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Plate RES·003 · Research methodGrid H1 · Rev. 2026-08-14

User Interviews

Structured conversations about what people actually did, which is far more reliable than what they say they will do.

Research methodEstablished researchIntermediate

Definition

An interview explores a participant's experiences, context and motivations. It is generative research: good for understanding problems, unreliable for predicting behaviour or evaluating solutions.

Established research. Originates in published research and has been replicated. The effect is real. Its size in your product still needs measuring.

On this plate
  1. 1Definition
  2. 2Question rules
  3. 3The shape of a good session
  4. 4Wording
  5. 5In practice
  6. 6Commonly confused with
  7. 7Local chart
  8. 8Sources
  9. 9Continue from here

Reach for this when

  • Understanding a problem space before designing.
  • Investigating why a metric moved.
  • Learning the vocabulary users actually use.
  • Writing a research plan and you do not yet know the right questions.

Common mistakes

  • Hypothetical questions.
  • Pitching the solution mid-interview.
  • Interviewing only current happy users.
  • Synthesising from memory rather than from transcripts.
  • Treating enthusiasm in the room as evidence of future behaviour.

Question rules

  • Ask about the past, not the future. 'Tell me about the last time you did this' beats 'Would you use this?'.
  • Ask for specifics. 'Walk me through what happened' beats 'What do you usually do?'.
  • Never describe your solution and ask for a reaction. That is a pitch, not research.
  • Follow the emotion. Frustration and workarounds mark real problems.
  • Ask about workarounds explicitly. A spreadsheet someone maintains manually is a requirements document.
  • Sit with silence. The second answer is usually the honest one.

The shape of a good session

  1. 1

    Open with the last time

    Walk me through the last time you did this. A specific occasion produces detail; a general question produces policy.

  2. 2

    Follow the story, not the guide

    The guide is a list of things you must not forget, not an order to march through. The best material comes from the follow-up you had not planned.

  3. 3

    Ask for the artefacts

    The spreadsheet, the notebook, the group chat. What people built to cope with the product tells you what the product failed to do.

  4. 4

    Sit through the silence

    Count to five after they finish. Most of the useful second half of an answer arrives in that gap.

  5. 5

    Close with what you missed

    Is there anything I should have asked. It is the single highest-yield question in the guide.

Wording

Do

  • Ask what they did, then how it went, then how they felt about it.
  • Repeat their own word back as a question when it is doing a lot of work.
  • Let them correct you. Being slightly wrong out loud invites precision.

Do not

  • Ask whether they would use a feature. They cannot know, and they will be polite.
  • Stack two questions into one sentence and take the answer to the second.
  • Explain the product. The moment you pitch, the interview is over.

In practice

  1. i.

    The spreadsheet as a requirement

    B2B discovery

    Asking what people do outside the product frequently uncovers a manually maintained spreadsheet, which describes both an unmet need and the mental model it should follow.

  2. ii.

    The workaround that became the roadmap

    What artefacts reveal

    Half the participants kept a private spreadsheet alongside the product. None mentioned it until asked what else was open on their screen, and it described a missing feature more precisely than any request had.

Commonly confused with

Close neighbours that get substituted for each other. The difference is stated first, then the condition that picks one over the other.

vs.

Contextual Inquiry

Research method

Observation of real work in the real environment, with questions asked as it happens.

Key difference

An interview is a conversation about the work. Contextual inquiry happens in the place the work is done, watching it as it goes. The difference is observation: one collects what people can recall and articulate, the other collects what actually happens.

Use User Interviews when

  • The work cannot be observed, or is spread across weeks.
  • You need history, reasoning and how people describe their world.
  • Access is limited to an hour on a call.

Use Contextual Inquiry when

  • The workarounds, tools and interruptions matter.
  • People cannot accurately describe what they do, which is usual.
  • You can get into the environment where the work happens.

Learn about Contextual Inquiry

vs.

Surveys

Research method

Structured questions to a sample, producing counts and comparisons.

Key difference

A survey measures how widespread something is among people you can reach. An interview finds out what that something is. A survey can only ask about what you already thought to ask, which is why it is the wrong first move.

Use User Interviews when

  • You do not yet know the right questions.
  • The answer is a reason, a story or a workaround.
  • A handful of people, explored properly, will settle it.

Use Surveys when

  • You already know what to ask and need to know how common it is.
  • The sample has to be large enough to generalise from.
  • The output is a number that will be tracked over time.

Learn about Surveys

vs.

Usability Testing

Research method

A task-based session that observes behaviour rather than collecting opinion.

Key difference

A usability test asks people to do something and watches. An interview asks people about their work, context and goals. One finds interface problems, the other finds out what to build.

Use User Interviews when

  • You do not yet know what to design.
  • The question is context, workaround or motivation.
  • There is no artefact to put in front of anyone.

Use Usability Testing when

  • There is something to use, even a paper sketch.
  • The question is whether people can complete a task.
  • You want behaviour, not recollection.

Learn about Usability Testing

Local chart

RES·003 · Region IV · Grid H1

This entry and the entries it is stated to connect with. Each line is labelled with what the connection means.

Confirmation BiasBIAS·009 · PRINCIPLES BEHIND THISSurvivorship BiasBIAS·010 · PRINCIPLES BEHIND THISInterview GuideTPL·002 · OFTEN USED WITHPersonaTPL·003 · OFTEN USED WITHResearch PlanTPL·001 · OFTEN USED WITHCondensTOOL·015 · OFTEN USED WITHDovetailTOOL·014 · OFTEN USED WITHRespondentTOOL·017 · OFTEN USED WITHUser InterviewsTOOL·016 · OFTEN USED WITHSurveysRES·004 · ALTERNATIVE APPROACHContextual InquiryRES·012 · COMMONLY CONFUSED WITHUsability TestingRES·001 · COMMONLY CONFUSED WITH

Sources

Where a source establishes something narrower than the popular reading of it, the note says so.

  1. [1]

    Interviewing Users

    S. Portigal, Rosenfeld Media, 2013, revised 2023

Continue from here

Each link says what the connection is, so you can tell a principle from an alternative from a thing people mix this up with.

Applies when you are designing

A Pricing PageAn AI ProductAn Enterprise WorkflowSettings

Principles behind this

The reasoning this solution is an application of.

Often used with

These usually appear in the same screen or the same decision.

Practical example

A worked decision where this was the deciding factor.

Short definition

The one-paragraph version, for when that is all you need.

Related concept

Connected closely enough to change how you apply this.