Top 15 Design Tools For Mobile App Designers

Design is a crucial phase while building a mobile app, and a mobile app’s UI can make or break the application. At present, there are so many mobile app design toolkits available in the market. Best app developers will always look for the right tool to deliver a great user experience as it has a powerful and direct impact on your user engagement, conversion rates, and consequently revenues.

As said earlier, there are many options available on the market to design a mobile application, but how do you know which ones are the best?

Before going in to it, here are some steps that can help you to design an awesome mobile app:

• Set the goal of your app
• Make a plan
• Research your niche and competitors
• Create a wireframe
• Get your app designed
• Collect feedback on your design
• Get your app developed
• Check your app with a focus group
• Launch a beta version
• Launch your app

Steve Jobs, the co-founder of Apple, Inc, says, “Design is not just what it looks like and feels like. Design is how it works”.

With that in mind, some top mobile app design tools are given below. It helps you in your mobile app designing process and will take your app to the next level.

1. Sketch

The tool is primarily used for designing UI and UX of mobile apps and web. The files designed using Sketch are saved with the extension, .sketch file format. You can also save the images with extensions like PNG, JPG, WebP, TIFF, etc. App engineers use the design created in Sketch to design mobile apps and website developers to design websites.

Using Sketch, digital artists can apply changes to their image and can still revert to the original or previous iteration when they need to do so. Sketch also enables designers to further refine or use their creations in other applications by letting them export codes and presets. It comes with symbols, a feature that allows users to create icons, avatars, and other design elements and save them for future use. So, users do not have to make these elements on other sections of their design repeatedly, and they can still customize them as they wish.

2. BuildFire

It is an application creator for both Android and iOS. Using BuildFire, you will get to craft cost-effective mobile apps faster than ever before. It comes with both cache facilities and cloud storage that lets you manage PDF files, audio, and videos.

It has a DIY platform that helps you create high-quality custom development. It can support over 10,000 apps. BuildFire is flexible and powerful, allowing you to scale up and quickly meet your business goals.

It has push notifications, tagging, user management, plug-in access, service-level agreements, etc. It allows you to design app dashboards, archive data, manage marketplaces, web apps and get amazing insights.

3. InVision

InVision is a workflow, collaboration, and prototyping tool that can convert your static application designs into fully functional prototypes having an interactive nature.

It is a design tool created for designers by designers. So, without a second thought, they can use this tool to create interactive mockups for designs.

It is known as the most powerful user interface design tool. It will take your designs to the next level. Additionally, it allows to test visuals and also wireframe flows in a more tangible manner.

This designing tool offers seamless navigation that helps users to navigate the entire design process in one place. It keeps them fully engaged and notified of changes. InVision is the best designing tool for the designing team that works together for the project because it allows for smooth communication, get feedback, and move projects forward.

4. Marvel

Marvel is the famous all-in-one platform that powers design. Marvel helps you bring new ideas to life, transform the way you create digital products, and take part in the journey of Transformation using creative technology like never before.

Want to develop your idea? Meet our tech experts!

5. UXPin

UXPin helps you create UX without using any code. You can utilize your designs from Sketch and Photoshop and they are compatible with UXPin. In UXPin, the import process is super easy. It provides you a pixel-perfect design for your product. It allows you to share your work with people who are involved in the same product like client, design team, developer, and all.

Since UXPin has a lot of built-in elements, you are not restricted at all. Hence, you can experiment with more than 1000 built-in elements for web, mobile, and desktop products.

6. Justinmind

Justinmind is a prototyping tool that helps you in creating high-quality work. By downloading this tool on your computer, you can work offline from anywhere.

Justinmind lets you export your prototype to a fully functional HTML document and make it readily available to display in any web browser. It creates wireframes for web apps and websites that adapt to multiple screen resolutions for desktop and mobile.

It allows you to add HTML, online widgets, videos, docs, interactive maps, and online/offline to your application through its widget library. Also, Justinmind has tons of plugins extensions to help make your job easier.

7. Axure

It is a popular wireframing and rapid prototyping tool with a drag-and-drop interface. It is a quick way to create highly interactive prototypes that are viewable on the web, tablets, desktops, and mobile devices. It tries to provide you with all the functionalities you need to design your app from start to finish and prioritize user experience.

Apart from prototyping, it also lets you design wireframes, flowcharts, mockups, idea boards, personas, UI design, user journeys, diagramming, and graphical documentation, and more.

The interesting thing about this tool is that it allows you to code and lets you include ready-to-use components and libraries to help the user create a better design.

8. Adobe Experience Design (XD)

Adobe XD is developed and published by Adobe Inc. XD. It is a vector-based user experience design tool used for web apps and mobile apps, available for macOS and Windows. There are versions also available for both iOS and Android. It helps to preview the work result directly on mobile devices.

Adobe XD also support website wireframing and creating simple interactive click-through prototypes. Using Adobe’s character and layout tools, elements can be made easily, and the individual objects can be exported.

Compared to other Adobe applications, XD is a lot more impulsive and easier to use. This enables a great introduction and creates a best user experience right from the beginning.

9. Figma

It is a cloud-based design tool quite similar to Sketch in the matter of its functions and features. It lets you design and prototype your digital experiences together, in real-time and in one-place, and helps you turn your ideas into products faster. Figma has the tools that you will need to complete your task. It works on any platform that runs a web browser.

Macs, Linux Machines, Window PCs, and even Chromebooks can be used with Figma. In many organizations, designers use Macs and developers use Window PCs. Figma helps to bring both together.

10. Origami Studio

Origami is an independent user-interface tool developed by Facebook engineers. It has been used to design Facebook, like Facebook Messenger and Instagram, and now it is available free for you.

Origami is a complex tool with great functionalities, you can preview your app prototype with Origami (Android or iOS), copy and paste layers from Sketch, and get them working in Origami. If you want to show designs to your clients or anyone, you can record your prototype and quickly send it to anyone using the Origami app.

Another functionality Origami offers is that you can connect it to your Apple or Android device to preview it and see the live changes as you work on it.

11. MindNode

With MindNode you can build relationship maps. The platform and interface are both super simple, and it doesn’t have any complicated or distracting features.

If you are working on a design, the system allows you to prioritize your most important tasks. Set reminders and deadlines on the platform to keep yourself on a realistic timeline without falling behind the schedule.

You can simply fold and unfold nodes whenever you need to access them for your current project. MindNode has several style options and layouts to get you started with. Its cloud software enables you to share your project with others and tackle it with a collaborative effort. The cloud means you can access your work on MindNode from any device.

12. Fluid UI

This tool is an HTML5 mobile interface prototyping tool that helps user interface designers to quickly create prototypes by arranging pre-built widgets into a drag-and-drop editor. It is performed during the requirements stage of app development. It allows iteration and collaboration between users and clients.

13. Balsamiq

For every mobile app designer, wireframing is essential. This is the reason Balsamiq needs to be a part of your toolset. It is one of the best ways to control different versions of your design.

As your work goes on, you may want to see something you did a few days ago; Balsamiq saves all of those old versions and makes it easy for you to work and rework your ideas. It has got many different versions like Google Drive-based, Jira-compatible, desktops, web, etc.

So, if you are looking for a tool to design wireframes alone, then Balsamiq will be the right choice. And you will able to provide the best solutions that make your clients happy.

14. Hotgloo

It is a prototyping and wireframe tool that lets you build different wireframes for mobile, web, and wearables. It helps you analyze planning processes as well as build and test drive interactions.

Hotgloo is a tool that helps you create and share interactive prototypes with your clients and team. It is easy to use, offers free tutorials, documentation, an excellent support team, and even live webinars. It is optimized for mobile; you can edit, check and test the work you create in any particular mobile device. You can easily invite co-workers and collaborate faster than ever.

15. Proto.io

It specializes in helping designers prototype different templates. In addition to that, it is also capable of designing custom animations. It is a mobile app prototyping platform that is best for beginners. Proto.io utilizes a drag-and-drop interface that does not require coding and is a lot easier.

It has many features for designing and prototyping mobile apps, including built-in component libraries for specific devices. Designers can make use of the timeline feature to create animations and show the flow of their app across different screens.

In Proto.io, If you have assets in Dropbox or Google Drive, this tool lets you synchronize them easily and help you to simplify your workflow.

As proto.io is a browser-based prototyping tool, there is no need to download any heavy software, you can begin to use it right away after signing up for their 15 days free trial.

Mobile app development is the process or action through which a specific mobile application is developed for different mobile devices like mobile phones, personal digital assistants, etc.

Many businesses rely on top mobile app development companies to develop mobile apps because, mobile apps strengthen their brand by increasing their visibility, increasing customer engagement, and reducing costs. Mobile apps are among the best ways that allow businesses to communicate with its customer directly.

However, before developing a mobile app, businesses have to consider:

• The audience: Whether it can help your customers or are people going to use it?
• The purpose: Put yourself in your customer’s shoes and think what do they need or want from your app? How will the app improve their experience?, etc.
• Allocation of time and resources: Mobile apps are not only a financial investment but also need an investment of time. Like any technology-based, mobile apps should be maintained to be relevant to deliver the best customer service and to continue improving the internal process.
• Your business requirements: Mobile apps are not for every business. Before you approach any top mobile app development company to build your app, focus on the actual needs of your business. Apps are specifically useful for businesses that have high customer interaction and engagement.

Do you know What is the Average App Development Cost in 2021?

Conclusion

Before deciding to develop a mobile app for your businesses, you have to consider these factors. Once you know its requirements, there comes the need for the right tool that can help you build an efficient design of your mobile app. It provides value to your customers and helps in influencing the success of your businesses.

Ready to join your customers in the mobile app revolution? Contact us and know how a mobile app can add value to your business.