UI/UX design agencies help bring brands to life and deliver optimized user experiences with well-researched and thoughtfully designed websites, apps, and products.
All of the agencies on this list offer a full array of design and strategy services. Each is a great option to consider. Frog leaps to the top of our list because of its comprehensive service offering and its longevity and experience.
The Top UI/UX Design Agencies: Our Top Three
We review five of the top UI/UX design agencies in this article. If you’re short on time, these are our top three picks.
Frog: Best overall UI/UX design agency because of its robust service offerings and decades of expertise working with clients across diverse industries. Contact Frog today to learn more.
Clay: Design solutions that stand the test of time and transparent communication makes Clay a winner. Reach out and learn how Clay can help you.
Desigit: When you want a humanity-centric and sustainable approach, Designit should be at the top of your list. Get in touch with Designit today.
Frog: Best Overall UI/UX Design Agency
Frog is one of the oldest, most established design agencies in the world. They’ve been around for more than 50 years and work with clients of all sizes in virtually every industry.
Frog’s 500+ employees serve its clients from 35 locations around the world, spanning every continent. The agency has worked with global brands like Unilever, Volvo, and IKEA, but is also at home helping startups scale and established businesses launch new lines.
What earns Frog the top spot on this list is the robustness of their service offerings and their focus on research-backed design. The agency’s “human-centered design approach” puts a priority on deeply understanding user needs, behaviors, and desires. They surface these through rigorous UX research methods.
Frog’s portfolio and case study collection is impressive. Whether you’re in the financial services, consumer products, technology, communications, retail, healthcare, social impact, or automotive and mobility industry, Frog provides a related case study detailing the solutions it created for customers just like you.
Its services are equally broad. Along with a full menu of UX services including research, strategy, and design, Frog also offers help with business growth and strategy, branding, marketing, and enablement. Everything you need at every stage of growth is offered.
No matter where your business is at growth-wise or what your ultimate goals are, Frog is a one-stop-shop to help you with proven UX/UI design and much more. Get in touch with them today.
Designit: Best for Sustainable Design
Sustainability is a buzzword that lots of brands toss out without any data to back it up. Designit is not one of those brands.
The agency puts its sustainable philosophy front and center on its website with its Do No Harm approach. It’s a framework the agency delivers to drive “responsible and sustainable business practices.”
Designit goes one step further by highlighting how it puts sustainability first in each client project. It offers a full suite of services that help brands understand how to adopt a sustainable role in the world and design and launch products and services that live up to the sustainability ethos. Designit also extends sustainability efforts to its own employees, helping them become sustainability changemakers.
The agency offers three prongs of service.
- Innovation & Futures covers business and product design, creative technology, and an innovation lab.
- Brand & Marketing offers brand and digital design, brand strategy, and design research.
- Experience & Loyalty delivers service design, UX design, and customer experience management.
Designit is also very up front about how it uses generative AI in the design process. As you would expect, it aligns with the brand’s focus on doing good for the people and planet. The agency deploys AI technology with a “humanity-centric approach” that includes a focus on where AI can help clients streamline operations and speed up prototype testing and product design while respecting existing processes and practices.
Designit has been in business for more than 30 years, and operates from 13 design studios around the globe, including U.S. locations in Seattle and New York. It works with clients in diverse industries, including energy, finance, healthcare, aviation, lifestyle, mobility, nonprofit, public sector, retail, and technology.
Reach out to Designit to find out how they can help you.
Clay: Best for Future-Proof Designs
Clay bills itself as a global branding and UX design agency. It works with clients at every growth phase, from startup to Fortune 100 companies. Some of its most recognizable clients include Meta, Google, Amazon, and Slack.
Clay operates from its San Francisco headquarters, has a team of 78, and has been in business for 14 years. The agency’s services include branding, digital product and website designs, content and asset creation, and website and product development. It works across diverse verticals, including technology, food & beverage, healthcare and life sciences, logistics, ecommerce, and more.
Clay made this list for several reasons. First, we like that Clay’s co-founders are still in the trenches, leading teams and delivering results. We also appreciate Clay’s lazer focus on great communication between client and agency, whether it is a scrappy startup or established enterprise brand.
But the biggest reason is because Clay designs solutions that scale. The agency notes it has numerous products and websites in its portfolio that have remained unchanged–and still fully functional–for more than five years. This means when you work with Clay, you’ll get a design that delivers a great experience today and in the long-term.
Clay offers a wide selection of case studies that showcase its digital products, websites, and branding work. The case studies are cleanly laid out in a colorful, fresh, and visually appealing way. Lots of visuals, little text. The overall experience gives you a glimpse into the agency’s tone and style.
In another nod to the agency’s transparent approach, Clay also offers a blog that is filled with timely and helpful design information, strategy, and tactics. This willingness to share so much is something not seen by many other agencies on this list.
And a quick shout-out about Clay’s website. It is a joy to browse. Clean, with dynamic visuals and streamlined, plainspeak copy. No industry jargon or word salad to be found. This tells us a lot about what it’s like to work with the agency, and we like it.
If you’re a forward-thinking brand with an eye on solutions that stand the test of time, you can’t go wrong with Clay. Get in touch today.
Fantasy: Best for Connecting Emotionally With Users
Fantasy is well-known in the design industry for its ability to tap into user emotion through innovative, engaging, and visually stunning designs. While that should be the goal of all design agencies, Fantasy dials up the impact (and results) with incredible animation, elevated graphic design, and impactful visual storytelling.
Fantasy’s client roster is diverse and represents a wide cross-section of industries and recognizable names, including Google, LG, Samsung, Pfizer, and Royal Caribbean. The agency even has worked with the NFL.
Fantasy does it all, from designing operating systems and digital ecosystems to creating products and apps to helping brands leverage AI and more. Its work spans nearly every industry and vertical, too.
Browsing Fantasy’s website is unlike any other website on this list. Its site superbly showcases the agency’s focus on immersive user experiences. It is easy to get lost as you browse the multi-media offerings on display.
We spent more time than we needed looking around and soaking it all in. We watched video snippets, admired stylish animations, and even popped over to the agency’s Dribble portfolio to consume more content. It was all a delight.
Fantasy is another agency that makes it a point to call out its commitment to open communications. It wants the client-agency relationship to feel like natural extensions of each other’s teams.
Fantasy, founded in 1999, is headquartered in New York City and has a dispersed workforce around the world. If you want to elevate your brand, product, or service with stunning visual designs, contact Fantasy to get started.
Ramotion: Best for Technology Brands and Startups
Ramotion is unique among the list for the focus the agency puts on its work with digital products and brands, especially those in the startup phase. Ramotion goes out of its way to call out the impressive statistics associated with the startups it has worked with.
$1 billion in raised capital, $6 billion in exits. Ramotion positions its design services as an integral part of these companies’ success. It has a complete service offering dedicated to helping brands prepare for M&A or IPO.
The agency also works with small and mid-size companies, including the likes of Turo and Crunchbase. But Ramotion doesn’t just play small. There are very recognizable enterprise-level names in their client roster, including Adobe, Salesforce, and Netflix.
Ramotion offers a full slate of design and strategy services and web app development to clients in industries that span B2B, SaaS, fintech, cybersecurity, and healthcare. The agency helps clients build design systems that allow for better alignment and consistency within internal teams and product designs.
Like Clay, another agency on this list, Ramotion puts a lot of great information out on its company blog. That’s a nod to both the openness of the agency and its commitment to working with startups that don’t always have a depth of UX/UI design, strategy, or branding expertise. The blog even has a #startup tag you can use to quickly consolidate relevant information.
One other thing we really like about Ramotion is the emphasis it puts on collaboration with its clients. It wants you to consider agency professionals an extension of your internal teams who just happen to work remotely.
Ramotion is San Francisco-based, with additional offices in Los Angeles and New York City. The agency has 70+ team members and has delivering solid results for 15 years. If you’re in startup mode or simply want to work with a dynamic, fresh design team, contact Ramotion today.
What Matters Most When Reviewing UI/UX Design Agencies
Choosing the best UI/UX design agency for your project requires legwork on your part. Before you dive in, it helps to have a framework. These are the seven criteria we consider essential when choosing the best design partner.
Portfolio and case studies
What it means: You want to work with an agency that understands your business. They don’t need to know your industry inside-out, but some familiarity is definitely helpful.
Why it matters: The best design agency in the world will struggle if they have no idea how your industry works, what industry norms are, or what your customers want. UI/UX design is not a one-size-fits-all solution. What works for a finance client isn’t going to work for a beauty brand. There’s no universal design template that applies to everything.
What to look for: Look at two things–the agency’s portfolio and case studies. The portfolio should demonstrate a wide range of completed projects, including at least a few similar to your business or industry. Is the quality up to your expectations? Do the solutions reflect what you want to see in your own finished project? The answers to both should be an unqualified “yes.”
The case studies should demonstrate not only the solution but also explain how the agency got there. Is there insight into their critical problem-solving skills? Do they outline their design process? Case studies should build your confidence in the agency beyond just an eye-catching solution.
Experience and expertise
What it means: This isn’t necessarily how long the agency has been around. Some of the newest agencies on the block have a great depth of expertise across their team. Look beyond agency age and surface individual talents and professional history.
Why it matters: You want to hire an agency that knows more about UI and UX design than you do, especially as it relates to your industry. That means finding agencies with experienced people. Of course, not every person at an agency is going to have decades of experience, and that’s fine. Newer talent often brings innovation to the table.
What you ultimately want is a mix of experience levels that come together to give you a solid foundation for creating great end results.
What to look for: Find out details about the individuals who will work on your account. What projects have they done? What’s their education and work experience background? Do they have experience with your industry?
The goal is to get an understanding that goes beyond the agency’s glossy website and marketing speak.
Workflow and communication
What it means: You have to have open lines of communication with your agency. Full stop. Being kept in the dark or feeling like an intrusion when you ask a question are red flags. You also need to understand the agency’s work process and how it plans to keep you updated throughout the working relationship.
Why it matters: Great UI/UX design doesn’t happen in a vacuum. Yes the agency has the expertise, that’s why you hired them. But as the client, you have valuable insights the agency needs to do the best job possible. Updates have to be openly shared along the way. This helps avoid bad design decisions or the need to re-do work because it missed the mark.
What to look for: You should ask about timelines, what communication methods the agency uses, how milestones will be delivered, what the expectations are for you to provide feedback. Also find out early on who your main point-of-contact will be.
The ultimate working relationship is one where both sides get the information they need in the timeframe they need it.
Client reviews
What it means: You want to read or hear from others who used the agency before you. This will give you insights to what the actual working relationship was like.
Why it matters: An agency is only going to focus on the positives when talking about itself. Getting insights from past clients is a great way to balance out what you hear. Clients’ direct experiences can reveal things you might never find in your own interactions with the agency.
What to look for: Start by reading any and all independent reviews you can find about the agency. A quick Google search may surface some information. You can also do some digging on sites like LinkedIn. You should also ask the agency to provide a list of clients you can speak to.
Research
What it means: User research is essential for any project. You want to know if, when, and how the agency conducts both qualitative and quantitative UX research to support design decisions.
Why it matters: Great design is about giving users the best experience on your site or app. You do that by fully understanding what users like, where they struggle, and how design can be improved to best meet user needs.
Without research, design happens in a bubble. That means your site or app is just as likely to deliver a sub-par user experience as a great one.
What to look for: Ask the agency to describe its approach to research. What tools are used and why? How does it run the research phase? What’s your role? You should leave that conversation satisfied that the agency understands the importance of user research and has a plan to surface the data needed to make solid design choices.
Team rapport
What it means: To get the best results, you must be able to easily communicate and work with the people responsible for your design project. You don’t have to become best friends, but you should feel comfortable engaging with them.
Why it matters: A positive working environment with open lines of communication usually results in better finished solutions. Tension or misunderstandings during the project often deliver the opposite. When you have good rapport, concerns get addressed quickly, pitfalls are avoided, and projects coast along faster to completion.
What to look for: Find out every team member who will work on your project. While you may have a primary point of contact for logistics purposes, there will be times when you will be meeting directly with the larger team.
Get to know them. Get a feel for what working with them will be like. Your project will likely take months and require regular interactions. It is best to get started with a team you align with.
How to Get Started with UI/UX Design Agencies
Choosing the best UI/UX design agency for your needs is a subjective process. There’s no one-size-fits-all formula to follow. But there are some helpful tips to keep in mind.
- Do your research. Find out as much as you can about any agency you’re considering. Talk to past clients. Read as much as you can on independent sites like LinkedIn. Do some Google searches and follow the credible links to learn more.
- Study the agency’s website. Start with a view of the layout, design, and functionality. There will be big differences among how agencies approach all three. Some are formal, some relaxed. Some rely on industry jargon. Others plain speak. The website will clue you in to the agency’s vibe and approach.
- Contact the agency, but prepare first. You’ll have to reach out to initiate a dialogue. Before you do, be sure to go through the tips we offer above in the “What Matters Most…” section and prepare ahead of time to make the most of the future conversations you will have.
- Ask for a proposal. After you narrow your options to a short list, ask them for an in-depth proposal outlining what they can do for you–and how much it will cost.
From there you can make an educated decision that aligns with your goals and budget.
Of course, if you want to cut to the chase, you can reach out to Frog right now and see how they can help.
