Heuristic Evaluation
An expert review of an interface against established usability principles, done without users, to find likely problems quickly and cheaply.
Process & MethodsReviewers walk the product against a checklist — visibility of system status, match with the real world, user control, consistency, error prevention, recognition over recall, and so on — and log violations with a severity rating. Two or three independent reviewers find substantially more than one, because each notices different classes of problem.
It is fast and cheap, and it is not a substitute for usability testing. Heuristics reliably catch craft problems: unclear labels, missing states, inconsistent patterns. They cannot tell you that users do not understand the mental model, because the reviewer already does. Use it as the first pass of a UX audit, then test the findings you are least sure about.
In practice
A banking app concept was reviewed against ten heuristics before any user session. Before: 34 issues logged, 6 rated severe. After fixing the severe ones — no confirmation on transfers, no error recovery on failed payments — the later user sessions surfaced mental-model problems instead of the same six complaints. The catch — reviewers disagreed on severity, so ratings had to be reconciled.
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You may ask
Frequently Asked Questions
How many reviewers do we need?
Three is the usual sweet spot. A single reviewer typically finds around a third of the issues a small group would; beyond three or four the additional findings tail off sharply.
Can heuristic evaluation replace user testing?
No. It finds violations of known principles, which is a different set from the problems users actually hit. It is best used to clear the obvious issues so that user sessions are not spent rediscovering them.
Related terms
All terms- UX AuditA structured review of an existing product against usability, accessibility and business criteria, producing a prioritised list of problems and fixes.
- Usability TestingWatching real users attempt real tasks in a product or prototype to find where they struggle, without steering them.
- Interaction DesignThe design of how an interface behaves — what responds to what, in what order, with what feedback, and what happens when something goes wrong.
- User ResearchThe systematic study of users' goals, behaviour and context — through interviews, observation and analysis — to inform what gets designed and built.
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