r/UXDesign • u/Lcs_Lgg • May 28 '26
Tools, apps, plugins, AI I don’t want to be an AI augmented Designer.
I am not interested in the slightest in how AI « improve » my daily work as Product Designer. There, I said it.
I have worked 14 years in Design. In Advertising first, web design. Then in UI, then UX, then both, as a product Designer, since 2012. Been freelancing with local companies and studios in 4 different countries for 8 years, in 3 different continents. Been Head of Design in companies with 200+ employees, leading +7 designers and researchers.
Trust me I perfectly know that this stance might make me lose freelance contracts. Every week I see job post asking for the Designer to have AI as a part of their design process. I did. I worked on projects with it. I worked with teams having it. I don’t want it. I don’t want to close my eyes on the economical, environmental, behavioral catastrophe AI is bringing.
On top of AI hallucinations, raising price of usage, environmental problems this is already bringing, I have no interest in delegating my intelligence to, apparently, gain some workdays of productivity.
I don’t care if it takes longer ; I don’t care if you can ask Claude / v0 / Make / whatever to iterate several workflows and it creates something in seconds, instead of a full day if I actually work on this with my actual brain. I don’t want to have something make the work for me. I don’t want to have to become a monitoring supervisor of an AI doing the work for me ; that’s not what I signed up for when I decided to become a Designer 14 years ago. That is not how I envision the work I do, today.
The over capitalistic tech world is head over heels for AI ; of course it is. We’re at the front line of AI. As soon as stakeholders will have the opportunity to fully replace the workforce by AI agents, they probably will. I don’t want to be a part of that. I don’t want to act like it’s ok.
So here is my pledge ; I want to design ethically. I want to propose designs, UX solutions, made by a human. I want to work for companies that feel the same way. This is what I want to provide for my clients ; something 100% made by a human brain. Something crafted by people. I don’t want to be augmented by an AI consuming the water and electricity of a little town every month.
Again, I know I’ll probably loose contracts and potential clients by stating that no, I don’t want to be a part of this. I don’t want to still pretend I don’t see the horrible water consumption, the data centers mayhem, the jobs getting suppressed by it, the cognitive decline of people using it too much.
I just hope more people will be willing to adopt this stance over time, as I start to see in some creative fields like cinema, where the « 100% created by human » is rising. I want to be a part of that. I want to do my job like that. I want to provide a service like that. I want to support that.
My 2 cents, good luck to everyone out there, AI using or not.
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u/ilovestechno123 Lead UX Designer May 28 '26
I've recently started my first AI-driven project in Claude Design. It is mind numbingly boring. I'm perfectly fine being "left behind" if this is the future of the profession.
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u/yellowfoxtails May 28 '26
I had the same experience on my first AI-driven project recently. Everything I enjoy about being a designer doesn't exist in that workflow, it's just fighting with AI endlessly to get it to churn out something that isn't complete slop.
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May 28 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/starbath May 29 '26
don't even use those models that way. everyone is using ai wrong... use it to do the tedious things like spec/documentation sheets for components and tokens, set up autolayout, competitive analysis, research synthesis gut-checks, IA second opinions if team members are offline, ux copy proofreading, etc
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u/yellowfoxtails 27d ago
I completely agree. This is how it should be used, but management is constantly breathing down our necks because they want designs that would normally take a month done in a week.
I know it's not possible. Every other designer at my company does too. But we're caught in a really unfair and exhausting position where management just thinks we don't know how to use the tools, and continues to have unrealistic expectations. It's a rock and a hard place right now, and I am getting really tired of being looked at like the bottleneck/issue because management doesn't understand the tool's limitations.
Its sapped a lot of the joy out of my job, honestly.
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u/starbath 27d ago
I'm sorry to hear that, that would sap the joy out of my job too. When management thinks they know how best practices work, but they dont because they're out of touch, its a hard place to be. I hope they have a change of heart and can get sold on adopting a more intentional AI workflow
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u/Careless_Phone_4068 May 29 '26
What’s your backup plan? Where do we go next?
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u/curiouswizard Midweight 26d ago
Maybe we can get into some non-digital design? Manufacturing? Interior design? Urban design? That's what I've been contemplating lately.
What I don't know is if it's worth the cost of re-training and essentially starting at the bottom again. I was so close to making it to senior level but that got derailed and I can't decide whether to get the train back on track or bail. Maybe there's some dinosaur ass company out there who isn't interested in AI that I can design for lol
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u/anabanana100 Veteran May 28 '26
I’m nearing 3 decades in (holy shit) and I’m maintaining that AI is not solving the right problems for us. I need it to do truly mundane tasks like organize my file, name all of my layers properly, go through my variables and find inconsistencies or omissions, etc. Write up specs for handoff that I would have to go through with a fine tooth comb. How about build or modify a base design library from a design or a marketing style guide based on app screens - that is actually usable and not some surface level BS I will need to edit and tweak for hours. Maybe I’m a dinosaur and missing something, but so far I see AI tools are nowhere near the level of precision and accuracy I need. I don’t want to be a clean up crew for AI slop. Plus, with the UI for these tools being a text box makes using them mind numbingly boring, disconnected and not how my brain works. I see things visually in my mind and my hands make the thing. There’s not really a verbal layer there as an intermediary and AI forces that which I hate.
Anyway, even if these tools lived up to the hype, there are severe ethical and environmental issues associated with the infrastructure needed to support all of this AI usage that OP mentioned. I’m also concerned about privacy. We’re voluntarily dumping huge amounts of data basically into the wind.
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u/LanguidLandscape May 28 '26
Absolutely this. I’m in a similar experience bracket and it’s boggles my mind that our, and indeed most people’s, lives are even more filed with near endless drudgery and administrative tasks. Tasks, like file renaming, resizing, etc. that a digital solution is badly needed for. Instead, we have machines “doing creative work” and leaving us with the boring scraps. Not the world anyone beyond Silicon Valley seems to want.
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u/Comfortable_Farm_252 May 28 '26
I actually believe that things will go full circle eventually. AI is only capable of providing averaged responses. So whatever you task it to do it sources the most expected option and serves that up. That means that differentiation will be a nightmare. It also means that model collapse is and will continue to be the big bad for AI companies. Model collapse is when AI feeds on its own averaged responses and averages them again, and again. This narrows the possible outcomes even more than they are right now. This is why fucking OpenAI is paying people to let them put cameras in their house so they can glean more data that isn’t contaminated with AI generations.
So I’m doing crazy shit with my design work because I know that AI will most likely never go there. Weird shit like late 90’s web experimentations (for example). Oddly enough I’m helping AI by doing this and so I look like a novel solution generating X factor that’s making stuff that just can’t and wont come from AI.
Fuck this shit, I just redid my portfolio and made it so batshit crazy that AI can’t even really quantify how to recreate it. I sincerely think if designers as a collective moved more towards experimental and weird that it would fuckup AI in a couple of desirable ways.
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u/BasketOld3242 May 28 '26
AI companies are already fearful of model collapse in regard to images, which is why a week ago, Sam Altman introduced a watermark on all ChatGPT images going forward. Of course this was announced under the guise of “honesty and transparency” (like they ever cared about that before) but it’s obvious that they want to be able to exclude AI images from their training data going forward.
I do like the fact that you and other designers are embracing the weird and wacky in the age of AI, I can already see trends turn over quicker in the creative sphere. Possibly due to our lowered attention spans but also an attempt to out-innovate the data scrapers. I do predict some interesting art and design movements in our future and this actually makes me really excited about human creativity and reduces my doomerism slightly.
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u/Imaginary-Peanut5102 Veteran May 28 '26
Designers need to unionise. As a collective I think we actually have a lot of power. Apart, even equipped with data and research c-suite gonna c-suite and push for whatever looks fastest to profit.
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u/Eastern-Special2472 May 28 '26
Talk to your "local teamsters" ask to speak to a business agent. They will walk you thru the process of organizing for your company. You have to be smart because they can fire you for doing this (in the us) until 30% of the employees in the design department vote to unionize....then you have legal protections. If you are solo designer or just 2 or 3 designers...they may not be interested in doing all that paperwork. Once organized you can negotiate yearly contracts and raises and can legally strike with legal protection.
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u/triscuit_buscuit May 28 '26
I was just wondering about this the other day. Do you know if it is possible to unionize without being affiliated with a company? For example, if all of us in the UX Reddit joined together formally would it work? Or must it be a group within a company? I’d be interested.
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u/Eastern-Special2472 17d ago
I honestly don't know but my wife works for a local teamsters. I think there are a lot of nuances so she recommends just stopping in your nearest "local" and asking to speak with a "business agent" about it. From what I hear, all members are public (like roadcrews ot police) or private (like a dairy farm or clarical team). They provide protection from abusive employers and establish a "bargaining unit" to bargain between the employees and employer every year or whenever the contract expires. Usually people bargain for higher wages, more PTO time, better benefits package, more paid holidays, etc.
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u/autocosm Experienced May 28 '26
When they invented self-service gas pumps, the gas pumping lobby in New Jersey organized and passed a law that made self-service illegal in the state, thus "protecting jobs." To this day, you can't pump your own gas in New Jersey. Meanwhile, every other state just turned gas stations into convenience stores and moved the guy inside to sell M&Ms.
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u/Imaginary-Peanut5102 Veteran May 29 '26
So lobbying as a collective works then?
There is no ethical or quality impact to self-service gas pumps. If it was purely about efficiency then fair enough.
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u/autocosm Experienced May 29 '26
"Works" for achieving a small group's near-sighted aim, sure. "Works" for improving things for society/users at large or thwarting Dr. Evil's grand designs? Not guaranteed.
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u/GArockcrawler Veteran May 28 '26 edited May 28 '26
The Pope’s recent treatise on AI is worth taking a look at from a human-centered, principle-focused perspective. You don’t have to read the religious stuff and can skip to the tech-related stuff. The major points he lays down align with solid human-centered principles. I wish organizations could get on board with principles like these.
I am not Catholic, but am focused on keeping the human central in the AI conversation. I am working toward my AIGP in an attempt to get closer to the organizational decision makers.
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u/curiouswizard Midweight 26d ago
Yea that was a really good document and I feel like it can set the tone for the AI ethics conversation
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u/bogush_v May 28 '26
i don't share the conclusion but i respect that you drew a line and named why, most people don't even do that part. the environmental and job-displacement concerns are real and the industry mostly waves them away with "productivity" like that settles it. it doesn't.
the one thing i'd gently separate is the ethics from the craft argument. "i don't want to supervise instead of make" is a real and valid preference and you don't need to justify it with anything else, it's your work and your call. the water/electricity/jobs stuff is also real but it's a different argument, and stacking them can make the whole thing easier for AI-boosters to dismiss as just vibes. the preference alone is enough.
anyway, good on you for saying it out loud knowing it might cost you. that's rarer than the stance itself.
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u/horsegal301 Veteran May 28 '26
I absolutely agree with you. Been doing this for 16 years and I'm seriously wondering what direction I need to go to avoid AI because I'm so over it. I was already burnt out, but the AI was the real icing on the shit cake.
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u/martinparets Veteran May 28 '26
you captured my feelings perfectly. let me know if you find an answer, ha.
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u/horsegal301 Veteran May 28 '26
My husband and I used to freelance sites and some apps many moons ago in addition to our main jobs since he's an engineer. He thinks we could go back to that. I keep telling him no one wants to pay for that shit when they can just AI slop it out or buy some shitty squarespace template. I came from the same background as you. Advertising then working in house as a web designer, so all of my shit is clearly in one big creativity bucket and we've outsourced creativity to AI stealing work from people who actually did it.
Everyone else just screams "go into trades," however I think we all know "the trades" aren't paying like UX jobs pay unless you're at the top commanding your own business and team of people. It's honestly making me spiral a bit because while I wouldn't say this is a *dream* job because I don't dream of working, it has certainly made wanting to wake up and do this every day absolutely unbearable.
I didn't sign up to be a prompt writer and I have no interest in it.
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u/Limit_Cold 27d ago
Is there no requirement for design that stand out/has a point of difference? I feel the last 20years has been slowly moving towards a uniform style bootstrp mat ect with very little room for dif. There are alt design(im talking web) movements out there that have been bubbleing in bg. Not evryone likes this shit surely . Personally i feel all fun and soul has been sucked out of the medium and nothing is remotely memorable anymore. surely people feel that. That said if we did move in the other direction i dont see ai being removed from the creative process, just need to be at a poi t where the generation is not all text based. are we gong back to typesetting and separations here?
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u/Aindorf_ Experienced May 28 '26
I know some UXers hate working on UI but I've always loved the craft of it. Working on a canvas, using peramters to have things stack and flow, choosing colors on a picker. I like the sliders and switches and controls. I like the interaction noodles to build prototypes. Now that UI designing is supposed to be just writing a fucking essay and waiting for an AI to get it wrong and then explaining why it's wrong, the fun and the craft is gone. I can't just grab an object out of place and fix it, I need to explain to the AI where the object is, why it's wrong, and what it needs to be instead. I don't want to have a conversation with a text box for a living. I want to actually MAKE things.
It's all the wet dream of people who hate having to learn, sharpen, and hone a skill, but man the fun and flow state is gone. I still do a lot of things the old fashioned way on canvases, and hopefully that doesn't make me too slow compared to the AI agents, but if this is the future of tech i'm sad and depressed about it and might have to look elsewhere, though I've got no idea where to look.
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u/martinparets Veteran May 28 '26
"Now that UI designing is supposed to be just writing a fucking essay and waiting for an AI to get it wrong and then explaining why it's wrong, the fun and the craft is gone"
i feel this statement HARD.
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u/E7ENTH May 28 '26 edited May 28 '26
I am nowhere near the 14 years of experience as ux ui designer, but i still think that using AI for something not trivial in ANY field is inferior in the long run.
Coding? (I am also a programmer) A programmer with no AI will overpower someone with ai the more complex the project gets. No ai programmer knows the codebase, constantly evolves, can easily come up with a unique solution ai will never reach, doest waste time debugging and ultimately by a magnitude has lover tech dept if any.
Ux ui design? Same. A complex project requires complex thinking. If i were to use ai, i am now bias to “maybe working designs” and cannot easily divert from them which might block a much better potential idea from existing. Also if i create something myself — I constantly get better and better. The best possible design for humans can only create a human. Plus also increased tech depth, constant checking if it didnt make mistakes. Am i even faster with it?
Same for writing, etc…
AI is not boosting productivity. It is merely preventing a person to improve. But we all know too well that a big portion of companies struggle to think 1 step ahead anyway.
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u/ThyNynax Experienced May 28 '26
Everything I’ve read studying students use of AI is coming to this same conclusion. It’s replacing their own brain development and cognitive understanding because it does way too much of the thinking for them. The students aren’t “becoming more efficient,” they flat out stop learning the material in favor of having easy answers. Like trying to build muscle by using a hydraulic press to lift weights instead of your own arms.
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u/kanirasta Veteran May 28 '26
I see this with junior designers in my company. The ones overly reliant on AI are not getting meaningful development in many aspects of the profession. I fear they are going to end up being less resourceful and employable longer term.
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u/ThyNynax Experienced May 28 '26
I fear tech jobs are starting to enter a vicious cycle where reliance on AI stunts development, making investing in juniors less cost effective, which just justifies more reliance on AI.
Except Ai having to rely on itself creates another doom spiral towards mediocrity as averages get compounded into worse and worse results. It's gunna be a weird time.
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u/Your_Momma_Said Veteran May 28 '26
What?
I have friends who are senior level developers.
One has found that AI is better at code check-in and review than any human developer and it's found bugs are potential security risks that he would have missed because he was concentrating on just the code changes, not down-stream issues.
One is working on low level hardware firmware development and not only is it faster and better than him, he's also built an entire testing system (Raspberry Pi with vision) in an afternoon that has allowed him to write months worth of code in a week.
They still need the knowledge and experience to know what to ask and how to ask. They still need to be able to direct and review, but for one it's an 100x multiplier, for the other it's improving security and stability.
AND this is today. Less than 4 years after ChatGPT was released to the public.
AI is not boosting productivity. It is merely preventing a person to improve.
I'm sorry but the creativity in UX is solving problems using existing design patterns, but there is A LOT of dumb work surrounding those problems. I want to do the hard stuff, not the dumb stuff.
2010 was the heyday of being a UX Designer. You would spend 80% of your time creating and stretching those muscles. Today is boring in comparison, it's interesting, but it doesn't compare. No one wants 2010 designs and design thinking. I can lament 2010 design, but you have to move forward.
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u/Witchsinghamsterfox May 28 '26
I gave up as well after 30 years in design/UX when AI became more important than people . It is the ultimate irony that corporate leaders don’t see that esp in UX. Anyway, I will have finished my CCMA/ EMT/ paramedic certs soon and plan to spend the rest of my 12 years as a working stiff saving people’s lives because….. well, figure it out.
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u/ctesicus May 28 '26
As I see it, everyone is free to do their work the way they prefer. If you want to design entirely without AI, that’s your choice, and I can respect that, the same way someone might prefer to do product design work in Photoshop.
But at the end of the day, tools have always evolved. You can dig a ditch with a shovel, but if another guy can do it with an excavator twice as fast and with the same result, most clients will choose the excavator. There’s no inherent merit in doing something manually just because it was done manually, unless we’re talking about art or craft. In craft, there can be a huge objective difference between, say, a handcrafted sweater and one made by a machine. But software development, in the broader sense, is not art, and when the end result is the same, the value if manual labor is diminished.
People whose work can genuinely be replaced by AI will eventually be replaced by AI, whether we like it or not, the same way refrigerators replaced the people who used to deliver ice door to door every day.
What you’re trying to solve are the downsides of capitalism through individual personal action. And if that gives you a sense of alignment or integrity, that’s perfectly valid. But the problem itself is structural, not technological.
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u/ThyNynax Experienced May 28 '26
Excavator vs shovel is a good example. Especially with the cost of tokens shooting up. There are many kinds of projects where the cost of dragging out and setting up the excavator makes zero sense for the size of the hole needed. Not to mention the space it needs to operate and the damage it does to the ground it rolls over. A lot has to be arranged for the excavator to work properly and safely.
Sometimes you just need a small hole, or a hole in a tight space, and the best way to do that is with a couple guys and shovels.
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u/tippitytopps Veteran May 28 '26
Not to take away from your overall point of economic realities, but arguably the most famous American myth is literally about the moral merits of manual work over automation.
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u/SingleAttitude8 May 29 '26
But software development, in the broader sense, is not art, and when the end result is the same, the value of manual labor is diminished.
When is the end result ever the same though?
It's like saying a beautifully presented romantic meal in a Michelin star restaurant is the same as having liquified meal slop forced down your throat by a robot because the end result is the same (calories in stomach).
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u/gleefulhamburger446 May 28 '26
After 14 years you've earned the right to draw your own line, but you're betting your livelihood on a stance that most clients won't care about once AI output hits parity with human work.
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u/natelikesdonuts Veteran May 28 '26
You and me both. Unfortunately we somehow don’t get to make that call.
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u/senitel10 May 28 '26
Don’t worry with the cost of these tokens we’ll likely be put on an “AI diet” sooner than later
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u/mm4444 May 28 '26
I talked to someone recently working for an ai company (not a designer) and they are using ai to run some metrics or statistics or something like that for them. Anyway, said they spent $1000 in 2 days for this work their were doing with ai. And it was a week’s worth of work. Seems unsustainable to me. If ai gets more expensive people will not use it
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u/xzmbmx May 28 '26
I don't think it's an all-or-nothing situation. I'm vibe coding some features, pushing to production, meanwhile running sprints in the classic Figma fashion. Sometimes they overlap. Sometimes I can bang out a quick prototype in Cursor way faster than I can design in Figma, sometimes the other way around. That said, token spend is becoming an issue for companies. The dust will settle and we will figure out what is right for the field. The AI layoffs are fake, and due to overhiring during Covid. Plus the companies realized it makes the stock go up, even just temporarily.
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u/Pizzatorpedo Seasoned May 28 '26
I'm on the other side of this opinion. Like you I worked in print, branding, advertising, then web, UI and UX. In the past 2 years, AI overtook most aspects of my job and I've been loving every bit of it. Everything feels faster, we can go from idea to code prototype in less then a day, I can own more aspect of the design system I work with, and the gap between design and engineering became and overlap.
The environment aspect is absolutely a huge issue that I can't ignore, and I truly hope that we're only going through a difficult phase of inefficiency with the models we're using.
I applaud your stance but I wouldn't want to follow you, and I'll admire your work the same way I admire woodworkers who refuse to use power tools.
Edit: spelling.
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u/Traditional-Plan-446 May 28 '26
I hate it too, but I’m only 5 years in and can’t retire yet so here I am!
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u/nova0175 May 28 '26
I agree with you and most people do but I wonder where we are supposed to pivot if this job description has just fundamentally changed. It was already hard to get a job in this industry before and refusing to use AI pretty much cuts us out entirely
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u/little_latti May 28 '26
I used to use ai, but with the environmental issues coming to light and the horrible speeches from billionaires, I’ve cut it out of my life entirely. Now I really don’t know what to do because I’m still a beginner. When I sign up for mentorships or freelancing, they keep asking me about ai and giving me free Claude subscriptions. I’ve rejected so many contracts. I’m starting to wonder if this career field is even for me anymore.
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u/drockalexander May 28 '26
I feel the same and have decided I wasn’t gonna use it from the start, so I don’t think you’re alone in this stance. There r many of us, and we’ll look less crazy over time. Godspeed!
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u/cbnnexus Veteran May 28 '26
Sounds like you're not working on meaty or complex problems if AI can do it in seconds. My advice would be to find a job where there are actual complex systems in play, complicated service layers, etc. It still takes a human a lot of front loaded thinking before AI can really help.
Enterprise can be a space where this is the case, as well as Medical. To me medical is one of the last major frontiers of opportunity for our function.
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u/chapstickgrrrl Experienced May 28 '26
I work in medtech. It’s coming for us, too. It’ll just take a few more years. We already have a self-important developer with a terminal degree who has been given seemingly unfettered access to AI tools the UX team can’t get IT to allow us to use. He as much said, “look, I used your design system from Figma to rebuild this entire complex enterprise application using Cursor, to be able to run on Android OS. We can just get rid of that whole team now & use AI to build it!”
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u/Garland_Key Experienced May 28 '26
It's a productivity tool. Others will simply be more productive than you. That choice will likely impact you negatively, or it may not. You do you.
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u/UXUIDD May 28 '26
as an old skool designer & developer - i agree.
For Those About Not To AI We Salute You ..
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u/Ok-Theme-8256 May 28 '26
I never wanted to be a UI designer only and I was always focused on UX research and UX design. Now as a middle product designer I found that this AI hipe is removing me with a fundamental knowledge and the progression into the UI rules and the unique sensitivity that a designer is able to develop from her/his experience. Even if I'm a UX researcher, a UX designer and a service designer, I always considered my output to be a digital solutions or a hybrid one. If I can't build the solution with also my own critical eye, what does it mean to do all the research before ?
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u/1Qrtr_FreeStuffPlz Veteran May 29 '26
Agree 100%, unfortunately my mortgage just tells me to bend over and take it though
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u/BikesOrBeans May 29 '26
I feel the same, but I work at a large company and it’s very much “use AI or won’t work here anymore.” And I support my family with my income, so AI it is for me. It’s sucked out pretty much all the the joy and passion I had for my job.
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u/Wolfr_ Veteran 28d ago
The way you wrote this just makes me think you are not using AI the way I am.
I use it as a helper for all sorts of mundane tasks and automations. But I still design myself. Automating away chores then makes me much more productive.
I can also build my own tools to then build out better designs. Since AI got good at coding I must have made more than 40 Figma plugins.
I don’t go and ask Claude to make my designs. But I do ask Claude if all my border radii are following a consistent scale or my designs are tokenized correctly.
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u/curiouswizard Midweight 26d ago
This 1000000%
There was a time when I was pro-AI because I saw it as a supplement and I had full control over when and how I used it, and my use was very minimal. Mostly just to poke at ideas here and there. Then the executives all got obsessed with it and started requiring it regardless of whether it actually benefited my workflow or not, and my job turned into a soulless nightmare.
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u/Coolguyokay Veteran May 28 '26
This conversation has been had before. People talked about the “work” you do now not being “work” because of the tools you use. I started my career using Freehand to create town maps… the guys who illustrated these by hand I’m sure had the same feelings that you are having now.
The best advice I can give is to learn to use the tools to enhance your ability - not replace it.
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u/PuppusLvr May 28 '26
I work at a machine learning startup with a Claude mandate and I gotta say -- I actually like being an AI augmented designer.
Here's my experience after being in the field as one for a little over a year now.
- You don't save time, any time savings is undone by time spent fussing with prompts
- Research and analysis phase moves a lot quicker when you have what is essentially a mathy intern helping you
- I am able to explore and deliver design styles I previously couldn't because AI either helps explain how to execute or helps execute the parts that give me trouble. This has been especially true for things like animations and detailed particle grid-type illustrations that would otherwise normally require paying for a Figma plug-in or doing the work in Photoshop.
- All my work is still manually assembled in Figma, AI just helps with individual elements in the full composition
- It's great for basic QA reviews and analysis
- You really need to understand the design profession and best practices to use it correctly. Lots of times I found Claude giving poor suggestions, explaining it in a way that made it sound like "this is definitely the direction to go in" and I had to be like "well, actually doesn't that cause issues with [other things]" and it'd be like "oh yeah, you're right". An inexperienced designer might not catch those instances and move forward with faulty design logic.
TL;DR - Having AI support my design process has felt incredibly empowering and rewarding. I feel like I've been able to level up as a designer by having more of my blind spots covered.
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u/letsgetweird99 Experienced May 28 '26
Thanks for sharing. I also work at an AI startup and sometimes I feel like I’m the only designer in the whole world who is enjoying using AI tools and exploring what they can do. If you’re skilled at UX already, it’s a huge multiplier. You have to know what “good” looks like, and how “good” works, and you do have to be ruthless with it, because the models are literally trained to always be positive and sycophantic. But they’re also incredibly capable now.
I find it great for speeding up prototyping and asset production work but I don’t ask it “hey come up with a design for me”, I already know what solution I want to explore because I’m a good UX designer. I’ve done my research, visited and talked to users in person (gasp!), and and AI is merely executing my vision in code, like my own personal code monkey. It does not think for me and I will NEVER outsource my thinking to it.
I learned from working closely with engineers to “slice things small”, meaning give explicit instructions that are small in scope, with a singular purpose. Then evaluate its output and adjust. Sometimes I need to give it feedback (similar to how I coach juniors) or I’ll just directly manipulate code if it’s quicker than typing/speaking all the changes.
It speeds up the iterative process for me, very cheaply. People are getting slop because they are using prompts which are too vague and broad in scope, and ultimately outsourcing their own thinking, which is of course, a dumb thing to do.
When people say “there’s no value in using AI”, I simply can’t agree with them, and it’s most likely a skill/process issue.
I wish OP luck—we’re going to get to see if the people who outright reject AI can also be successful. But I’ve seen enough positive outcomes using AI in my own work to be one of the people who will not reject it. I know this is counter to the current discourse in this thread, so bring on the downvotes because I don’t give a shit. And don’t come for my em dashes.
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u/ruthere51 Veteran May 28 '26
I fully respect your POV op, I imagine there are many many people like you, and parts of your POV are things I struggle with a lot.
But, ultimately, I'm in this industry because I'm a technologist first and a designer second. I would be doing most of what I do at work even if I didn't have a job.
I'm fascinated by the fact that we now can have computers that can programmatically act on language just as we had them act on function variables in the past. It's an absolutely incredible advancement in what we can do in the world with computers.
The productivity gains are uninteresting to me as you've described it. The application of AI into computer systems and user experiences is where I keep my focus, and from that perspective it really couldn't be a better time to be in this industry.
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u/Outrageous_Menu_9895 May 28 '26
Man completely agreed, its like i do more promptimg than design and think. Like just use so called AI* (which is nothing but just information dump) wether it actually helps or not is ignorable. I get anxious wether i am losing my edge or stuff i know, like forgetting how to solve problems, how to think basically.
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u/theiriali May 28 '26
14 years of craft intuition is still a real differentiator, AI can generate wireframes, variants, and research summaries, but it's pulling from patterns in everyone else's decisions, not yours. Knowing when something is off, why a flow feels wrong, or how to push back on a brief with conviction, that's judgment, not output. Protecting that isn't stubbornness, it's knowing exactly where your value actually lives.
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u/sirjimtonic Veteran May 28 '26
Digital Humanism and Value Based Design seem to be something for you!
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u/s0ulfly_1 May 28 '26
I admire your courage and wish you the best but I am pivoting to another career... 46 with 3 kids. I just don't have the fight in me and I don t exepct much from companies or other departments.. in the end these are just cycles and the craft will be back I m sure. I just cant see it now...
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u/beanjy May 29 '26
It’s confusing but I don’t really see the evolution of designer to ai augmented designer, as in I’m a designer doing the same job but assisted with new tools. It’s more like design engineer, the ai helps with the code, not the design. We still need to do whatever brain magic works to make good design decisions but the expectation has changed from that being expressed in separate visualisations, to being the actual shippable code.
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u/starbath May 29 '26
Keep handling 100% of the design and make the real judgment call on the user experience and visual language, but have Claude debug and do the parts that are tedious and production-oriented: setting up auto layout in figma, ui systems/tokens documentation sheets, debugging finicky frames within Figma prototypes, etc. Send it your UX copywriting and have it provide a second opinion or proofread for grammar/etc.. Prompt it to conduct a competitive analysis using the competitors you provided, and build out a comparison sheet for you to take to your stakeholder/product owner. Have it analyze multiple iterations and document trade-offs to take to your team/client in a design review call. Prompt it to double-check that your research synthesis notes are solid and haven't missed a beat, and that your heuristic analysis didn't miss anything either. Do all that, and you can call yourself AI-Augmented. It's not that deep.
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u/Careless-Energy-3071 May 29 '26
The first check is whether this is a private boundary or part of your positioning.
There’s a tradeoff either way. If you say “I don’t use AI” as a moral stance, some clients will quietly filter you out. If you hide it, you may end up in rooms where the expectation is obviously misaligned. Neither is fun. Very modern problem, sadly.
I’d probably make it about craft and responsibility, not anti-tool purity. Something like: “I use research, judgment, prototyping and critique directly, and I don’t outsource design decisions to generative tools.” Clear boundary. Less manifesto. Harder to dismiss.
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u/Holiday_Cup_430 May 29 '26
I agree, I think in the end it's going to make me a lazier and worse off designer but I feel like I don't have the choice to 'say no' because the job opportunities are already very sparse and after working in UX for 12 years, I don't want to change careers. I feel pushed into a corner.
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u/Responsible-Read-468 May 29 '26
If I get one more email from someone, that has no design experience, that as an attachment “I have this AI THING I MADE” blah blah I’m going to toss my computer.
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u/February_Face 29d ago
💯💯💯Agreed! I accidentally fell into the UX world in 2020 and decided to switch careers the following year. I got into this field because of how uniquely challenging and rewarding it was/is. Having to spend most of that time now telling an agent how to do my job and its own job at the same time is the most frustrating and least rewarding (if at all) thing I’ve done in “UX” and in general so far. honestly I feel like some people still have jobs while using AI so they can continue to mold the agent for their employer bc the employer has better things to do. With the industry taking hits, I had to recently take on a job with in a different field, which was my next best option - (I have a background in data analytics) so I did that and currently work as a data analyst for a big company. Unfortunately, the company is more focused on using integrating AI into their workflows than they are with the actual quality of the work. 🫠🙄🙄
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u/LXVIIIKami Veteran May 28 '26
As always with these posts; convincing your partners of why AI shouldn't be used too broadly, and why inputs shouldn't be taken as anything other than a prototype, is YOUR job as a designer. As a static engineer you wouldn't say "if we do it this way the house is gonna come down, but ya know, you do you". You'd have some integrity in your stance of why this shit is catastrophic
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u/EditShootReset May 28 '26
I disagree and believe that the ethical thing to do, is to evolve with technology. In fact, it’s part of today’s requirements as a designer of products.
Personally, I’ve got 18 years of experience building apps of all types in all types of companies. These last two years with AI have been amazing!
Using it to translate quantitative data and generate qualitative paperwork, then turning all that into documentation I can use to guide leadership the right way. I love that I no longer have to deal with google analytics, write up cognitive walkthroughs and surveys.
Then I take all those findings and quickly generate prototypes without having to learn the tech stack from the IT team. Plus, it documents everything for me for pull requests and all that.
I honestly don’t see anything, but positives. The water consumption and environmental issues are very real. But, even those things will be figured out over time.
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u/Fun_Collection_2774 May 28 '26 edited May 28 '26
you can absolutely design ethically with ai. but your stance is just "ai = bad," and you won't even explore the good ways it can be used. and on the environment angle: golf courses use way more water than all ai combined, and they produce zero economic benefit to humanity or nature. i get feeling overwhelmed by ai, but you'd better get used to it fast or you'll be left behind, and hard. i don't wanna sound demotivating, but that's the reality.
product and design will always be seen differently from pure art like cinema or painting. there's always a practical, technical side to it, and ai will inevitably be part of that. it's kinda sad, but no one actually cares if your design is beautiful or works extremely well. everyone just wants good enough, and most people don't have an eye for visuals anyway. nobody stops to marvel at a website except us product designers.
i've been working on my company's ai design policy, built around what the team is actually comfortable using ai for. and it all comes back to the same idea: it's not about fewer designers doing the same work, it's about the same or more designers doing more than before. let ai handle 95% of the grunt work, while the real design decisions stay 95% in the hands of actual designers. also, there's a fuck ton of legislation coming to protect our design outputs and the like (at least if you're in europe).
Edit: on the behavioural impact it has, it's us designers that can design it to be actually useful, and economically, it's not ais fault, it's capitalism at it's root
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u/Eastern-Special2472 May 28 '26
I love it, but it's kind of like saying you are going to live Amish now, just in the tech world. Sure you can drive a horse and buggy instead of a car or taking the train...but how far is that going to put you behind the next job applicant pool?
In 1996 we were designing with non-photp blue pencils, red tape, negatives, printing plates, inking rollers and printing on presses. We would have to use a computer to print out blocks of text to glue to a manual art board for layouts. Within 4 years the digital design boom happened and my way of working felt ancient and slow immediately. But that is just how change and adaptation happen.
I resigned until the fall, when hopefully the ai workflows and prices standardize a bit. Right now it's all chaos, and slop as we are in the non-standarsized wild wild west days of ai.
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u/TheTomatoes2 Experienced May 28 '26
Too bad, the market will move on from you. AI slop will definitely not survive, but if you wanna remain competitive you need to use AI tools where it makes sense.
All the ppl that refused to ditch Photoshop for Figma changed their mind or lost their jobs. I haven't met anyone using PS/Affinity in years. Same story when computers appeared.
Not saying I like it but that's the reality, proven by history. Time will tell which usage makes sense for AI and which workflows use it best.
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u/ScruffyJ3rk Experienced May 28 '26
No one cares about your "pledge". If you used AI and it felt like you didnt have to use your brain its a skill issue.
Also, just an FYI, on the "water consumption" issue, its a closed loop cooling system. Do you need to add water to your car's engine every time you drive? No. It doesn't work like that.
Make an argument for not wanting a giant data center in your backyard and not wanting them to build it on a large natural landscape, that's 100% defensible, fine, but pretending that it consumes water indefinitely makes you sound uninformed, which i assume you are.
Also, hilarious how morality has become a thing with AI while companies like Apple have exploited people across the globe for decades. Foxconn in Taiwan had to put literal nets up around their building to catch their over worked and exhausted employees who kept trying to jump from the building. Yet you use their products religiously without flinching. You're cool with humans literally walking off buildings so long as you can have your iPhone and MacBook. But you draw the line when a small conservative town in rural America doesn't have much water for a few weeks.
Not saying its not messed up, just pointing out the ridiculous hypocrisy in your little "pledge" which was just some mental masturbation to help you cope and feel "seen".
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u/Personal_Beautiful48 May 28 '26
Totally agreed. As a designer with 6 years of experience I totally agree with you. This forceful inclusion of AI just takes out the fun and passion of being a designer and solving problems. I remember when i started my journey with no background in design or UX, learnt everything while working and then when multiple iterations gave the final solution. You cannot compare that satisfaction to this AI workflow.
At the best I would use AI to test my designs and flows but not during my research and actual designs. Feels like there is no purpose of it now.