We’re unashamed fans of books.
Real, paper, pick-me-up-and-flip-through-me books. Sure, we follow a ton of blogs, Twitter feeds, discussion forums and even online courses … but nothing beats an old-fashioned book for structured learning at your own pace on a lazy Sunday afternoon.
Below is our collection of recommended reading. These are the titles that have helped us along the way, and we hope you’ll find them useful too. We plan on posting some summaries and reviews over the coming months, and we’ll update this list with more books as we find new gems or old favourites at the back of the shelf.
In the meantime, know that every book listed below comes highly recommended. Read this collection and you won’t go far wrong in your journey to UX mastery.
Introduction to UX
- The Elements of User Experience by Jesse James Garrett
- Killer UX Design by Jodie Moule
- A Project Guide To UX Design by Russ Unger and Carolyn Chandler
- The Design of Everyday Things by Don Norman
- Mind Hacks: Tips & Tools for Using Your Brain by Tom Stafford & Matt Webb
- Undercover User Experience Design by Cennydd Bowles & James Box
Communicating UX
- Communicating the User Experience: A practical guide for creating useful UX documentation by Richard Caddick & Steve Cable
- Mental Models: Aligning Design Strategy with Human Behaviour by Indi Young
- Communicating Design: Developing Web Site Documentation for Design and Planning by Dan M. Brown
- The User Is Always Right: A Practical Guide to Creating and Using Personas for the Web by Steve Mulder
- See What I Mean: How to use Comics to Communicate Ideas by Kevin Cheng
Usability
- Don’t Make Me Think by Steve Krug
- The Usability Kit by Gerry Gaffney and Daniel Szuc
- Rocket Surgery Made Easy by Steve Krug
- Forms That Work by Caroline Jarrett and Gerry Gaffney
Information Architecture
- Information Architecture for the World Wide Web by Peter Morville and Louis Rosenfeld
- A Practical Guide to Information Architecture by Donna Spencer
Interaction Design
- About Face by Alan Cooper
- Seductive Interaction Design by Stephen P. Anderson
- Emotional Design: Why We Love (Or Hate) Everyday Things by Don Norman
- Designing Interactions by Bill Moggridge
Visual Design
- The Non-Designer’s Design Book by Robin Williams
- The Principles of Beautiful Web Design by Jason Beaird
- Sexy Web Design by Elliot Jay Stocks
- The Design of Sites (2nd Ed.) by Jason I. Hong
Mobile
- Tapworthy: Designing Great iPhone Apps by Josh Clark
- Mobile First by Luke Wroblewski
- Content Strategy for Mobile by Karen McGrane
- Responsive Web Design by Ethan Marcotte
Collaborative Design
- Gamestorming: A Playbook For Innovators, Rulebreakers, and Changemakers by Dave Gray, Sunni Brown and James Macanufo
- Sketching User Experiences by Bill Buxton
- Sketching User Experiences (workbook) by Saul Greenberg, Sheelagh Carpendale, Nicolai Marquardt and Bill Buxton
Communicating Ideas
- Resonate: Present Visual Stories that Transform Audiences by Nancy Duarte (alternatively, check out the interactive ebook for iOS)
- The Visual Display of Quantitative Information by Edward Tufte
- Envisioning Information by Edward Tufte
Web Analytics
- Advanced Web Metrics with Google Analytics by Brian Clifton
- Web Analytics: An Hour A Day by Avanash Kaushik
Sketchnoting
- Sketchnotes 2011 by Eva-Lotta Lamm
- The Sketchnote Handbook by Mike Rohde
The Bigger Picture
- The Information: A History, A Theory, A Flood by James Gleick
- The Shallows: How the Internet is changing the way we read, think and remember by Nicholas Carr
- Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion by Robert B. Cialdini