Here’s everything I’ve learned from designing 10,000+ UI screens as a lead product designer.

Besides: “Yes, that is still misaligned.”

Quick Note: I learned all of this from amazing designers like you, fantastic mentors, and lots of trial and error. If you learn something from this article, share it with another designer. I’ll love you for it, and they will, too.

One last thing: If you’re interested, check out the design system I recently built in Figma! I think it will help you design!

1. Prioritize your design efforts.

I always use this analogy:

No one cares what color the stitching is on the leather seats of your fancy concept car if it doesn’t even have wheels yet.

Prioritize your design efforts so that you’re satisfying all baseline requirements first. Then AND ONLY THEN can you move on to fancier things like custom illustrations and animation.

Which conveniently leads us to…

2. No one cares about animation.

Sorry, everyone. It’s true. And I’m not saying this out of spite because I’m just not that good at it (which is also true).