recommended rollout sequence for the CMO next Tuesday.
escojdonet3 agree
when the reply comes backPush once: ask it to sharpen the weakest part, and to say what it assumed. Helpful?
Optimize website graphics for performance+
Reduce page weight by auditing hero images, SVGs and icon sets, propose compression and lazy-loading rules that keep visual fidelity, produce a before/after asset list and size savings estimate for the front-end team by Friday.
jdwiki2 agree
when the reply comes backPush once: ask it to sharpen the weakest part, and to say what it assumed. Helpful?
Design layout and visual elements+
Design the homepage and dashboard layouts for the healthcare prototype with clear visual hierarchy, deliver annotated wireframes, spec font sizes and color tokens, export layered assets for engineering and book a design handoff review with frontend on Thursday.
escojdwiki3 agree
when the reply comes backPush once: ask it to sharpen the weakest part, and to say what it assumed. Helpful?
Stay updated with web design trends and technologies+
Scan the last three months of leading design blogs, the product analytics notes, and our component library changelog, extract new patterns or APIs that affect navigation and form UX, then summarise three adoption risks and one quick experiment for next sprint.
onetwiki2 agree
when the reply comes backPush once: ask it to sharpen the weakest part, and to say what it assumed. Helpful?
Integrate multimedia elements into websites+
Embed responsive video, animated SVG icons, and an audio caption track into the product landing page prototype, verify load times under three seconds on mobile, and hand the assets and implementation notes to the front-end devs for sprint planning.
jdwiki2 agree
when the reply comes backPush once: ask it to sharpen the weakest part, and to say what it assumed. Helpful?
Create searchable indices for Web page content.+
Index the product docs, blog posts, and help articles to build a searchable page index, tag entries with intent and component names, and deliver the index plus a search UI spec that returns relevance-sorted results within 200 milliseconds.
onet
when the reply comes backPush once: ask it to sharpen the weakest part, and to say what it assumed. Helpful?
Create Web models or prototypes that include physical, interface, logical, or data models.+
Build interactive prototypes that show physical layout, interface flows, data structures and logical rules for the checkout and account pages, include sample payloads for API calls, and hand the prototype to engineering with a one-page mapping of screens to models.
onet
when the reply comes backPush once: ask it to sharpen the weakest part, and to say what it assumed. Helpful?
Keep the record3
Grow the practice3
Watch and assess2

What the work runs on

named inside the evidenced tasks
9 tasksAJAXused for diagnosing and reproducing client-side asynchronous issues during testing
3 tasksAdobe Photoshophandles bitmap optimization and export settings to validate compressed image quality
3 tasksAdobe Illustratorexports and optimises vector icons and SVGs used on the site
3 tasksAmazon Redshiftstores and queries large indexed content sets for fast relevance scoring and analytics
2 tasksAdobe Creative Cloudprovides design and prototyping assets to show strategic changes and mockups
2 tasksAdobe Acrobatused to assemble interview transcripts, annotated PDFs and the final consolidated research report
2 tasksAmazon DynamoDBstore and serve device and session dimension data used in the analysis
1 taskAmazon Web Services AWS CloudFormationdocuments and scripts the infrastructure components behind the sequences so diagrams align with deployed services
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The same task, four heights

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ExecuteDo today's task, with fewer mistakesyou are here → ImproveMake it easy for the next person to acceptin the atlas → DecideWork out the right move when it is unclearin the atlas → BecomeLearn the pattern so it stops coming backin the atlas →

Can AI actually do this job?

the honest answer

It can

where it genuinely helps
  • Explain the theory behind the work
  • Draft, tidy and structure your writing
  • Rehearse a hard conversation before you have it
  • Build a study plan that fits your gaps

It cannot

where it stops, completely
  • Be in the room where a ux designer actually works
  • Carry the responsibility when the call is wrong — that weight stays yours
  • Notice what no one wrote down: the hesitation, the thing left unsaid
  • Live with the outcome

What the work pays

two countries, two different measures

United States

this exact occupation · BLS 2025
  • $104,000 a year — the middle: half earn more, half earn less
  • The lowest tenth earn near $53,750; the top tenth near $201,550
  • 113,330 people employed in this occupation

India

the occupation GROUP, not this job · PLFS via ILOSTAT 2025
  • ₹38,298 a month — the median for Professionals, the group this work sits in
  • India publishes pay by broad occupation group, so this covers many jobs besides this one. It is a shape, not a salary.
read this carefullyThese two numbers are not comparable and must not be converted into each other. One is a yearly figure for this job alone; the other is a monthly figure for a whole family of jobs. What travels between them is the pattern, not the amount: experience lifts pay almost everywhere.

Where the evidence lives

open any of it yourself
O*NETThe US Department of Labor's own record of this job15 of these tasks ESCOThe European skills and occupations register5 of these tasks Job descriptionsReal postings, in the wild8 of these tasks WikipediaHow the world describes this work6 of these tasks US Bureau of Labor StatisticsPay and employment, by occupation2025 figures UK NOS TECDT130144Conduct user experience design assignmentsnational standard UK NOS TECIS100141Design and develop digital user interfaces for web and mobile app platnational standard

Close to this work

12 nearby
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Questions people actually ask

You usually split time between research, design, and testing. Morning might be user research or team stand-up, reviewing interview notes or analytics from Amazon Redshift or Google Analytics to find pain points.

Afternoon is often design work in Adobe XD or Photoshop, creating prototypes and storyboards, then testing them in the browser with real users or automated tests. Evenings can include updating content, writing a test plan, or documenting technical details like server load and browser types.

Common tools are Adobe Creative Cloud apps: Photoshop for images, Illustrator for icons, InDesign for documents, and Acrobat for PDFs. For prototyping and interaction flows you’ll use design tools that export HTML/CSS/JS or work with developers.

On the technical side you’ll read server, bandwidth, and database stats from AWS services (Amazon DynamoDB, Amazon Redshift, CloudFormation) and write or inspect HTML, JavaScript, and sometimes SQL. Keep an eye on AJAX calls for interactive features.

You write HTML and JavaScript for prototypes, small interactive components, or to test a design in the browser. That helps you confirm layout behavior, accessibility, and performance before full development.

SQL or inspection of databases (like DynamoDB or Redshift logs) is used less often, mostly to check real content, user data, or analytics. You won’t be a full backend developer, but knowing these languages helps you troubleshoot and document technical factors.

The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) reports about 113,330 employed UX designers (SOC 15-1255.00). The median annual wage is $104,000. The lowest tenth is $53,750 and the top tenth is $201,550.

Use BLS as the source for national numbers; local pay varies by city, company size, and your experience with tools like AWS, front-end code, and user research.

Start with user research basics: how to run interviews and make simple surveys. Learn to make wireframes and prototypes using Adobe XD or Photoshop, and practice creating storyboards and moodboards for a project timeline.

Also learn core web skills: HTML, CSS, basic JavaScript, and how AJAX works. Build a small site you can test, document (write testing protocols), and show—include notes on performance, server/browser tests, and any analytics you tracked.

UX design focuses on understanding users, testing flows, creating interaction diagrams, and aligning the product with business strategy. You draft prototypes, run user tests, and document results. The job mixes research and systems thinking.

A web developer builds production code and manages server-side concerns; a UI designer focuses mainly on visual polish. In many teams a UX designer writes some HTML/JS and selects tools, but hands off full production code to developers.

Measuring and interpreting real user data—making decisions from analytics, server logs, and tests. That means reading traffic and performance numbers (page load times, server load, bandwidth), and using those to change designs.

Good designers craft interfaces; great ones use data from Amazon Redshift or analytics, A/B tests, and user sessions to prioritize fixes, optimize graphics for performance, and prove why a change matters.