What is Adobe XD? Features of Adobe XD with its Pros and Cons

October 1, 2020October 1, 2020 Optimistic Coder 0 Comments best designing application, download adobe xd 2020, features of adobe xd

Today we have Adobe XD, the most famous interface design, and prototyping tools for designers. This software is already very famous among designers and most professionals prefer this tool for designing and prototyping stuff. There are many popular designing tools in the market but among them, Adobe XD is most popular due to its vast functionalities. So, lets first see what is Adobe XD?

What is Adobe XD?

Adobe XD is a vector-based interface design tool for mobile and web apps. It was developed and published by Adobe Inc. Adobe Xd was first announced with the name of “Project Comet” at the Adobe Max conference in October 2015. It was officially launched with the name of Adobe XD and out of beta on October 18, 2017. Adobe launched this software in response to the rising popularity of Sketch, which was a well know designing tools at that time.

Adobe XD is available for Windows and macOS, although there are versions for Android and IOS which previews the work result directly on mobile devices. It also supports wireframing and easily connecting prototypes. The main feature of Adobe XD is to create user interfaces for web and mobile apps. This software contains tons of impressive features, let’s go through them one by one.

Impressive Features of Adobe XD

There are many features in Adobe XD which makes it much more functional and unique as compared to its competitions. It contains some extra features which are nonexistent or hard to use in other Adobe applications like Photoshop and Illustrator. Let’s see what these features are:

1. LAYOUT & DESIGN – Faster work done for your intensive tasks

Components: Build resizeable cards, create reusable buttons. Freely push changes across designs
States: Add toggle and hover. Make different variations of components for different scenarios. Create interactions
Content-Aware Layout: Resize and swap content. Automatically make changes. Spend less time adjusting and nudging.
Repeat Grid: Duplicate lists and galleries. Instantly make changes. Drag, click and repeat elements in any directions.
Sync with Illustrator, Photoshop, and Sketch: Resume your work from where you stopped. work with your favorite tools and bring all together in XD
Adobe Fonts: options to choose from a wide variety of fonts and sync across designs with Creative Cloud account.

2. ANIMATION & PROTOTYPING – Feel like the real thing in front

Voice prototyping: Build-in speech playback. Create voice commands. Enable the sound with voice-enabled features.
Auto-Animate: Add animations. Build micro-interactions. Stunning eye-catching motion effects.
Anchor Links: Create interactions like scroll-to-top. Add navigation menus. directly access different points in your designs with simple clicks.
Scroll Groups: Make menus and lists loop. Designate different areas of your designs to scroll. Build interactive carousels.
Device preview: Previews and test mobile prototypes with the XD app for Android or IOS.
Audio Playback: Add music tracks and effects to your designs for better personality and usability.

3. COLLABORATION & HANDOFF – Get to work together with your team

Share Links: Option to publish links to the designs. Get feedback from the team in a snap. Share with stakeholders.
Design Specs: Send the CSS snippets effortlessly. Publish links to share with other people. Handoff assets and layouts.
Coediting (beta): Work together at the same time and share the same screen. Keep your team engaged at any time.
Comments & Mentions: Follow feedbacks and conversations from stakeholders directly on the share link.
Design tokens: Give customized names for characters styles and colors to use in coding.
Password protection: Add customized passwords to Design Specs and Share links for enhanced security.

4. DESIGN SYSTEMS – Confidently scale your projects

Creative Cloud Libraries: Exchange graphics and colors. Access shard logos. Store all your creative assets from Illustrator, Photoshop, and more.
Cloud Documents: Share your designs quickly with other designers. Save assets directly to the cloud. Access your files from anywhere at any time.
Linked Assets: Link components to different documents. Use shared character styles and colors. Commit changes across designs instantly.

5. EXTENSIBILITY – Access different things in one place

App integrations: Use built-in integrations. Work easily with Paper, Jira, Slack, Dropbox, Microsoft, Teams, Zeplin, and much more.
XD Plugins: Unlock impressive features with 200+ plugins effortlessly. Enhance your designs. Automate all your tasks.
Plugin APIs: Add your own unique features. Create plugins. Automate your workflow by connecting to XD tools.

What is Adobe XD? 3 Features To Boost Your Workflow!

Pros and Cons of Adobe XD

Pros

Prototypes of iOS, Android, and web applications.
Can make wireframes of your project screen. After applying animations and transition effects, you can elaborate on the details to enhance the look and feel.
It’s easy to use and similar to other Adobe applications.
Connects easily with the library and other applications
Some basic designing particles are provided by Adobe XD so we can use it directly in projects.
After the prototype has been made, you can actually run that app in different screen sizes all sizes of iOS Mobiles, Android Mobiles, and also web applications.
Natively responsive/flexible drawn elements.
Syncs very well with other Adobe products that many designers and devs have experience with.

Cons

After so many different improvements, Adobe XD is still lacking some important designing features like real-time collaboration. Third-party plug-ins are also not available yet.
Adobe XD’s User Interface is still not so attractive compared to others like Sketch.
Given that it’s still on the newer side, tools and add-ons are still in the development phase.
Adobe XD supports many plugins, but does not have as many plugins as its competitor, Sketch.
Adobe XD does not support timeline animation, so its animation capability is elementary.

How to Download Adobe XD on various platforms

Downloading and installing Adobe XD is very easy and doesn’t need any prior knowledge of any software. Just click on the below links and it will start downloading automatically. One thing to note that the personal version of Adobe XD is absolutely free but to access it for professional purposes you have to pay $9.99/month (Rs. 797.68/month) and if you want to buy the whole creative cloud apps which include 20+ apps then it will cost you around $52.99/month (Rs. 4230.30/month). As I have told earlier Adobe XD comes in two modes, one is the desktop version for Windows and macOS and another is the application version for Android and IOS devices. Below are the links to download Adobe XD effortlessly.

Desktop apps

Download Adobe XD for Windows

Download Adobe XD for macOS

Mobile Apps

Download Adobe XD for Android

Download Adobe XD for IOS

Conclusion

I hope I have given you all the necessary details about Adobe XD and the features of Adobe XD along with its Pros and Cons. I have also provided how to download Adobe XD on all platforms.Adobe XD is already popular designing software and tough competition for all its competitors. So, I recommend you give it a try and experience what this designing tool has to offer. Do you agree with me? Please leave a comment. Hope you like the content and the information shared by me. If you find this post knowledgeable and learned something new and interesting today then please share this post with your friends and family members and help the Optimistic Coder to spread informational contents. Thank You.