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We’ll be looking into each platform’s course ratings, top features, pricing, and more to help you find the best solution for your specific UX learning needs.
We’ll also be looking at the certifications provided by each course, as well as the pros and cons taken from popular review sites. Read on to find out everything you need to know about Uxcel and Designlab, starting with an overview of the basics.
Designlab vs Uxcel at a Glance
Before we take a closer look at the details surrounding Uxcel vs Designlab, here’s an overview of the key information to help you make your decision.
Ready to improve your UX skills and knowledge? Check out Uxcel’s wide range of UX courses today, and sign up free to start your UX upskilling journey.
About Uxcel
- Best for: Individuals looking to develop UX knowledge and move into UX roles
- Price: $0/month for Starter Plan, $8/month for Pro Plan
- Duration: Flexible, whatever suits you
- Format: Online
Uxcel is an online learning platform for building your UX knowledge and skills. It provides key learning and assessment tools to beginner, intermediate, and expert designers to help build and improve on UX skills. It’s a flexible online learning space that enables you to learn UX design at your own pace with courses, challenges, assessments, and certifications.
It also provides a Job Board for finding your ideal UX role when you’re ready. You can add your career preferences and get a curated job feed tailored to you, or you can browse the jobs posted by small businesses and big brands alike.
Employers are able to view your Skills Graph—a visual representation of your design skills proficiency. This Skills Graph is automatically created and updated by taking Uxcel assessments—meaning it’s always an up-to-date snapshot of your current design skills.
Uxcel offers an easy-to-use platform with an intuitive interface that makes learning UX design simple and enjoyable. Whether you’re just looking to build your UX skills or ready to move into a new UX role—Uxcel’s courses are the high-quality resource you need.
Key Features
- Lessons: hone in on specific skills with Uxcel’s wide variety of lessons on UX concepts, methodologies, and more
- Courses: focus on a larger UX concept with UX design courses comprised of relevant lessons
- Assessments: take UX skills tests on what you’ve been learning, and build your Skill Graph to identify your strengths and weaknesses and land UX roles
- Challenges: take UX challenges and see how you compare to other similar learners on the global leaderboard
- UX training: complete UX design courses, practice skills, and test your knowledge with guided paths to prepare for your UX certification and future roles
- UX Certifications: earn globally recognized UX design certifications to validate your design skills
- Arcade: build on your UX knowledge with fun and engaging UX games
- Team learning: looking to upskill your team? Uxcel’s Team solution gives your team access to the resources they need to build their UX skills and knowledge
What You’ll Learn
Here’s what you can expect to learn about with Uxcel’s online courses:
- UX design foundations
- UX terminology
- UI components
- UX writing
- Information architecture
- Wireframing
- Mobile design
- Mobile-specific functions & interactions
- Mobile prototyping
- Design accessibility
- UX research methodologies
- Typography
- Coding for UX design
Alongside these lessons you’ve also got complementary exercises, challenges, and games to improve your knowledge.
Top Courses
Here are some of the most popular courses available on Uxcel:
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Now, let’s turn our focus to Designlab.
About Designlab
- Best for: Individuals looking for a guided UX course
- Price: $7,749 up-front, payment plans available
- Duration: 15 weeks (full-time) or 30 weeks (part-time)
- Format: Online
Designlab offers an online UX Academy focused on helping individuals transition into UX design careers. The course is designed for people who already have some existing UX knowledge or experience—be that as a web designer, graphic designer, or any other UX/UI experience. However, if that’s not you—you can take the UX Academy Foundations course ($499) to get your knowledge to where it needs to be.
The course offers learners a full-time approach to learning—where you’re expected to commit 40 hours per week—and a part-time approach—where you’re learning is reduced to 20 hours a week. Prospective students apply to enrol and join the next available course cohort, which is typically one cohort per month.
The UX Academy course is separated into three clear phases:
- Phase one: UX / UI Design Essentials
- Phase two: Personal Brand and Portfolio
- Phase three: Career Services
Phase one comprises seven design modules, each with its own lessons and projects, created to give you a hands-on learning experience. Phase two then focuses on getting the freshly-trained UX designers ‘job-ready’. You’ll create portfolio deliverables and write case studies to create your own online design portfolio. Then, you’ll work on a cover letter and resume, polish your online presence, and put together an action plan for your job search.
Phase three is where you’ll start working with a career coach to help you land your ideal UX role. You’ll meet with your career coach for 26 coaching sessions—where they’ll provide support on any aspect of the job search and application process.
Key Features
- UX Designer Mentorship: you’re matched with a UX Academy mentor—a top designer with 3+ years experience in the industry—for 30 sessions of learning support throughout the course.
- Portfolio projects: to complete as part of the course and to showcase your skills to employers.
- Video tutorials: to explain some course concepts, perform design tasks, and create deliverables.
- Career-focused outcomes: the second half of the course is dedicated to applying the skills you learn in the first half, and the ongoing job placement assistance is key.
- Access to relevant tools: students get free access to Figma and Sketch for the duration of the course. You also get access to Huntr during the job search to help refine your search and access opportunities.
What You’ll Learn
Here are the seven modules you cover during the 15-week course:
- What is UX design?
- User research
- Ideation to prioritization
- Information architecture
- Interaction design
- User interface design
- Prototyping and testing
The UX learning and project-based curriculum in phase one help learners work towards creating their first user centered design: a complete mobile-first web page.
Top Courses
Alongside its main offering—the UX Design Academy—Designlab also offers four shorter UX courses. These are:
- Design 101
- UX Interaction Design
- UX Research and Strategy
- UI Design
These courses cost $399 each and take four weeks to complete.
Designlab vs Uxcel: Certificate Value
A key consideration when choosing a learning platform is the official certifications you get following course completion. These help you validate your knowledge and skills to potential employers and help increase credibility within the design industry.
Designlab offers learners a certificate of completion upon finishing the course, but their main focus is to help learners build a professional UX/UI portfolio. They argue that ‘formal degrees and certification are of little value’. Whilst we understand that thought process, there’s definitely value in both portfolios and certifications as a UX designer.
Uxcel certifications are globally recognized UX design certifications that validate your design skills to other professionals. They’re reputable certifications that help you gain credibility and land your ideal UX opportunity. Currently, you can validate your knowledge with these UX certifications:
These are all Level 1 certificates, however Level 2 and Level 3 (Master) certifications are in the works.
Designlab vs Uxcel: Pros & Cons
Now we’ve looked into each platform, let’s compare them together. These pros and cons come from customer reviews and feedback over the past year to ensure you’re getting accurate and relevant details.
Let’s start with Uxcel.
Uxcel Pros
- Clear, high-quality content and platform
- Engaging gamification with tests and assessments
- Globally recognized certifications
- UX training to prepare you for certifications
- Great customer support
- UX networking and opportunities, the LinkedIn of UX
Uxcel Cons
- No instructors to answer questions
- Doesn’t feel as ‘academic’
Read more about what people are saying about Uxcel on TrustPilot. Now, let’s consider Designlab’s pros and cons.
Desiglab Pros
- Free access to tools
- UX Foundation Academy students get $500 off the UX Academy
- Mentorship program, when successful, is very helpful
- Challenging material
Designlab Cons
- Expensive with no free-trial option
- Non-accredited certifications
- Reports of over-promising outcomes, no job guarantee
- Mentor quality varies, but can request a new mentor
- Very text-heavy resources that can be found for free online
Designlab’s TrustPilot reviews are limited, so we instead looked to CourseReport for user reviews.
Interested in transitioning to a UX role? Sign up to Uxcel today for free to start developing your UX skills and knowledge with free lessons, courses, and assessments.
