9 Best UI Design Tools for 2026

There are about 1.4 billion websites in the world—more than 26 million of them for ecommerce—vying for shoppers’ attention. A well-designed website can help you stand out, and UI design tools can help you build one. These tools help designers, developers, and small businesses create online storefronts that are appealing, easy to navigate, and drive conversion. 

Modern web-based tools streamline the design process with plug-and-play templates that you can also customize easily. With the right design-to-development stack, your next project could take a fraction of the time your last one did. 

This guide delves into the world of UI design, highlighting nine of the best UI design tools available today. 

What is UI design?

UI design, or user interface design, refers to the design of a website’s appearance and interactivity. In other words, it’s everything a user can see: fonts, colors, images, layout, typography, animation, interactive elements, and more. 

UI is most effective when part of a broader plan, considered alongside your site’s structure, user experience, and content management system. To be most effective, entrepreneurs should map out their goals early, create a strategic plan, and make sure their site’s underlying architecture is sound before any visual design work begins.

UI design can make or break the customer experience. Take the case of Ronaldo Jewelry, whose site was clunky and cluttered before it migrated to Shopify. Changing up the UI by reducing white space and adding a sticky search bar and an Add to Cart button significantly increased the site’s performance: Add-to-cart rates increased by 22% and checkout completion rose by 34%. 

UI design vs. UX design: What’s the difference?

User interface design is a part of user experience (UX) design, but it’s not the whole picture. 

While UI design refers to the appearance and visual interactivity of a site, user experience refers to that and other foundational elements (e.g., user flow, conversion-optimized copy, and load times). UI is the interior design (colors, furniture, décor), while UX is the architecture that determines how the rooms connect and how people move through them.

UI designers will focus on the color of a button, how the button appears when the user hovers over it, or the speed at which a dropdown deploys. UX designers, by contrast, are more concerned with how those buttons work in the context of the overall interface. It depends on the project, but in practice, a user experience designer might do the low-fidelity wireframing, then pass it to a user interface designer to actually build live prototypes.

9 popular UI design tools

1. Shopify Website Builder
2. Figma
3. Sketch
4. Framer
5. Webflow
6. PageFly
7. Shogun
8. Lovable
9. Proto.io

With new tools launching all the time, it’s difficult to choose which software has the right features for you.

While Sketch and Adobe XD used to be industry leaders, the UI design space is rapidly changing. Sketch, while still beloved by some teams, is losing market share to its newer siblings, and Adobe has discontinued Adobe XD. Many designers and developers are looking to all-in-one tools like Shopify, or AI-assisted vibe-coding tools like Lovable to make UI design faster and easier.

These nine platforms double as UI design tools for ecommerce businesses. 

1. Shopify Website Builder

Shopify is an industry leader in ecommerce, and its website builder comes equipped with an extensive library of templates and premade assets. For large and small businesses looking to align their storefront’s user interface with its back-end functionality, Shopify offers an intuitive, no-code option that’s easy to customize to your needs. Shopify integrates seamlessly with thousands of other apps, providing a seamless customer experience.

Moreover, Shopify’s themes are purpose-built for ecommerce, meaning UI designers don’t have to reinvent core shopping elements like product filtering, checkout flows, or mobile-responsive grids—they’re already optimized out of the box. The platform also provides built-in accessibility standards, performance optimizations, and conversion-focused UI patterns that have been tested at scale across millions of stores. Plus, Shopify’s app store features dozens of apps and integrations to take your site’s UI to the next level. 

For UI designers, this means they can focus on elevating the brand visually while trusting that the underlying interface components will behave consistently, load quickly, and support a smooth buying experience without additional development work. 

Key features:

• Interface is easy to use for anyone

• Robust library of apps and integrations 

• Ample educational resources

• Easy-to-use content management system that focuses specifically on ecommerce

Pricing: $1 for the first three months, then $29 to $299 per month. 

2. Figma

After launching in 2016, Figma quickly became the new industry standard in web design software because of its ability to enable real-time collaboration for teams, seamless component-based design systems, and a user-friendly interface. For UI designers specifically, Figma’s robust component libraries, reusable styles, and layout tools make it easy to build consistent, scalable interfaces without having to recreate elements from scratch.

Figma began as a design and prototyping tool that allowed designers to hand off their design files to developers to build and push live. In 2025, the company announced its all-in-one web-based tool for both design and development, Figma Sites, making it an even more inclusive software. 

Unlike other UI tools, Figma is just as useful to graphic designers creating web assets as it is to web designers creating complex, multipage websites.

Key features: 

• Interface is easy to use for designers, developers, and newbies

• Thousands of plug-ins, UI kits, and integrations 

• Ample educational resources, like its YouTube channel 

Pricing: Free if you’re working on your own with basic design files; $16 to $90 per month per full-access team seat, with varying levels of team-wide integrations and assets.

3. Sketch

From the time of its 2010 release until Figma launched in 2016, Sketch was the leading UI tool for Mac. It was also the first tool built specifically for UI design and featured a vector-based UI design interface and easy (and free) handoff functionality. Sketch has been losing significant market share to Figma, though it has released new features. However, the software has certain advantages: it’s cheaper for teams than Figma, available offline, and allows designers to get very granular when they’re designing with vector-based graphics.

Key features:

• Interface is easy to use for designers

• Robust library of design resources

• Free developer handoff

• Work on and offline

Pricing: $12 to $74 per month depending on team size, or $120 for a Mac-only forever license.

4. Framer

Framer’s interface looks, feels, and functions like Figma’s, so anyone comfortable on that platform won’t find Framer difficult. Before Figma launched its Sites product, conventional wisdom held that Figma was best for creating full-scale design systems to support complex brand ecosystems and websites, while Framer was stronger at creating simple but functional websites without a developer.

For UI designers in particular, Framer turns static interface designs into interactive, high-fidelity prototypes with minimal effort. Its built-in animation tools, responsive layout controls, and component overrides make it easy to test real button states, transitions, and microinteractions without needing custom code. This lets designers validate interface decisions early and bring UI ideas to life faster than they could with other traditional design tools.

Since Framer is completely free to use until you publish, it can be cheaper than Figma overall, depending on your setup. That being said, Framer is a more nascent tool, so its community features, ready-to-use components, and cross-functional tools aren’t as built-out as Figma’s. 

Key features: 

• Interface is easy to use for designers, developers, and newbies

• Robust library of plug-ins, UI kits, and integrations 

• Ample educational resources

• Easy-to-use content management system

Pricing: Free until you publish your site—after that, plans range from $10 to $100 per month.

5. Webflow

Webflow’s design interface invites you to think like a developer, borrowing tools and language from CSS, such as “style selector” and “class name.” If you don’t know how to work with code snippets, it’s easy to get lost. 

For UI designers, Webflow offers far more granular control over layouts, spacing, breakpoints, and responsive behaviors than most no-code tools—because everything is built on real HTML and CSS under the hood. This means designers can fine-tune interactions, hover states, animations, and component behaviors exactly as they’ll work in production, rather than relying on prototypes that only simulate them. 

Unlike traditional design software, Webflow lets UI designers see how their design choices translate into real code in real time, bridging the gap between visual design and front-end execution in a way few tools can match.

Key features:

• Developer-friendly interface

• Robust library of plug-ins, UI kits, and integrations 

• Ample educational resources

• Strong animation capabilities

• Easy-to-use content management system

Pricing: Free to design two pages and host your site; $14 to $39 per month per full-access team seat for varying levels of increased horsepower.

6. PageFly 

When you want to add customization to your Shopify storefront template but don’t have a web design team, PageFly can help bridge the gap. It’s a drag-and-drop tool that allows you to build standalone Shopify pages and connect them to your storefront seamlessly—no coding required, though you can directly code if you choose to. 

PageFly also supports custom sections, reusable design blocks, and granular control over elements—features that help UI designers maintain brand consistency across pages while still tailoring the interface for specific campaigns, collections, or product types.

Key features:

• An easy-to-use interface; though it’s a little easier for those with a design eye

• More than 100 templates

• Dozens of integrations

• Ample educational resources

• 24/7 live chat support

Pricing: Free to use and publish one “slot” (i.e., webpage); $6 a month to publish three, or $99 per month for unlimited slots.

7. Shogun 

Shogun is another page builder specifically meant to integrate with Shopify. Like PageFly, it features a drag-and-drop editor that allows you to build new pages for your Shopify storefront—but unlike PageFly, it also allows you to pull in existing pages from Shopify and customize them directly in the Shogun app. 

However, Shogun offers less customization overall. Some non-designers love this, since it’s harder to make mistakes. It can feel a bit confining for those who want room to try new things, though. Shogun also offers an A/B testing tool made for Shopify.

Key features:

• Intuitive interface 

• Template-based, with the option to customize code

• Educational resources

• Smart pages that change per customer

Pricing: $39 per month for basic builder and analytics; $249 per month for content scheduling and global sections; $499 per month for content syncing across stores and custom CMS collections.

8. Lovable

Lovable utilizes AI chatbots so users can build page layouts and elements from a simple prompt. Once Lovable has built its first draft, it provides suggestions for next steps and includes an interface to adjust padding, colors, and more. 

It also makes it easy to toggle over to dev mode and edit code—or review the code and prompt the tool to make the edits on its own. Since it’s newer and relies heavily on AI, troubleshooting can require design or coding knowledge that more established tools don’t demand. 

Until it matures a bit, Lovable is probably best used as a time saver for designer-developers looking to build very simple pages or smaller custom page elements in record time. For UI designers, this can be especially helpful during early ideation or rapid prototyping. You can generate quick layout drafts, interface variations, and component ideas.

Key features:

• Innovative vibe-code (i.e., AI-assisted code) technology

• Ultra-fast prototyping

• Shopify integration

Pricing: Free to play around with; $25 to $50 per month for large-scale team-wide adoption. 

9. Proto.io

If you’re looking for a prototyping tool that does high-fidelity, interactive mockups while being ultra-simple to use, Proto.io may be a worthwhile option to consider. With more than 250 components, over 1,000 templates, and more than 6,000 digital assets like stock photos, dragging and dropping your way to a usable mockup is easy. Or, you can easily import from another design tool. 

Like its competitors, Proto.io is totally web-based, allowing teams to collaborate on the same file in real time. The tool offers an array of interactive and animation features that designers can export to high-fidelity mockups and test with real users. Bottom line: This is purely a prototyping tool, so that’s what it does best.

While Proto.ai is more expensive than a tool like Origami Studio (Meta’s proprietary prototyping tool that it released for free), Origami is geared toward developers; everyone else will find it challenging to adopt.

Key features:

• Beginner-friendly interface

• Huge range of prototyping components and tools

• Cross-team collaboration

• More than 250 components, over 1,000 templates, and more than 6,000 digital assets

Pricing: Prices range from $24 per month for individual freelancers to $160 per month for 10 corporate users.

Other tools for UI design

Not every UI design tool has to build a page from the ground up. These helpful tools can enhance your projects, despite being smaller in scope:

• Mobbin.Mobbin is an inspiration aggregator like Pinterest, but tailormade for UI design. It makes it easier to pull similar projects into folders and take notes on why you liked them.

• Phosphor Icons. Phosphor Icons is a free, open-source family of simple UI icons. If you need elements to add to your navigation bar or landing page in general, but you don’t want to design them from scratch, these can come in handy.

• Coolors. If you’re looking for a tool to generate color palettes quickly, consider Coolors: Rather than trying to figure out which shades and hues go together yourself, this tool can help you find one that works automatically.

• Colour Contrast Checker. Colour Contrast Checker helps you check the accessibility of your color palette. Your font colors should always stand out clearly against the background, so visually impaired users have the best possible chance of seeing the content. For that matter, all users will be glad to see elements that contrast each other well.