Graphic & web design review checklist (with free template)

Your design project is underway and seems to be going in the right direction. For the first time (in a long time), graphic and web designers enjoy their tasks.

You look at the project’s calendar before signing off for the day.

And there it is, staring right back at you. You start sweating, and your heart rate increases. How could you have missed this?

The design review is in a few days. 😰

…how do I check or know if we’re still on track?

Don’t worry. MarkUp.io’s blog has come to the rescue, as always.

Graphic of the Eisenhower decision matrix with four quadrants that read resolve immediately, schedule, reassign or delegate, and delete.

Important and Urgent (resolve immediately), e.g., typos, no color contrast, fonts, and colors don’t match.
Important but not Urgent (schedule), e.g., no central visual focus, slightly different brand colors.
Not Important but Urgent (reassign), e.g., unidentifiable text links.
Not Important and not Urgent (delete), e.g., repetitive feedback.

Analyzing feedback this way will let you know which should be implemented in order of importance.

Another option is to leverage the Priority Planning Poker technique if you want the design team to contribute to the prioritization process.

This technique supports prioritization by voting, and here’s how it works:

Set up a virtual poker room or any system that supports voting.
The team lead invites everyone and introduces different items of client feedback.
Everyone on the team votes on each item according to its importance as they’re introduced.
Display the final results with members’ votes alongside.
Votes can then be recast if need be.

So, with vague comments out of the way and a clear direction on what’s important, designers can now incorporate stakeholders’ and clients’ feedback into the design.

✅ Review changes

When you’re done implementing the changes recommended by clients, you can resolve their comments within MarkUp.io’s Workspace.

But don’t worry. They haven’t disappeared. You can still access them in the Resolved tab, MarkUp.io’s feedback archive.

After resolving feedback, you’ll need to present the updated design to clients and stakeholders for them to review (again).

And yes, they can still use MarkUp.io to add comments if there are more changes they’d like to make.

✅ Get approval for the revised design

What’s next after implementing the client’s feedback?

You’ll be just one step away from creating the final draft. But before that, you need the client’s approval on the updated design so there are no more back and forths when working on the last iteration.

If they requested changes to the revised design, you’d have to analyze and implement them again.

And if not, be sure to get their approval to proceed.

✅ Create the final version of the design

This is the last phase on the review checklist, where you create a final design ensuring all the client’s requirements have been addressed.

You want to involve clients in this process, too, so you don’t go through another round of review.

This way, you have an appealing, engaging, and audience-oriented graphic or web design.

That was quite the checklist with embedded lists too. Putting everything in a doc can be a chore. To save you some time, we’ve done that for you.

Check out our free checklist template for your design needs below.

Download our free design review checklist

A lot goes into creating a design, and a review checklist is an important part.

You can create a design review checklist specific to your team or the industry you’re in.

But if you’d rather spend more time on designs, you can use this checklist template instead.

You can customize it to suit your different needs.

Click here to download our free design review checklist!

Easy design review checklist for non-designers

POV: You’re a non-designer who’s also a stakeholder on a design team, and you’ve been asked to review the design.

After seeing the design:

That doesn’t have to be the case for you, as we’ve put together a checklist that can help you review the design like a pro.

Are the design elements in a consistent order? E.g., the logos, register/log-in buttons, headers, footers, etc.
Are the font sizes consistent?
Do the colors match the brand’s guidelines?
Is the design responsive? Does it look good on other devices?
Is the design consistent with previous designs?
Are the wordings appropriate?
Will the web design fit into the performance system?
Are there too many pop-ups?
Is there a good use of white space?
Are the designs compatible with different devices?

Now that you’ve been armed with the proper strategy needed to review designs and keep track of the process with ease, there’s only one thing left to do.

Streamline the design review process with a smart tool

Your review process would be a lot smoother if there were a smart tool you could leverage.

Everything would be in a central location. You can upload designs, invite collaborators (teammates, clients, stakeholders) and request contextual design feedback.

If that’s something you’d like to experience, we’ve got a free trial waiting for you.