What Is the Best Way to Build a UX Design Portfolio?

A portfolio is a collection of your best and most sophisticated works in any field. It should highlight the process of design and make stress on your strongest works. So the headhunters understand your experience, skills, and stage of development as a professional.

One of the most important things about a UX portfolio is that the document should explain in detail the process of creating the project. It allows hiring managers to see the stages of your works and your train of thought.

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Tips on Creating UX Portfolio

Before creating anything, think about the targeted audience of your portfolio: recruiters, designers, etc. It's important because depending on this, there will be different structure.
Make sure that the medium you're using in your portfolio is the most comfortable one for the people who will read it.
Edit your portfolio according to the position you're applying for: HRs need to see that you have relevant experience and you're good at it.
Put important info on your skills, experience, and achievements first. It will be easier for the ones who read it to see the summary.

Remember, that's very important to know who is going to read your portfolio, and we're going to guide you through the process of UX portfolio creation both for a job application and other purposes.

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Steps on Creating a Sophisticated UX Portfolio

Step 1. Choose the Works You Are Proud Of.

And never put the ones you're not 100% sure are great! Choose from three to five of your favorite works on a different kind of design such as prototyping, UX, UI, wireframes, etc., so the recruiter sees your skills and level in every case.

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Step 2. Create Case Studies, Which Are Detailed and Engaging.

It's highly important, that you explain how the works are done. Use text, but not too much, make the info blocks, something like problem and the resolution. HRs should see the process of achieving the result.

Font animation by Sacha Tourtoulou

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Step 3. Choose a Medium for Your Portfolio.

We would recommend creating both a Web-based portfolio and PDF file, so you can easily edit it and send it to anyone. Pros of each type:

Web UX portfolio is easier to access and get found organically
A PDF file is easier to edit

Cons of each type:

Web portfolio is harder to edit
PDF file portfolio is harder to find

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Step 4. Create a Portfolio.

Block format for information is what your portfolio needs, whether is a Web or PDF one. Formatting also matters, it should be clear, without excessive details, and easy to read. Remember, that the more engaging your portfolio is, the more chances you'll get noticed and get a job!

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Step 5. Get and Analyze the Feedback!

Feedback is also an important part of the UX design portfolio creation: before publishing/sending a portfolio, ask the opinion of your colleagues, and afterward, when publishing one, analyze the feedback of the recruiters: whether it's searchable or not, easy to read, if the structure is okay or not.

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Tools for UX Designer Portfolio

Don't forget that there are lots of cool tools for creating your Web portfolio, here are some that proved their credibility:

Dribble. HRs love searching there for UX designers, and it's free.
Behance. Offers a free acc to upload your works, it's searchable and convenient.
Wix or Tilda.cc. To make it look like a website page, it's nice instruments to start with!
Readymag. This is web-tool for designing websites that is mainly used to create amazing portfolios.

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The tools for creating a PDF portfolio:

PowerPoint/Keynote is a classic way to create a PPT for the HRs. But now it looks a bit old fashioned and amateurs.
Adobe Illustrator, if you like. It's a pro way to create portfolios with lots of graphics to impress a recruiter!
Sketch is also a skilled instrument for the users of iOS (we wrote here about it). It's good for creating info blocks and graphics.

When creating your UX design portfolio, don't forget, that you have to love your creation, because if you not, how is anyone going to do that and offer you a dream job?

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