8 tools you need to design amazing products

A strong, iterative design process results in informed decisions, excellent end products, and delighted customers.

It’s essential to choose the right tools for the job. While great tools won’t do the work for you, they can make your life easier and your products more effective. 

This article breaks down 8 different tools and explains how they help in every stage of the design process, whether you’re looking for a platform to help pinpoint user needs or software to test prototypes.

8 stand-out product design tools

You’ll need design tools during every stage of the product design process, so we’ve categorized our top picks according to the stages of Design Thinking. To refresh your memory, these stages are:

• Empathize

• Define

• Ideate

• Prototype

• Test

• Collaborate

Empathize

The 'empathize' stage of the product design process is all about understanding user needs: discovering who they are, what they want, and what problems they need solving.

1. Contentsquare 

Contentsquare offers a comprehensive suite of tools for empathizing with your users. It goes beyond traditional metrics to help businesses really dig into their customers’ wants, needs and preferences.

Contentsquare’s experience intelligence tools, like the heatmap above, offer insights into your user experiences

Key tools include

• Interviews: recruit for, host, and transcribe 1:1 user interviews easily to expedite your research process 

• Surveys: gather voice-of-customer (VoC) data both on and off site by launching surveys

• Heatmaps: see where users click and scroll on your pages, to discover which elements attract attention and which get overlooked 

• Session Replays: watch playbacks of users navigating your product to understand issues, pain points, and bugs

How does it help teams with product design?

Contentsquare is the tool for understanding your users. It offers a multi-lens view into how they interact with your product: ask people directly for their opinions, or observe their behavior via qualitative and quantitative insights.

Traditional product analytics tools use quantitative data to uncover patterns in user behavior—but they don’t tell the whole story. Contentsquare’s tools allow teams to see what’s happening with their product (via product dashboards) then connect the dots to learn why it’s happening (via tools like session replays and heatmaps). As a result, teams can make design decisions based on real user experiences rather than assumptions.

Contentsquare’s tools are also designed so that anyone can easily use them, no matter how much technical expertise they have.

How much does it cost?

Contentsquare’s free plan gives you unlimited access to heatmaps and session replays, as well as basic product analytics. There are 3 tiers of paid plans:

• Growth plan: €40/month

• Pro plan: by request 

• Enterprise plan: by request

Define & Ideate

We’ve combined the tools for the 'define' and 'ideate' stages of the design process here. Although they’re distinct phases, they’re linked and require similar tools.

The 'define' stage focuses on synthesizing user insights and working out the core problems you want to solve, whereas the 'ideate' stage is all about brainstorming solutions to address your users’ needs.

2. Mural

Mural is a digital whiteboard tool that you can use for everything from brainstorming to organizing meetings to design research. It allows teams to collaborate to define user issues and turn their ideas into product solutions.

Some of their stand-out features include

• Every whiteboard element you could need: sticky notes, shapes, connectors, icons, frameworks, and a drawing tool

• Whiteboard templates: Mural has over 300 templates for common use cases 

• Facilitation superpowers: tools to take your workshops up a notch and make them more interactive

How does it help teams with product design?

Mural is similar to a traditional whiteboard, but makes it a lot easier to organize and refer back to ideas.

There are always many ideas flying around in the 'define' and 'ideate' stages of the design process. They can’t all be good ones, but it’s important to record them all so you can circle back and find the diamonds in the rough. 

How much does it cost?

Mural has a free forever plan that includes 3 murals and unlimited members. They’ve also got 3 paid options:

• Team+ plan: $9.99/member/month (billed annually)

• Business plan: $17.99/member/month (billed annually)

• Enterprise plan: upon request

Pro tip: don’t be afraid to hop back and forth between different stages of the design process. If the creative juices aren’t flowing, go back to your users. Teams can always benefit from building more user empathy with tools like Contentsquare’s Surveys or Session Replays.

3. Miro

Miro is another online whiteboard tool that helps people collaborate, anytime and anywhere. It’s used for mapping, diagramming, strategy, and planning. 

Miro’s features include

• A huge library of integrations: easily connect to tools like Figma, Adobe XD, InVision, and Notion

• A Miro developer platform: if you’ve got technical minds on your team, you can customize Miro and build with their API

• Use-case-specific templates: Miro has template categories for everything from empathy maps to user personas to product-market fit

How does it help teams with product design?

Tools like Miro can be huge time-savers because of the variety of templates they provide. There are templates specific to user research, journey mapping, and other tasks central to the product design process.

How much does it cost?

Miro has a free plan that includes 3 editable boards. They’ve also got 3 paid plans to choose from:

• Team plan: $8 /member/month (billed annually)

• Business plan: $16 /member/month (billed annually)

• Enterprise plan: upon request

Prototype

The goal of the 'prototype' stage is, naturally, to turn your most promising ideas into testable prototypes. Good design tools help you build prototypes quickly and avoid bottlenecks in the design process.

4. Figma

Figma is one of the most popular all-in-one design tools out there. They’ve got 2 products: Figma (design software) and FigJam (online whiteboarding platform).

Let’s explore what makes their offer so special:

• Unique design features: Figma has a modern pen tool, instant arc designs, and 'OpenType' features to help make all your design ideas a reality

• Seamless prototyping: build prototypes without any coding and share them via link so your team can work together more efficiently. You can toggle back and forth between your design file and prototype at any time.

• Online whiteboarding: if you’re looking for a collaboration tool for the ‘define’ and ‘ideate’ stages, Figma’s FigJam is another great option 

How does it help teams with product design?

Product teams love Figma because it offers so many different design tools within one platform, meaning there’s no need to bounce between different pieces of software. 

It’s also relatively quick to put together prototypes with Figma. This makes it feasible for product teams to turn multiple potential solutions into prototypes, test, then pick the best one. 

How much does it cost?

Figma has a free plan that includes 3 files, but they’ve also got 2 paid plans:

• Figma Professional: $15/editor/month

• Figma Organization: $45/editor/month (annual billing only)

FigJam is billed separately. 

5. Sketch

Sketch is another of the biggest design platforms. It’s built for collaboration and can accompany teams through the design process, from ideation to launch.

Some of their most well-loved features include

• Professional features for everyone: Sketch is made for designers, but their flexible vector editing, presets, and smart components are intuitive enough for non-designers too

• Prototype testing: bring prototypes to life and test them out on your browser

• Robust collaboration capabilities: Sketch puts collaboration at the heart of its platform with design libraries and cross-platform tools

How does it help teams with product design?

Collaboration is at the heart of any successful product design process, and Sketch lives and breathes it. They make it easy for teams to work together throughout every stage of the design process on one core platform, whether you’re adjusting permissions, browsing your version history, or viewing a prototype.

Sketch is also highly customizable: you can alter it to fit into your team’s established workflows. Their long list of integrations makes it easy to add the automation you need to work on your designs efficiently.

How much does it cost?

Sketch offers a 30-day free trial and 3 different paid plans:

• Standard plan: $10/editor/month (billed annually) 

• Business plan:  $22/editor/month (billed annually) 

• Mac-only license: $120/editor/year 

Test

The 'test' phase of the design process is self-explanatory: evaluate your designs with real users. You can use several different testing methods here, and they all help validate your designs so you can launch them with confidence.

6. Maze

Maze is a fantastic product research and testing tool that allows teams to make quick, data-driven decisions about their product development.

Try Maze to evaluate

• Wireframe and usability testing: gather quantitative user insights and determine how well your prototype is performing

• Concept validation: if you’re not crystal clear on your ideas during the earlier stages of the design process, use Maze to test them before you move forward

• Content testing: Maze can validate everything from website messaging to product copy

How does it help teams with product design?

Not all teams have a captive user audience to work with during the testing phase. Maze provides a solution to this roadblock by supplying you with 70,000+ potential testers, allowing product developers to validate their designs quickly.

Maze also offers myriad options beyond prototype testing. Their tree testing, five-second testing, and card sorting tools provide various actionable insights.

How much does it cost?

Maze has a free plan that includes 1 active project. Otherwise, they’ve got 2 paid plans available:

• Professional plan: $99/month (5 seats included)

Organization plan: upon request

Pro tip: are you already using Contentsquare for the ‘empathy’ stage of your design process? You should also use it for testing. Contentsquare’s User Tests tool lets you test your products or prototypes easily. As per Maze, you don’t need to worry about sourcing your own participants—recruit from our pool of over 200,000 demographically diverse users. 

User tests are unmoderated: simply give participants a set of instructions for a task to complete on your prototype, then watch as they complete it. This will reveal any usability issues so you can launch with confidence. 

Contentsquare’s User Tests in action

7. Marvel

Marvel is a fantastic platform that aims to share the power of design with the world. Teams can create prototypes and test them out with their comprehensive software.

Let’s talk about their main features:

• Prototyping: upload design mock-ups and turn them into interactive prototypes in a matter of minutes

• User testing: collect video, audio, and analytical feedback on your designs

• Developer handoff: Marvel automatically turns your designs into code, specs, and assets that are ready to be handed off to developers

How does it help teams with product design?

Since the different stages of the design process often blend together, teams need flexible tools. This makes Marvel a great option: it’s perfect for the testing phase if you just want to validate your prototypes and then move on, but you can use it for prototyping too.

Marvel is also handy for its developer hand-off features, which save teams from creating manual documentation.

How much does it cost?

Marvel has a free plan that includes 1 user and 1 project. They also have 3 kinds of paid plans available:

• Pro plan: €9/month (billed annually) 

• Team plan: €27/month (billed annually) 

• Enterprise plan: upon request

Collaborate

The design process is an iterative loop, so the last stage is 'collaborate'. 

If you’ve found a solid solution through product testing, it’s time to work as a team toward your product launch. If your solution didn’t work as well as you’d hoped, you need to backtrack, dive deeper into user problems and needs, and come up with a better idea—together.

8. Slack

Slack needs no introduction. It’s a widely-used messaging platform that allows teams to streamline their communications.

Their users love

• Slack channels: divide your workspace into different channels to keep things organized

• Over 2000 integrations with tools like Contentsquare, Google Drive, Salesforce, and Hubspot

• Accessibility: Slack offers keyboard shortcuts, adjustable zoom levels, and different contrast settings

How does it help teams with product design?

Let’s face it, the design process involves a lot of back and forth. It’s difficult to keep our inboxes—and our minds—organized. Slack is a great solution for easier communication and collaboration.

Pro tip: use Contentsquare’s Slack integration to share insights from session replays and surveys. With all these insights in your shared messaging tool, you’ll pinpoint user issues quicker, keep all your critical insights in one place, and maintain great team communication.

How much does it cost?

Slack has a free plan with limited functionality, or 3 paid plans to choose from:

• Pro plan: €8.25/active user/month

• Business+ plan: €14,10/active user/month

• Enterprise Grid plan: upon request

Streamline your product design process by choosing the right tools

There are a wealth of tools that can help you through all the stages of the product design process. When choosing product design tools for your company, be sure to consider whether they suit your team’s unique needs and relate to your users' experiences and pain points.

Take a look at the options we’ve covered, think about how they could fit into your workflows, and discover how much easier your design process can be.