Building a User Journey Mapper Tool for Design Students

As a designer and developer, I’ve always been frustrated by the gap between learning UX theory and actually creating professional deliverables. User journey maps are a staple of human-centered design, but most tools are either too complex for students or too simplistic to be useful in real projects.

So I built my own: a free, web-based User Journey Mapper that guides designers through creating in-depth, actionable journey maps.

The Problem

Most user journey mapping tools fall into two camps:

1. Enterprise tools (Miro, FigJam) - Powerful but overwhelming for beginners
2. Simple templates - Easy to start but lack structure and guidance

Students need something in between: a tool that’s approachable but teaches best practices along the way.

Design Goals

I wanted the tool to:

• Guide without constraining - Provide structure while allowing creativity
• Teach HCD principles - Embed best practices into the interface
• Be immediately useful - No account required, works in the browser
• Export easily - Share work as images or JSON files

Try It Yourself