Title: What is Holistic Design? | Interaction Design Foundation (IxDF)
Headings: Holistic Design
Holistic Design
What is Holistic Design?
Holistic Design means You Fly High above the Users’ World
Succeed with Holistic Design
Learn More about Holistic Design
Literature on Holistic Design
Learn more about Holistic Design
All Literature

Content: and aims to deliver an optimal experience. At times the entire experience (with a product or brand) is not limited to digital devices but is a mix of digital, real-world brick-and-mortar, and human-to-human interactions.” — Miklos Philips, Principal UX Designer at Toptal
Holistic Design means You Fly High above the Users’ World
Structural architects developed holistic design as a way to do better than build for just one purpose (e.g., to house people). The idea was to examine views of human occupancy from all angles (e.g., energy consumption, mental health). Therefore, they could design buildings tailored to everything the people who used them needed. In user experience, designers try to work with a better grasp of all the human dimensions that are involved between users and a particular design. They can explore the various angles more realistically than they would if they focused only on catering to a few aspects of what the users experience (e.g., designers creating an impressive user interface (UI) design but not considering other aspects, such as search engine optimization (SEO)). From there, designers can examine the intricate dynamics in users’ different environments to get a better idea of the balance they need to achieve in their design. Then, they can customize feature sets from the insights they discover. With a holistic mindset, your team doesn’t examine isolated aspects of how users use products/services and experience brands.