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UC San Diego · on Coursera

User Experience: Research & Prototyping

Beginner English SpecializationFREE
SkillsUX researchPrototypingUsability testingUser researchInteraction designWireframing

Is this course right for you?

Our take
Scott Klemmer's UC San Diego course zeroes in on two skills at the heart of design: understanding users through research, and turning ideas into testable prototypes fast.

Good for: Learning UX research methods and rapid prototyping.

Skip if: You want visual/UI design skills or a specific tool tutorial.

It's practical and method-driven, part of UCSD's Interaction Design Specialisation, and it deliberately owns the research-and-prototyping core of UX rather than the visual surface. That's the fit to weigh: it's ideal if that's the part you want, and aimed elsewhere if you're after visual or UI design skills or a specific tool walk-through.

Free to audit on Coursera; the certificate needs a subscription (about $49/month) or Coursera Plus, with financial aid available, and confirms you did the work rather than a qualification. Research and prototyping methods stay relevant across tools (as of 2026).

Comparison · LBS

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About this course

User Experience: Research & Prototyping focuses on two skills at the heart of design: understanding users and quickly turning ideas into testable prototypes. From UC San Diego's Scott Klemmer, it covers research methods and several forms of prototyping — storyboards, role-play, walkthroughs, and touchpoints — none of which require any coding.

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Instructor

SK
Scott Klemmer
Coursera instructor

Scott Klemmer is a professor of cognitive science and computer science at UC San Diego and a well-known HCI researcher and educator. Learners frequently single him out as a clear, engaging instructor.

Frequently asked questions

UX research and prototyping methods: generating design ideas, building rapid prototypes to test them, and evaluating those prototypes with users. It is part of UC San Diego's Interaction Design specialization (taught by Scott Klemmer), so it emphasises the research-and-testing side of UX — trying multiple design alternatives and learning from real feedback — rather than visual polish or final production design.

Not primarily. Its focus is research and prototyping — needfinding, generating and testing ideas, and evaluating designs — rather than visual craft like colour, typography, and interface aesthetics. That reflects the specialization's academic, method-driven approach. If you specifically want visual or UI design skills, you would add a dedicated course; this builds the research and rapid-prototyping discipline behind good UX.

Yes. It is one course in UC San Diego's Interaction Design specialization, a substantial eight-course, research-heavy program. You can take it standalone for the research-and-prototyping methods, but it is designed within that sequence, which covers the full design process from needfinding through to evaluation and a capstone. If it appeals, the wider specialization goes considerably deeper.

Yes, you can audit it on Coursera and watch the lectures at no cost. The graded assignments, peer-reviewed projects, and the certificate need a subscription, with financial aid available. Since the value lies in actually doing the research and prototyping exercises and getting peer feedback, auditing gives you the teaching but misses that applied practice.

As a single course within a larger specialization, it runs a few weeks at a moderate weekly pace, though the research and prototyping projects take real time to do properly. It is method- and project-heavy rather than a quick tour, so the hours go into carrying out the studies and building prototypes, which is exactly where the skills form.
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