"I don't know what questions to ask" and "the example questions I see don't map to my product" are the two most common complaints from people running their first user interviews.
This article is a purpose-organized question library you can actually use, plus the design principle that ties it together: easy-to-answer questions are not necessarily good questions.
Five purposes
| Purpose | Question type |
|---|---|
| Opening | Icebreaker, background |
| Usage deep-dive | Concrete situations, behavior, emotion |
| Value articulation | "What is this actually solving?" |
| Competitor comparison | Decision criteria, prior consideration |
| Churn / retention | "Why leave / why stay" |
Walking through each.
Category 1: Opening
The first 5–10 minutes: relax the respondent, switch into conversational mode.
Examples
1. "Tell me about something memorable from your recent work."
2. "Walk me through your average day — even just the morning routine."
3. "If you had to introduce yourself in one line — 'I'm someone who…' — how would you say it?"
4. "Anything you've recommended to someone recently?"
5. "Anything you've stopped using recently?"
Design notes
- Open with concrete questions, not abstract ones
- Don't bring up your product yet
- Start where they're comfortable
Category 2: Usage deep-dive
The most important category. Reconstruct a specific situation in chronological order.
Examples
1. "When was the last time you used our product? Where, in what context?"
2. "What were you trying to accomplish?"
3. "What did you do to prepare before using it?"
4. "Were there moments where you got stuck or hesitated?"
5. "How did you feel afterwards?"
6. "If our product didn't exist, what would you have substituted?"
7. "About how long did it take?"
8. "When do you think you'll use it next?"
Design notes
- "When was the last time?" activates real memory
- "What do you usually do?" is weak — ask about the last specific session
- Reconstruct chronologically
- Track emotional movement in parallel
NG examples
✗ "How do you usually use it?" (too abstract)
✗ "Is it convenient?" (leading)
✗ "What's your satisfaction score?" (that's a survey question)
Category 3: Value articulation
Help the respondent articulate what your product is actually solving for them — often a thing they haven't formulated explicitly.
Examples
1. "If our product disappeared tomorrow, what would be the problem?"
2. "What does our product give you that nothing else does?"
3. "How would you explain it to a friend?"
4. "Do you want people to know you use this — or rather they didn't?"
5. "What part of yourself does using this express?"
6. "If your mood while using it were a color or weather — what?"
7. "If we doubled the price, would you keep using it?"
Design notes
- "What if it disappeared?" runs deeper than "what if you had it"
- Metaphors (color, weather, animals) surface emotion
- Hypothetical framing probes motivations the respondent doesn't normally examine
Questions like "if it were double the price" or "if no one could see you using it" expose motivations the respondent isn't normally conscious of.
Category 4: Competitor comparison
Understand decision criteria and the actual consideration process.
Examples
1. "What alternatives were you considering before picking this?"
2. "What was the deciding factor in the end?"
3. "If you've used other tools, what's different about this one?"
4. "If a competitor were cheaper, would you switch?"
5. "If a friend were stuck on the same decision, what would you advise them?"
6. "Any complaints about this category as a whole?"
Design notes
- "Compared" and "thought about" are different — probe for the actual comparison
- "Deciding factor" surfaces decision criteria
- Third-party advice framing brings objectivity into the room
Category 5: Churn / retention
The hardest category. Pulling honest answers requires real interview craft.
Churn-side examples
1. "What was the first trigger that made you consider canceling?"
2. "Did the timing tie to any external event?"
3. "Was there one last thing you tried before canceling?"
4. "If we'd fixed X, would you have stayed?"
5. "How did you feel right after canceling — regret, relief, or just nothing?"
6. "If you switched to a competitor — what are you getting there that you weren't here?"
7. "Any conditions under which you'd come back?"
Retention-side examples
1. "Was there a recent moment when you almost canceled? Why didn't you?"
2. "If you reset your subscription and had to choose again, would you?"
3. "If a friend asked 'why are you still on that?' — how would you answer?"
4. "Name three things you get from staying."
5. "At the next renewal — what would make you stay? What would make you leave?"
Design notes
- Churn involves anger / regret / resignation — handle gently
- "The last thing you tried" exposes their unmet expectation
- Most retention is unconscious — hypothetical framing pulls it out
The hard part — the easy / good trade-off
"Easy to answer" questions
"Is it convenient?"
"Are you satisfied?"
"Will you keep using it?"
These are easy but yield shallow information. Yes/no questions waste interview time.
"Good" questions
"If our product disappeared tomorrow, what would you substitute?"
"What if someone saw you using this — how would that feel?"
"If we doubled the price, would you keep using it?"
These are harder to answer but force articulation. Good questions are the ones where the respondent realizes mid-sentence "huh, I guess that is how I feel."
The trade-off
| Dimension | Easy questions | Good questions |
|---|---|---|
| Speed of answer | High | Low (they pause to think) |
| Information depth | Shallow | Deep |
| Burden on respondent | Low | Slightly higher |
| Findings per minute | Low | High |
Interviews work better with questions that make people think. 15 deep questions in 60 minutes beats 20 shallow questions in 10.
Design taboos
Taboo 1: Leading questions
✗ "This is convenient, right?"
○ "How did this feel to use?"
Taboo 2: Yes/no questions
✗ "Are you satisfied?"
○ "Tell me the parts you're satisfied with, and the parts you're not."
Taboo 3: Stacked questions
✗ "Why did you start using it, why do you keep using it, and what are the issues?"
○ "Let's start with why you began."
Taboo 4: Imposing your hypothesis
✗ "So you're using it because it's convenient, right?"
○ "Just to check — when you said that, did you mean 'convenient'?"
Taboo 5: Too abstract
✗ "How do you generally use it?"
○ "Walk me through the last time you used it, as specifically as you can."
Running the question library
Rule 1: Don't read the list in order
Working through an "interview question list" in order produces a mechanical interview. The library is a drawer; pick what the conversation needs.
Rule 2: Probe before advancing
When the respondent says something interesting, don't move to the next prepared question — probe. "Tell me more" and "what specifically" are the strongest follow-ups.
Rule 3: Let silence sit
A pause means deep response incoming. Filling the silence kills it.
Rule 4: Always record
Notes light, eye contact, transcription from the recording later. Trying to take perfect notes degrades the conversation.
Combine with surveys
User interviews work best paired with surveys:
- Survey finds a signal → interview the relevant segment (probe)
- Interview generates hypothesis → survey validates at scale (validation)
- Pre- and post-interview surveys (background context + reaction capture)
See combining quantitative and qualitative methods for the full pattern.
Where Repoan fits
Repoan handles the survey side around the interview:
- Pre-interview screening surveys — find the right 5 respondents
- Post-interview validation surveys — convert hypotheses into scale
- AI-assisted question design — script ideas
- AI open-text analysis — theme extraction across interview notes
Summary
User interview question design:
- Cover five categories (opening, usage, value, comparison, churn/retention)
- Pick questions that make people think, not questions that are easy
- Hypothetical framing surfaces deep motivation
- Use metaphors, third-party lenses, past-event reconstruction
- Avoid leading, yes/no, stacked, hypothesis-pushed, and overly abstract questions
The library is a drawer. The depth comes from how you probe what the respondent just said, not from how many questions you prepared.