The Double Diamond Design Process
If you prioritize clarity, creativity, and iteration in the design process, you should use the Double Diamond. The British Design Council developed this process in 2005. In this guide, we’ll provide a thorough overview of how to use it to stay agile and creative as user needs evolve.
The How and Why of the Double Diamond Design Process
The Double Diamond design process is a structured UX design framework consisting of four phases:
Discover
Define
Develop
Deliver
The framework is often applied to design thinking to guide teams to identify problems and deliver effective solutions. If you’re a designer or UX expert, the Double Diamond is useful for tackling complex design challenges such as:
Understanding user needs and paint points
Generating and testing ideas
Implementing a user-centered approach
The Double Diamond process empowers your UX design process with a structured, iterative approach to product discovery, generating ideas, testing concepts, and validating solutions.
Why Two Diamonds?
The Design Council aimed for a simple design process for delivering projects, regardless of the methods or tools used. The two diamonds in the design framework represent:
The problem
The solution
Designers work within these two diamonds in order to:
Truly understand the problem
Thoroughly test the solution
After identifying the core issue in the first diamond, you can create a design brief as a foundation for the second. The second diamond focuses on prototyping and testing a solution until its ready for release.
How the Double Diamond Principle Impacts UX Research
Here are the main ways the Double Diamond supports all phases of UX research:
Discover
Using interviews, observations, and surveys, UX researchers gather insights to identify user pain points and needs.
Define
Researchers sort through the collected data to develop a clear problem statement to guide design focus.
Develop
The team brainstorms and prototypes potential solutions, testing them with users to refine ideas.
Deliver
Implement and launch the final, tested solution based on ongoing user feedback collected to ensure the product meets user needs.
By adopting the double diamond design approach, you ensure a thorough, user-focused process to product design. This maximizes the chances of success built on a deep understanding of user needs, exploring and refining solutions, and effectively implementing and launching the final product. As you explore the Double Diamond, you can find 150K+ user flows and screens on the UILand website to get your next design project off the ground.
