designlab
About
About
Designlab teaches in-demand UX/UI design skills online through 4-week short courses and a 15 to 28-week UX Academy. Designlab courses consist primarily of hands-on projects and 1-on-1 mentorship from expert designers so that students can master the techniques needed to design stunning web and mobile products. The Designlab community of mentors gives students timely feedback on work and Skype with students regularly to help them improve. Mentors include top industry professionals from companies like Twitter, Airbnb, Dropbox, and more. Courses are self-paced, which means students can complete the readings/projects whenever their schedules permit. Designlab is ideal for a developer, product manager, entrepreneur, marketer, aspiring designer, or anyone working on web/mobile products.
To apply for the UX Academy, applicants need to fill out an online application, and schedule a call with a Designlab representative. Applicants should have a love of good design, a grounding in design fundamentals, and commitment and resilience.
Graduates of the UX Academy work with a career coach to get help with their portfolios, job applications, and interview technique. Top graduates also get access to Designlab's hiring partners and exclusive job opportunities. Designlab offers a 6-month tuition-reimbursement guarantee for graduates of the UX Academy who are job hunting.
Recent Designlab Reviews: Rating 4.79
Recent Designlab News
Courses
Courses
Design 101
ApplyStart Date February 5, 2021 Cost $399 Class size N/A Location Online In this 4-week online course built for design beginners, you'll learn about the fundamentals of color theory, typography, and layout in web design, gain familiarity with the design tool of your choice (Photoshop, Sketch, or Illustrator), hone your skills & start building your portfolio with a series of hands-on projects, work with your own expert mentor, with written feedback on all your work and 4 Skype sessions. You'll end the course with a certificate of completion, a portfolio of projects, and a strong foundational skill set in design.Financing
Deposit N/A Getting in
Minimum Skill Level Beginner Placement Test No Interview No More Start Dates
February 5, 2021 - Online
UI Design
ApplyStart Date February 5, 2021 Cost $399 Class size N/A Location Online In this 4-week online course you will develop a detailed "eye" for visual design, learn to decide which typefaces to use, become equipped to choose and create color palettes, learn about best practices for UI patterns and reusable design components, and learn how to create retina-ready designs that scale across different devices. You'll end the course with a certificate of completion, a portfolio of projects, and a strong skillset in UI design. This course is intended as a follow-up to our Design 101 course, or for anyone who has a basic understanding of visual design principles. Students are expected to be acquainted with a professional design tool before they begin this class.Financing
Deposit N/A Getting in
Minimum Skill Level N/A Placement Test No Interview No More Start Dates
February 5, 2021 - Online
UX Academy Foundations
ApplyStart Date February 8, 2021 Cost $499 Class size N/A Location Online Looking to transition your career into the world of UX/UI design? Learning visual and UI design is a great place to start. Through our flexible, 4-8 week UX Academy Foundations course, you'll work 1-on-1 with an expert mentor to learn key visual design concepts and practical skills. Your mentor will give you written feedback on all your work and also meet with you for 8 personalized sessions to further discuss concepts, project work, and the UX/UI industry in general. By the end, you'll have completed a final design challenge which you can use in your application for UX Academy to showcase your newfound knowledge and skills.Financing
Deposit N/A Getting in
Minimum Skill Level Beginner Placement Test No Interview No More Start Dates
February 8, 2021 - Online
UX Academy (Full-time)
ApplyStart Date January 25, 2021 Cost $6,749 Class size N/A Location Online UX Academy is an online design intensive, aimed at career-switchers looking to make the move into UX/UI/product design roles. You'll complete over 480 hours of coursework, develop a portfolio, and hone your skills through 1-on-1 mentorship, peer Group Critiques, and Career Services.Financing
Deposit $399 Financing Available through Climb CreditTuition Plans 6 month internal payment plan and extended plans financed by Climb Credit Getting in
Minimum Skill Level Design 101 or its equivalent (foundational skills in visual/graphic design); knowledge of at least one major design tool (Sketch, Photoshop, or Illustrator) Prep Work Application pre-requisites: https://help.trydesignlab.com/hc/en-us/articles/218228487-How-do-I-apply-to-UX-Academy-Are-there-any-prerequisites-for-the-program- Placement Test No Interview No More Start Dates
January 25, 2021 - Online Apply by January 15, 2021
UX Academy (Part-time)
ApplyStart Date January 25, 2021 Cost $6,749 Class size N/A Location Online UX Academy is an online design intensive, aimed at career-switchers looking to make the move into UX/UI/product design roles. You'll complete over 480 hours of coursework, develop a portfolio, and hone your skills through 1-on-1 mentorship, peer Group Critiques, and Career Services.Financing
Deposit $399 Tuition Plans 6 month internal payment plan and extended plans financed by Climb Credit Getting in
Minimum Skill Level Design 101 or its equivalent (foundational skills in visual/graphic design); knowledge of at least one major design tool (Sketch, Photoshop, or Illustrator) Prep Work Application pre-requisites: https://help.trydesignlab.com/hc/en-us/articles/218228487-How-do-I-apply-to-UX-Academy-Are-there-any-prerequisites-for-the-program- Placement Test No Interview No More Start Dates
January 25, 2021 - Online Apply by January 15, 2021
UX: Interaction Design
ApplyStart Date February 5, 2021 Cost $399 Class size N/A Location Online In this 4-week online course you’ll develop an eye for seeing, and a language for talking about, interaction design. You'll become familiar with human interface guidelines, principles of usability and fundamental interaction design details. You'll also practice evaluating if and how interactions can be improved. Finally, you'll develop a portfolio to demonstrate your interaction design prowess. As with all Designlab courses, you'll work 1-on-1 with an expert mentor, with feedback on all your work and weekly Skype sessions. By the end, you’ll have an interaction design toolkit for evaluating and improving the usability of your products. You’ll have examples of your process and work that you can speak to and draw on in related projects. This course is especially useful to anyone looking to develop better communication of and confidence in their interaction design work, and for folks looking to develop their ability to understand and work with product designers.Financing
Deposit N/A Getting in
Minimum Skill Level Beginner Placement Test No Interview No More Start Dates
February 5, 2021 - Online
UX Research & Strategy
ApplyStart Date February 5, 2021 Cost $399 Class size N/A Location Online In this 4-week online course, you'll learn the basics of UX, and user-centered design, explore the core research techniques professionals use to gain customer insight, and get experience by working on hands-on projects, develop your UX portfolio, creating deliverables like personas, storyboards, customer journey maps, & empathy maps, and work with your own expert mentor, with feedback on all your work and weekly Skype sessions. By the end of this course, you'll know all about user research, and have a toolkit of methods you can use throughout your career. You'll have a strong portfolio of work and crucial real experience to draw upon for interviews. Whether you want a career in UX/UI Design, or you just want to build better products, this course is the perfect next step.Financing
Deposit N/A Getting in
Minimum Skill Level Beginner Placement Test No Interview No More Start Dates
February 5, 2021 - Online
Reviews
Designlab Reviews
- Great Intro to the field- 11/17/2020Hannah S • Student • Graduate • Course: UX Academy Foundations • Campus: Online • Verified via LinkedInThere are so many bootcamp options out there, and it's such a huge financial commitment to jump into something you're not certain of. I really enjoyed the UXA Foundations course because it let me dip my toes into what UI work could look like. This course definitely leaned heavy on UI rather than UX, but having never taken any formal training in design it was really helpful to see all those principles laid out. Another really great feature is that you have meetings with a mentor where you can talk about your work but also career-type questions. If you're interested in the industry and aren't ready to commit a ton of cash and time, this is a great place to start.
- UX Academy Foundations- 11/16/2020Donna • Student • Student • Course: UX Academy Foundations • Campus: Online • Verified via LinkedInUX Academy Foundations
- Designlab - UX Academy Foundations- 11/13/2020Zoe • Applicant • Course: UX Academy Foundations • Campus: Online • Verified via LinkedInThe content is definitely helping me in understanding the basics of visual design and how users would view an interface! I so glad to have learned about visual hierarchy, color and typography etc! Although with enrolling the course won't get me a job, it surly sets myself ready to learn about UX design and other design thinking strategy in UX Academy!
- Chou Yang • Student • Course: UX Academy Foundations • Campus: Online • Verified via LinkedInI've been doing graphic design, web design, and design-adjacent things in my various job roles over the last 10 years, when I decided to make a career switch into UX design which lead me to DesignLab. The Academy Foundations course is meant to prepare you for their DesignLab Academy proper, which to be honest, I was a tad skeptical of how much value I would get from this "foundational" course. But I was shocked by how much I was learning and reestablishing in myself in just the first few weeks alone! The assignments were flexible enough that a beginner could handle, but tons of room for any experienced designers to challenge themselves.
Pros:
- Good price for the value, and you get reimbursed for the course if you move on to take the DesignLab UX Academy course
- Comes with a mentor to talk shop or get advice from, and they help ensure that you're applying what you learn correctly
- A large and active community of students, support staff, and mentors on Slack
- Includes group crit sessions to get you used to presenting your ideas and defending your design decisions in the "real world"
- Includes lots of resources for learning how to use industry tools, and lots of partnerships with those tooling vendors to get those tools at a good price or for free
- Lots of extra material that you can get to in your own time for furthering education after the course is over. (Throughout the course are tons of book, podcast, and blog recommendations, and DesignLab is always hosting webinars)
Cons
- I honestly can't think of any
- UX Academy Foundation- 11/13/2020Maggie chiang • Graduate • Verified via LinkedInI went into UX academy wanting to become a UX designer. I decided on the design lab because of the job guarantee and assistants that they bring to prepare you. I am overall very happy with choosing to do UX academy foundations to prepare me for UX academy. I enjoyed learning the new material and projects as well as building a relationship with my foundation's mentor. Highly recommend!
- Amazing course! Would highly recommend.- 11/11/2020Priya Shah • UX Designer At Autodesk • Graduate • Course: UX Academy (Full-time) • Campus: Online • Verified via LinkedInDesignlab is an amazing UX/UI course for anyone looking to either switch careers or enhance their design knowledge. I found their 1:1 mentorship, group critique sessions, and comprehensive curriculum extremely useful. My mentors were very supportive and their Slack community is extremely warm and resourceful. I would highly recommend this course! :)
- UX Academy- 11/8/2020Olivia • Associate Product Designer • Graduate • Course: UX Academy (Full-time) • Campus: Online • Verified via LinkedInA great UX/UI course at an affordable price. The one-on-one mentorship and group crit facilitators give the program a personal touch even while remote. I switched careers from marketing and wound up getting my dream job one month after graduation, so with that being said, I'd highly recommend :)
- Vie Pereira • UX Design Masters Student • Graduate • Course: UX: Interaction Design • Campus: Online • Verified via LinkedInMy mentor Jessica was really excellent, and went above and beyond to tailor the course to my own project interests. The emphasis on design critique and iteration was fantastic, as so few online short courses have this feature! Generally, the content itself was well curated, relevant and heavily focused on the practical application of skills through projects, so you have a valuable set of projects to add to a personal portfolio, should you so wish to do so.
The only caveat would be that you get out from this course what you put in - so to anyone thinking of doing a DesignLab short course, my recommendation would be to thoroughly review their Sketch/Figma/XD tutorials beforehand, and make sure you're well acquainted with the design tool of your choice before you begin!
- Short program, huge value- 9/9/2020Amanda So • Visual Designer • Graduate • Course: UX: Interaction Design • Campus: Online • Verified via LinkedInA huge incentive to choosing Designlab was the mentorship. Though I chose the 4 week short course, it was great to know that I would have a mentor throughout the course available to help me with concepts in the lessons, providing me feedback on my projects, challenge me, and meeting with me in one-on-one 1 hour sessions. That and the fact that I would be working with someone in the field--a Designlab success story--gave me the accountability I needed to complete this course. My mentor was a Designlab alum and I think I especially benefitted from that because she had a reference to great mentorship to provide mentorship and confidence to me. I was concurrently taking an Interaction Design course through Coursera which is $40 per month and the difference between the engagement I had was huge.
The UX of the lessons made the concepts easily digestible and each lesson was supplemented with projects which really benefited my understanding of the material. I would say that the lesson on heuristics needed further Googling to supplement my understanding; my Coursera course was also a huge help for supplementing this section but otherwise all concepts were well explained through the lessons and projects. The time estimates I feel were not always accurate as I definitely spent more time on each project due to my own slow process or having addressing my mentor's feedback for revisions on my projects. I believe that you definitely put in the amount of time and effort that ultimately aligns with your goals and I definitely wanted to put in my best professional foot forward for every project. I enjoyed the challenges of the projects and it was particularly useful to have other classmate work and their mentors' feedback visible; it reminds me of the critiques that would take place in in-person design classes.
While the course claims to provide projects to add to your portfolio, I think it honestly provides you all the different pieces for a single but complete case study to add to your portfolio. I'm really happy I dived into this course, it was one of the most fulfilling 4-weeks I've had and definitely opens me up to the idea of taking the bootcamp with Designlab once I decide whether a job change is my goal. Shout out to Olga A. for being an amazing mentor! Get you a mentor genuinely wants you to succeed!
- Design101- 8/6/2020Sam Davidowitz-Neu • Graduate • Course: Design 101 • Campus: Online • Verified via LinkedInGreat Course, highly reccomend to anyone looking for an affordable introduction to the fundamental components of UX/UI Design
- Hands-on UI Design Course- 6/2/2020Vanessa • Graduate • Course: UI Design • Campus: Online • Verified via LinkedInA great asset of this course is that you get a mentor to support you. You have 4 live sessions with the mentor and you also get written feedback on your tasks/projects through the platform. You'll be able to see how fellow students tackle the tasks via the platform. The mentor has been great for my motivation and to keep going and improving. The fact that you are doing hands-on projects makes you learn by doing, my favorite way of learning. You also learn whenever you want (morning, evening, daytime) whatever fits best and that's great as it offers great flexibility.Even though it says around 10 hours per week of work, you spend more time on the hands-on tasks if you want to do them good to be able to show a portfolio piece. The theory is easy to take in (well structure, in bite-size chunks of 20min mostly), but for the tasks/projects, you often spend more than the time they estimate.
- UI Design- 5/8/2020Erick Solares • Student • Course: UI Design • Campus: Online • Verified via LinkedInThe course really surpassed my expectations, great support, Peter was my mentor and he was great, I learnt a lot from him, having a mentor is very important, the course was well structure and overall very happy that I was able to attend the course. And Emma on admissions was very helpful as well.
