Top Mobile and Tablet Wireframing Tools

Written by  Sudheer Raju | 06 March 2011
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Wireframes have been an excellent help since long time to effectively sketch an idea, translate the idea into a drawing and further to prototype. Most importantly collaborate the idea with all stakeholders to gain their feedback and avoid any confusions before development of an idea starts. With rapid change in technology day in and day out within web, and further need to ensure any product or website works across various platforms and devices like mobiles, tablets and others, the wireframing tools have also been developed to support such devices. Here are few of them listed which we found interesting and useful. 

 

JustinMind
Visit Website		 JustInMind is the most powerful wireframing and prototyping tool that can be used across multi platforms including websites, mobile phone and tablets. It helps increase user experience right at the start of your project and reduces costs considerably. This amazing tool comes with features to build rich and dynamic wireframes, data simulation, publish and users feedback through a browser, define and perform usability tests, rich export mechanisms and easy to use drag and drop interface without any need to write code. In addition it also comes with rich collection of widget libraries which are free to download or create your own widget libraries, ability to define workflows, forms, datasets etc.
3OfficeClip
Visit Website		 Mockapp is by far the simplest of wireframing app thats available and justifies its testimony for being picked as one of top 10 apps by apple. This very simple and easy to use app has two things once you download it for free* (* They say its Tweetware meaning free if you tweet about MockApp once to your friends. Cool isnt it? :))
  1. Download the Libraries which contains Headers, Icons, Toolbars, Lists, Grids and what not. Any and everything you need to design an app for iPhone.
  2. Template (This is Canvas where you compose your iPhone app with elements in library)
And thats it, open up keynote or powerpoint and start using the libraries to drag and drop the elements to design your app. Every element is editable to customize text to your needs and it will be hard to imagine if any basic IT literate will take more than couple of hours to define his/her app. Show it to your stakeholders in minutes/hours on your or stakeholders ideas and start development. Watch out also for upgrades that are continuously delivered to improve and, if i am not wrong to an extent to generate source code as well once the prototype is done. Although its a bit of a challenge www.mockapp.com claims this will be done in future releases.
mockingbird
Visit Website		 mockingbird is a SaaS wireframing tool that allows you to quickly create mockups, create links within mockups and share the mock up with global audience for quick collaborative preview.

This online tool comes with Grids/Columns, All UI elements needed for app design, multiple pages, fully web-based, smart text sizing, clean and clear mockups, better user experience and ability to export to PNG of PDF.
blueprint
Visit Website

Blueprint is the most powerful iPhone(or iPad) UI design application. Blueprint has many predesigned widgets, including built-in iOS views, controls, and buttons. With just a few taps, drags and drops, you can make a meaningful UI screen.

Its an easy iPhone, iPad UI design tool with built in iOS widgets including buttons, labels, textfields, switches, segmented controls, table views, tab bars, navigation bars, etc. and with an ability to set various properties like type, size, text color, background color, tint, image, and so on.The app supports widget actions like tap, double tap, swipe, rotate and transition effects to dissolve, move, reveal, push, flip, curl.Send your design via email, copy to Mac or PC using iTunes File Sharing, export in PDF file format. 
mockabillyVisit Website
 Mockabilly reduces the time and effort needed for drafting visual mock-ups of iPhone apps. Users can create perfect mockups directly on their iPhone from several screen layouts – quickly and easily. Mockabilly is targeted at designers and conceptual artists who want to easily create and present perfectly designed mockups of an iPhone app.
  • Use any screen design you‘ve created
  • Import/sync screens via FTP, e-mail or Dropbox
  • Create nonlinear flows by creating touchpoints
  • Use touchpoint transitions for iPhone behaviour
  • Instantly switch between edit and play
  • One tap starts your iPhone app mockup
listviewVisit Website
 LiveView is a specialized remote screen viewing application intended as a tool to help designers create graphics for mobile applications, it has also proven to be useful for creating quick and dirty simulations, demos, and experience prototypes.

FOR VISUAL DESIGNERS — Develop pixel–perfect graphics for the iPhone and iPad quickly and easily with a live view of your canvas/artboard while you work. LiveView is compatible with both standard and Retina displays.

FOR INTERACTION DESIGNERS — With your iPhone or iPad tethered via WiFi, you can interact with software prototypes and demos running on your Mac to communicate and iterate your concepts quickly.

FOR EVERYONE — If you've ever needed to press a button from afar or wished that you could take a piece of your monitor with you across the room, this app may prove useful from time to time.
pidoco
Visit Website
 Pidoco is a web application for planning usable websites, mobile apps and desktop software. Easily create clickable wireframes, UI prototypes, share them, collect feedback, and run usability tests. It allows to validate requirements iwth users and save costs, speed up projects and is really easy to get started. Sign in and start prototyping as simple as that and no programming skills required or no downloads/installation required.
balsamiqVisit Website
 Balsamiq is a small group of passionate individuals who believe work should be fun and that life is too short for bad software. The sofware comes with a very simple yet rich features including
  • Low-Fi Sketch Wireframes - Sketchy, low-fidelity wireframes let you focus design conversations on functionality
  • Click-Through Prototypes- Linking lets you generate click-through prototypes for demos & usability testing
  • UI Components & Icons - 75 built-in user interface components and 187 icons, plus a whole lot of community-generated components.
  • Export to PNG or PDF - Share or present mockups with embedded links using PDF export, or use a 3rd party tool to export to code.
  • Quick Add for Speed, Import/Export, Drag and Drop, Works Offline, Re-Usable Symbol Libraries, Full Keyboard Support and Cross platform (Windows, Mac, Linux)
omnigroupVisit Website
 With OmniGraffle, your iPad touch screen is your canvas. Using simple multitouch gestures, draw shapes, drag in objects, and style everything until it's just right. Share your creations via PDF export, or open them in OmniGraffle for Mac.  When you need a clear understanding of how information needs to be presented or how processes are carried out. OmniGraffle for iPad is the tool to help you organize your thoughts visually, document them beautifully, and communicate them to the world.

Some of the Key Features of OmniGraffle include Stencils, Freehand Drawing, Diagramming Tools, Smart Guides, Stylish Options, Selection and Styles, Shared Layers, Multiple Page Documents, Tables, Text Wrap and Export Options. This is available for Mac as well with an ability to import and export of visio files. 
iRise
Visit Website		 iRise for Apple is a free iRise iDoc that gives business analysts, user experience (UX) professionals and project managers a way to quickly prototype the look, feel and behavior of Apple mobile device applications through pre-defined visualization widgets and templates that can be quickly assembled into a high definition mobile applications. Support for the Apple iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad is included.

Apart from above tools there are iPhone and iPAD stencils and sketch books as well that you would want to refer to for even quicker and simple way to produce mockups. Please find below few links that you can refer to for such stencils that could be useful.

App Sketchbook (iPhone and iPAD) || Mobile Sketch Book || UI Stencils (Web, iPhone, iPAD & Android)

Author: Sudheer Raju, itwings.co.uk, This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

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Sudheer Raju

Sudheer Raju

Founder of ToolsJournal, a technology journal on software tools and services. Sudheer has overall accountability for the webiste product development and is responsible for Sales and Marketing. With a flair to write, Sudheer himself writes for toolsjournal across all journal categories.


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