Hey and welcome back to a new week!

I wanted to share a survey with you by Carlo Friscia who is currently building a design learning tool specifically tailored to juniors and of course I support that.
Fill out his survey here to help him out!

In this issue:

• All Your Portfolio Questions Answered: Your portfolio is the most essential piece of your job search. Make sure it works for you, not against you.

• Join Me For A Portfolio Roast Next Week: I’m doing it again! Showing you what works and what doesn’t portfolios straight from the community. RSVP here.

• Justin’s Portfolio: A portfolio that I could really feel.

Thank you for reading!

🔥 I’M ROASTING PORTFOLIOS AGAIN!

I’m picking apart portfolios from community again - LIVE!

Join me for this free live event that is always tons of fun and insights!

I will (nicely - you know me) roast portfolios from the community to talk about what works and what doesn’t. I’m gonna apply a hiring managers lens and tell you what would cause me to close the tab and what keeps me scrolling.

If you want your portfolio reviewed, you can submit it ahead of time in the Uxcel Discord community discord.gg/uxcel. We’ll review as many as time allows during the session.

​Even if yours isn’t selected, the feedback shared will help you see portfolios through the same lens hiring managers use.

The Ultimate Portfolio Guide for Product Designers in 2026 🎒

Your portfolio is still a designers strongest and most important asset in the job search.

I see this all the time through Open Doors, the Portfolio Showcase, and the Talent Collective. Some portfolios are so strong that people get interviews without even applying. And if that feels very far from your current reality, there is probably still work to do.

Usually, the difference is not some wild creative concept.

It’s that the fundamentals are simply much stronger.

So if I had to reduce portfolio advice in 2026 to just five things, it would be these:

1. Pick a Tool That Doesn’t Block You

People often ask what the best portfolio tool is.

The truth is: it mostly doesn’t matter.

No one is rejecting a strong candidate because they didn’t use Framer.

What matters is whether the tool helps you execute your vision well, without wasting tons of time or forcing everything into a generic shape.

My default recommendation is still Framer. It’s easy to use, especially if you’re used to Figma, and a huge number of the best portfolios I feature are built with it.

But in 2026, vibe coding is also a very real option. Tools like Lovable, Claude Code, or Cursor can absolutely get you to excellent outcomes too.

The real rule is simple: pick the tool that enables you.

And one very clear don’t: your portfolio is not Behance. Especially not if you’re going for full-time product design roles.

2. Make the Structure Serve the Work

A portfolio has one core job:

Make your work accessible and showcase it in the best way.

That means the structure should be simple.

You have some kind of landing surface or hero.

Then the work comes immediately.

Only after that do you add things like an About section, side projects, or anything else.

The biggest mistake I still see is people adding friction before the work. A long intro. A separate page just to reach the projects. Too much personal context too early.

Don’t do that.

Recruiters are often the first people to look at your portfolio, and they will not work hard to find your projects. Your work should be obvious right away.

And on the homepage itself, the project previews should already do a lot of work. Strong visuals, good framing, maybe some useful context. Enough to make people want to click.

3. Position Yourself Clearly

This is one of the most important things, and also one of the easiest to overlook.

A lot of portfolios feel unfocused not because the work is bad, but because the person behind them has not really figured out where they want to go.

If you want to move into B2B, your work should support that.

If you want startup roles, your work should support that.

If you want more systems-heavy product design work, that should show up too.

This does not mean tailoring your portfolio for every single application.

It means understanding that you have one profile, and that profile will fit some roles better than others.

Your hero statement alone won’t do the job. If you say you’re one kind of designer, but the work below tells a different story, the work wins.

So when you curate projects, choose the ones that support the direction you want to be known for.

The hardest part is actually knowing where you want to move to as a junior. Analyze your work, job descriptions and try to get a feeling for it—it will help a lot.

4. Keep Case Studies Short and Easy to Scan

Case studies are not read the way most people hope they are.

They are scanned. Fast.

If you have analytics on your portfolio, you’ll usually see that people spend very little time in them. Often 30 to 60 seconds on average.

So build for that reality.

Keep them short.

Use headings well.

Make the story easy to follow at a glance.

Lead with strong visuals.

The best case studies I see have surprisingly little text. They don’t dump walls of process on people. They show the work clearly, give enough context, and move on.

And please don’t throw in giant grids of screens. If you can, go further than that. Use motion, showreels, small prototype clips, or other ways to make the work feel more alive.

A good test is to let someone scan your case study for 30 seconds and then ask them what they remember. If they get the story, you’re in a good place. If not, it’s probably too long or too cluttered.

5. Visual Polish Is Often the Differentiator

This is usually what separates decent portfolios from the ones that really stand out.

Not because every portfolio needs some crazy creative concept.

In fact, many of the best portfolios I feature are structurally very simple. What makes them strong is that they feel resolved. Everything feels intentional. Typography, spacing, hierarchy, motion, color, everything works together.

That’s what people pick up on immediately.

And that’s also why trying to be overly clever can backfire. I’ve seen portfolios with fun concepts like desktop metaphors or draggable surfaces work really well. But I’ve also seen them turn tacky very quickly when the underlying visual and interaction skills weren’t strong enough.

So the real target is not novelty.

It’s quality.

Study the fundamentals.

Get spacing right.

Get line height right.

Be careful with color.

Use interactions and transitions intentionally.

Because if enough of those small details feel off, the whole portfolio feels off.

And sometimes, honestly, the right next step is not rebuilding your portfolio yet. It’s improving your design fundamentals first.

A Strong Portfolio Changes the Whole Game

A strong portfolio won’t do everything for you.

But it can make the entire job search feel different.

It can make you easier to understand.

Easier to remember.

Easier to take seriously.

And sometimes even easy to discover without applying at all.

So if you’re reworking yours right now, focus on the things that actually move the needle:

Pick a tool that enables you.

Make the work easy to access.

Position yourself clearly.

Keep case studies short.

And polish the hell out of the visual details.

That’s where the difference usually is.

If you want, I can also make this even shorter again, closer to your usual newsletter length.

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👀 Portfolio Showcase

Today: Justin Mason

Justin Mason is a soon-to-be graduate from the University of Michigan, set to finish in April 2026. And this is a portfolio I’m genuinely happy to feature, because it brings together a couple of qualities that you don’t often see this well combined at this stage.

There’s strong product thinking, clear attention to detail, and a sense of care in how the work is presented. At the same time, the projects themselves carry real weight. Two of them in particular stand out as genuinely impactful pieces of work, and there’s an additional one that adds personality and range in a way that feels intentional rather than filler.

Overall, this is a portfolio that shows a designer who is not just focused on making things look good, but on understanding what makes them work. And that’s exactly what makes it worth taking a closer look.

That’s it for this week—thanks so much for the support! ♥️

Do you want your own portfolio reviewed in-depth with a 30-minute advice-packed video review? Or do you require mentoring to figure out a proper strategy for your job search?

I got you!

• Book an in-depth portfolio or resume review with me

• Book a mentoring session with me

• Book a quick 15 min chat to ask a question and see if we vibe

Keep kicking doors open and see you next week!
- Florian