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This user interview question bank collects 98 open-ended questions across 11 common scenarios, plus 10 common follow-up questions, to help you write an interview guide faster. The right way to use it is to select and rewrite: first write down the decision this study needs to support, then pick 5–8 questions from the relevant sections, replace the [ ] placeholders with your product and context, reword them so participants will understand, and give every question a follow-up direction. Don't copy the whole set. A 30-minute interview can't cover twenty main questions, and asking more means going less deep.
How to pick questions from the bank
- Start by writing one sentence on the decision the study needs to support, such as "Should we rebuild onboarding next quarter?", then decide which sections you need.
- Pick two for the opening, two for the wrap-up, and three to five from the main sections in between. Keep the main questions in one interview under ten.
- Rewrite in the participant's words: replace [product name] and [domain] with specific names, and cut terms they wouldn't use.
- Under each main question, write two or three follow-up directions. You can choose from the common follow-up questions at the end of this page.
- Try the questions out on one or two colleagues first. Delete or rewrite any that sound leading or are hard to answer.
Opening and warm-up
The opening questions help participants relax and share some background. The answers themselves aren't the point, so two or three are enough.
- To start, could you tell me a little about yourself? What kind of work do you do?
- What does a typical day look like for you? When are you busiest?
- Which apps do you open most often on your phone?
- When I say [domain, e.g., budgeting], what's the first thing that comes to mind?
- When did you first get into [domain]?
- Who else usually does [task] with you?
- When it comes to [domain], do people around you come to you for advice?
- Has anything been taking up a lot of your attention lately?
Usage habits and context
These questions help you reconstruct how participants actually use the product. Anchor them in one recent occasion rather than general habits.
- When was the last time you opened [product name]? What were you doing at the time?
- Could you walk me through how you usually use [product name], from start to finish?
- Where do you usually use it? For example, at home, on your commute, or at work?
- When you're using it, what other tools or pages do you usually have open at the same time?
- Are there days of the week when you use it a lot more, or a lot less? Why is that?
- Besides you, who else sees or uses what you make in [product name]?
- Is there a feature you use almost every time?
- Is there a feature you know is there but have never used?
- If [product name] stopped working one day, what would you do?
- How has the way you use it now changed from when you first started?
First use and onboarding
Use these to study sign-up conversion and new-user churn. Participants' memories of their first time fade, so it's best to talk to people who started using the product in the last 30 days (an example criterion; adjust to your product's cycle).
- Do you remember how you first found out about [product name]?
- Why did you decide to give it a try at the time?
- When you first opened it, what was the first thing you did?
- During sign-up or setup, was there any step where you hesitated or stopped?
- After using it for the first time, what was your impression?
- From when you started using it to when you felt you knew how to use it, about how long did it take? What happened in between?
- When you were getting started, did you look for help, like asking someone, searching for a tutorial, or reading instructions?
- Was there a moment when it turned out different from what you expected?
- If you were teaching a new coworker to use it, what step would you teach first?
Churn and stopping use
When talking to people who stopped using the product, ask about changes in their life and work first, then about the product itself, so you don't open by asking them to justify quitting.
- About when was the last time you used [product name]?
- Think back: what was changing in your work or life around that time?
- When did you start using it less and less?
- Before you stopped using it, was there anything that made you think about replacing it?
- Since you stopped using it, how do you handle that task now?
- Since switching to what you use now, what's easier and what's actually more of a hassle?
- When you decided to stop using it, did you talk it over with anyone?
- After you stopped, did you ever open it again? What was that for?
- Since then, has there been a time when you thought about it? What were you doing?
Features and needs
Don't ask directly what features people want. Ask where they get stuck and what workarounds they use, and the needs will surface from what happened.
- When you use [product name] to [task], which step takes the most time?
- Is there something you wished it could do, but you had to handle some other way? How did you handle it that time?
- Have you come up with any workarounds of your own to make it work for you?
- Has a feature ever broken in a way that held you up?
- Tell me about the last time you exported or copied data out of it. What did you do with it afterward?
- The feature you use most, what does it help you get done?
- If you could keep only three features, which three would you keep? Why those?
- Have you ever made a suggestion to us or anyone else? What was it?
- This need you mentioned, how often do you run into it these days?
- If this never gets solved, how much does it affect you? Tell me about the last time you ran into it.
Concepts and new products
Show participants the concept description first, then use these questions to learn what they understood it to be and whether they'd use it. Don't start by asking whether they like it.
- After reading this description, what do you think it's for? Tell me in your own words.
- Was there anything you didn't quite understand?
- What kind of person do you think it's best suited for?
- When you see it, what things you already use does it remind you of?
- Compared with how you do it now, what's the same and what's different?
- If it were available tomorrow, what's the first thing you'd use it for?
- Is there anything about it that makes you uneasy?
- To start using it, what do you think you'd need to prepare or change first?
- In this description, which sentence resonates with you most, and which one do you think could be cut?
Price and payment
When you talk about price in an interview, focus on how participants think about the money and how they've spent it in the past. Leave testing specific price points to quantitative methods such as Van Westendorp or Gabor-Granger.
- Roughly how much do you spend on [domain] each month right now? What does it go toward?
- The last time you paid for a similar product or service, what was the situation?
- Before you paid, what other options did you compare?
- When you see the current price of [product name], what's your first reaction?
- Looking at this price, which part feels worth it and which part doesn't?
- Did you decide to pay on your own, or did someone else need to approve it or reimburse you?
- Has a renewal or charge ever caught you by surprise?
- How would you explain to someone else whether this was worth the money?
- In what situation would you consider switching to something cheaper or free? Have you done that before?
Purchase decisions
Reconstruct one real purchase in order, starting from when the idea first came up. The approach is close to the timeline questioning often used in Jobs to be Done interviews.
- Could you walk me through how you decided to buy [product name], from the beginning? What first got you looking for this kind of product?
- Where did you look for information at the time, and who did you ask?
- How many options made it to the final comparison? How did you rule each one out?
- Was there a moment when you almost didn't buy it?
- What finally made up your mind?
- What were you worried about before you bought it? What happened with those worries afterward?
- Besides you, who else was involved in the decision? What did they care about?
- From when you started looking to when you finally bought it, roughly how long did it take?
- Looking back now, did this purchase live up to what you expected at the time?
Satisfaction and recommendation
Use these as follow-up after an NPS or satisfaction survey. A score only shows attitude; these questions help you find the specific experiences behind it.
- You just gave it a [score]. What's the main reason?
- What would need to happen for you to give it one point higher?
- What was the most recent time you were happy with using it?
- What was the most recent time it let you down?
- Have you ever mentioned [product name] to anyone? What did you say?
- Was there a time you could have recommended it but didn't? What was going on?
- If a friend asked whether they should use it, what would you tell them to watch out for?
- Compared with similar products you've used, where does it rank for you?
- Do you feel differently about it now than you did six months ago? What brought about the change?
Brand and advertising
Brand questions tend to get polite answers. Ask more about where participants have seen it and what they remember, and less about whether they like it.
- When you hear [brand name], what's the first thing that comes to mind?
- Where did you first see or hear about this brand?
- If it were a person, what kind of person would it be?
- In your view, what's the biggest difference between it and [competitor]?
- Have you seen any ads or content for it recently? Do you remember what it was about?
- After watching this ad, what do you think it's trying to tell you?
- Was there any part of the ad that felt relevant to you, or not relevant to you?
- What do people around you say about this brand?
Closing and wrap-up
Wrap-up questions often fill in things that were missed earlier. Leave at least two or three minutes and don't rush the ending.
- Of everything we talked about today, what matters most to you?
- Is there anything I should have asked but didn't?
- If you could say one thing directly to the team that builds this product, what would it be?
- Is there anyone else who sees this differently and would be worth us talking to?
- Looking back at what we talked about today, is there anything you'd like to correct or add?
- If we have a new idea later, would you be open to taking a look?
- Was there any question today that felt uncomfortable or hard to answer?
- Lastly, is there anything you'd like to ask us?
Common follow-up questions
The main question just opens the topic; most of the information comes from follow-up questions. The probes below work in any section and help turn a general answer into one specific experience.
- When you said "[participant's exact words]," what did you mean, specifically?
- What day was that? Where were you at the time?
- What happened next?
- What did you do then?
- How did that turn out?
- How many times a month does this usually come up?
- Who else was around at the time? How did they react?
- Where did you learn to do it that way?
- What happens if this doesn't get done?
- The time you just described, how was it different from usual?
Here's an example of how a main question works together with follow-up questions.
In the example, the participant keeps a separate record in a notes app. Workarounds like this are often more valuable than a direct answer about what features they want, and they're worth probing further.
Common mistakes
- Copying every question from a section wholesale: the interview turns into reading from a list, and participants can only answer superficially. Pick questions based on the decision the study supports, with no more than ten main questions.
- Using questions without rewriting them: the [ ] placeholders aren't filled in or the wording is too formal, so participants have to guess what you mean. Rewrite in their words and try the questions out first.
- Sending the question bank out as a survey: these questions only pay off with follow-up, and written answers run to one or two sentences. Run a separate survey when you need data on scale.
- Asking main questions without follow-up: all you get are generalizations and opinions. Prepare two or three follow-up questions for each main question, and when an answer is vague, ask about the most recent time.
- Getting the order wrong: opening with price or reasons for stopping puts participants on guard. Warm up and walk through their usage first, then move into sensitive topics.
- Using the same guide for different groups: new users can't answer questions about stopping, and churned users struggle to recall getting started. Choose the sections that match each participant's profile.
How to do it in heari
In heari, once you enter a business question, AI generates a research plan and interview guide, and the research lead can swap in or rewrite questions from this question bank. AI runs the interviews by text or voice, in parallel, and automatically asks follow-up questions based on the answers. To reach a specific group, you can select participants by behavior data in Agentic Engine, such as users who recently stopped using the product. Every finding in the insight report comes with quotes and counterexamples and is labeled with participant counts.
FAQ
How many questions should you prepare for a user interview?
For an interview of about 30 minutes, keep it to 8 to 10 main questions and leave the rest of the time for follow-up questions. If you prepare too many, the moderator tends to rush and participants can only give short, general answers.
How do you ask interview questions without leading?
A question that isn't leading doesn't assume an answer, offer options, or include judgment words. For example, instead of asking "Is this feature hard to use?", ask "What happened the last time you used this feature?" and let the participant describe what happened and how it felt.
Can the questions in this bank be used in a survey?
Mostly not. The questions in this bank are open-ended and need follow-up to get at specific experiences. In a survey, you'd only get one- or two-sentence answers. When you need to measure scale, first use interviews to find the main situations, then design a multiple-choice survey based on them.
What order should interview questions go in?
A typical order is warm-up, background and usage, specific problems and needs, sensitive topics such as price or why they stopped, then wrap-up. Start with experiences the participant knows well, and once you've built some trust, move on to questions that ask them to take a position or talk about money.
