I am a former UX designer with over a decade of experience. Transitioning to the XR space has been the most challenging shift in my career, largely due to the lack of tools specifically tailored for this field. To address this gap, I began learning 3D graphics and quickly realized that mastering a tool specifically designed for creating immersive experiences was essential. I chose Unity as my 3D engine due to its widespread adoption across various platforms. Unity’s use of C#, a modern and accessible programming language, made it an ideal choice for me compared to C++, which powers other engines like Unreal. Additionally, I wanted to avoid node-based systems like Unreal Engine’s Blueprints. While effective for material creation, they can be less efficient for broader coding tasks and are deeply integrated into Unreal’s workflow, even when working in C++. This further solidified my decision to focus on Unity. Tools like Bezi and Shapes can be useful for creating rough layouts, but they are inadequate for XR development or prototyping. XR projects demand highly specific interactions that often require custom design and coding. As a result, having the ability to code within a game engine is critical. This realization led me to pursue coding as a Full-Stack Unity Developer through an intensive learning process-a journey that is still ongoing. Many quick-start XR courses claim to offer an easy entry into the field, but they often provide only a superficial understanding, leaving students unprepared for the complexities of the work. In XR, purely design-focused roles-similar to Figma or Bezi-based workflows in web design-are insufficient. This medium is far more complex, requiring both design and technical expertise. Hybrid roles, such as Design Technologist or Design Prototyper, are crucial for creating immersive experiences. These roles demand a deep understanding of both design and technology, much like the role of a Creative Technologist in game development. XR professionals must be capable of designing with code to bring their ideas to life. I firmly believe that succeeding in XR design requires more than a basic understanding of game engines. Designers need advanced technical proficiency to avoid becoming bottlenecks in the creative process, enabling them to prototype and test ideas efficiently. Oleg Frolov’s work is a prime example of this vision in action. He creates exceptional XR prototypes that demonstrate how deeply integrated design and technical expertise can produce groundbreaking results. Achieving this level of quality is nearly impossible with the traditional workflow, where designers create concepts far removed from the actual platform. The sheer amount of communication required between designers and developers in such a setup makes it unfeasible for XR.

Which tool is your favorite? Why? Did I miss anything? LMK in the comments.

Thanks am building at the moment and this was a very helpful thread thank you.

heyyy. thanks for sharing the video. very insightful. I am wondering do you perhaps have citations for your published works? thanks!

Thanks for making this video. I'm in the middle of transitioning myself to traditional flat to the world of XR. Can you share to me some online community in any case that I'm ready to share my future works? Thanks!

CORRECTION/UPDATE: Bezi testing doesn't work on Cardboard for iOS that I've been able to get to work since support for Cardboard is dropping rapidly. You can still try out existing experiences that are available, but even that has been dropping lately. You may be able to prototype with Android, but I don't have an Android phone so I can verify that. If you have an Android and want to test it, let me know here whether or not it works.

What are your burning questions about interacting with digital space in XR? Let me know in the comments.

What are your burning questions around input methods for XR? What's your favorite input method you've tried so far? I'm definitely eyeing that new art pen that's coming out soon.

Great overview! 💜💜💜

Thank you for this. Love your content ❤

Thank you. These are solid advices

Thank you for this video, and your insight. Helped clear some things up on my path. Watching your udemy courses now.

Is coding required to get into the XR design field, or can I become an XR designer without coding knowledge?

Amazing,

Even though content seems okay(general guidelines not deep knowledge), the background noise is over powering your voice

Hey, I loved your views. I am UX Designer from India with 5 years experience. I have already reached the point where I feel saturated. So, I have decided to learn XR design and I felt that it can give better experience than any other device so i started learning and designed few prototypes using figma. I want to get into XR industry as a XR designer as am based out of India there are very minimal chances so can you help how i can get into industry in any part of the world ?

I feel there should exist a compilation of guidelines and considerations that should be thought of, before designers start designing any XR product. I have attempted to develop such a document, and it'd be great if you could review it. I believe it'll be very helpful for other designers who are struggling or want to get started in XR design.

Thank you for your contribution!! Good channel! Do you have any examples of XR UX designer portfolios?

What are you struggling with the most around XR UX Design? LMK

THANKS FOR THE VIDEOOOOOOOOOOOOO 😍

If you need a more structured approach to your learning, take my free tutorial course on Udemy. www.udemy.com/course/xruximmersion/

I am college currently in last year of computer science engineering and I have designed website and apps and I have not polished my portfolio or my projects because I'm learning so many new things and I don't want to maximize the time on learning so I wanted to ask you that I have experience with blender I also have used unity to make a game for college project and I have designed websites and apps using figma will I be able to get into any company in next 3-6 months if I work on XR design without any formal course??

I am college currently in last year of computer science engineering and I have designed website and apps and I have not polished my portfolio or my projects because I'm learning so many new things and I don't want to maximize the time on learning so I wanted to ask you that I have experience with blender I also have used unity to make a game for college project and I have designed websites and apps using figma will I be able to get into any company in next 3-6 months if I work on XR design without any formal course??

Grab a copy of the free Skills Assessment Workbook here XR UX Skills Assessment Workbook www.figma.com/community/file/1301258709466814611/xr-ux-designer-skills-assessment What are your burning questions about XR UX Design?

Have you tried the AVP accessibility features? Do you have an Apple Vision Pro with the inserts or contacts? How's it working out for you? Let me know right here.

Love it! Definitely needed more guidelines on this when I first started, so glad to see a resource like this! 😄

What are your questions around XR UX design? Let me know here in the comments. If you prefer a structured approach to learning, check out my free Visibility and Legibility tutorial on Udemy at www.udemy.com/course/xruxfoundations-visibility/

Just lemme use the joystick, teleportation makes me sick.

Build a portfolio 😅

This is such a good video for those getting into XR. Such solid advice. Love this video! The hardest part is trying to decide (because of financial and time investment) on the headset and its compatibility with your computer's operating system. Without knowing how a particular device makes us or others feel, it becomes difficult to improve the experience and our work. It's all about having fun learning and pushing the envelope on that headset's features to make inclusive and enhanced creative experiences.

I am considering a career change and XR seems so amazing and interesting. Are there opportunities for newbie juniors (since experience in ux is mentioned)? How developed is the job market?

thank you so mush it's was a great video i learnt a lot about the most important points i should focus on

Thanks for creating such amazing content! 🙌🙌 I just signed up for the course.👍👍

Is this in relation to that Tesla Apple Vision Pro demo, perhaps? 😉

What are your questions around XR UX design? Let me know here in the comments. If you prefer a structured approach to learning, check out my free Human Factors tutorial on Udemy at www.udemy.com/course/xruxhumanfactors/

What's your biggest struggle with getting your foot in the door in XR UX Design? LMK

Only thing I'm struggling with is seeing if I can break into the industry without a CS degree (seems very math oriented) or can I do all of this self-taught and with courses & professional college certificates. Other than that, I want to give this a try. Edit: I finally got to the section talking about certificates don't mean shit, your work speaks for itself. So glad I didn't take out a loan to get into this professional certificate program lol.

OMG you're awesome. This video is so useful and couldn't be more timely. Thank you so much this has really helped me, A LOT! thank you, thank you, thank you.

Hello, I am a student of XR Design at a School of Design in India. I just came across this channel and I am absolutely blown away by the quality of the content available. I wanted to thank you from the bottom of my heart for putting in so much effort into sharing your knowledge. This is by far one of the most amazing resources I have found. We are a group of 26 Designers and we are part of the first design programme in India. I will be sharing your channel with my batch and I am sure it will help all of us a ton. Thank you so much once again for these videos. Please keep them coming

This will be a 500K+ (likely more) YT channel. Phenomenal storytelling. Jam-packed with value. So good.

I’m soooo grateful to be included in this video, and to have the honor of being part of your journey. You have designed a beautiful life full of passion and give so much to the world. Thank you!

Can you please link the post

Thank you so much for this video!! Super interesting things discussed

This is so helpful - love your perspective. Appreciate you so much!

Oh, and to call out specific skills I think people should look to foster as an XR Designer, here's my own list: - Strong writing and verbal communication skills --- able to communicate complex ideas through engaging yet succinct descriptions - Immersive Storytelling abilities/interest --- able to (learn how to) write a script or storyboard for an XR experience - Aptitude for spatialized thinking --- able to visualize, explain, and/or depict spatial concepts - Cross-departmental communication skills --- able to work with developers, artists, project managers, clients, end-users, etc and communicate on their level - XR hardware familiarity --- able to troubleshoot, demonstrate, and communicate the limitations/advantages of different XR hardware - Strong user-centered design principles --- able to communicate the value of user-centricity and imbue it into every part of the design/development process - Accessibility advocacy --- able to transfer known accessibility standards, and discover XR-centric standards to every project Then you have your tool-based skills which are fairly easy to pick up, such as proficiency with Confluence or some other wiki-like tool for documentation, as well as Figma/Adobe/etc for UI, and whatever you use for user flows and presentations. Finally, ability to use/learn some tool for visualizing XR concepts, like ShapesXR or I guess Bezi. I think XR Design is a fairly generalist discipline. Though I do think 3D design skills or Unity skills could of course be helpful, I think any job that requires that of you is going to be less about the actual UX design aspect, and more about the art or dev implementation of whatever design is decided upon. The reality is that coding and 3D design are their own disciplines. They only really cross-over to UX XR design tangentially. I'd personally hire a (real) UX designer (ie not one who is actually UI designer), over a 3D artist or developer to train into an XR designer.

This is interesting to see!! I've been in this space for like 2 and half years now and my own experience is fairly different than either of yours. For me, I've kind of crafted my own unique space as an XR designer that is more focused on the storyboarding side, since the (small) company I work for creates mostly training simulations for large clients. Further, my own background does not come from UX. I stumbled/carved my way into this field thanks to my passion for emergent technology (same as you there), but primarily through my job working at a VR arcade, where I got to play dozens of XR games PLUS see thousands of people actually engaging with those games. I'm with you on the UX for XR thing too. I don't even use 3D software much at all. We have 3D artists specifically for that, as well as Unity devs on the programming side, but none of them know much, if anything, about UX or storytelling. I find that a Huge missing piece in (t)his video is the importance of storytelling for XR design. Being able to tell stories in an immersive space is So different than any other type of design. I've found myself learning from movie directors, video game level design, urban planning, L&D, and fiction writing in addition to UX principles. But yeah, definitely need to be able to solve problems. But even that comes down to creating/finding a process that allows you to do so consistently and rigorously. And the dude is kinda toxic, indeed you need rest. And no company should demand you to work so much when at the end of the day, they will drop you as soon as it becomes financially expedient. If they want you to work so much, even if you are getting paid, they almost certainly dont care for your mental/physical health. I work a 9-5, very very occasionally we may have a bit of 'crunch' time, but we do our best to avoid it, and its always fairly optional. Spending time outside of work just doing stuff you enjoy is different, though and can help you grow as a person. No need to mistake one for the other. However, I do need to share my work online more! That's something I've been slacking on a lot! But I got plans for that. Thanks for this channel!! Interviewing all those years ago and seeing your growth has been incredibly inspiring and motivating.

Do you have a different take on this? What were your aha moments? What are your burning questions around XR UX design? Let me know here in the comments. Time for a change: (0:24) Building my own future: (1:32) Accessible XR Tools: (4:20) XR Companies: (5:45) Big Tech Skills: (6:40) Startup Skills: (8:14) XR UX Skills Assessment: (9:17) Hunger to learn: (9:28) Different design hats: (11:13) XR Design Principles: (13:20) Think in 3D: (14:03) Spend time wisely: (15:33) Certificates don’t matter: (16:41) Share your experiments: (18:48) Join an XR Community: (20:01) Advice about trolls: (21:07) Learn more: (22:13)

What was your aha moment about this video?

What's overwhelming you in your XR UX design journey? Let me know here and I may create a video about it in the future.

Really glad to find your channel, great vid :) One thing I've been playing with in experiments is understanding arm length - might need calibration - and project ray / virtual hand as you reach out towards objects. I kind of like having more movement in interactions as people are designed to move but it's a good point that it can be less efficient. I love your point about challenging yourself and not settling for floating a bounded 2d dialog in space, it just seems the default in most experiences and missing the opportunity. Gonna check out your other vids, thanks!