How leveraging competitor insights can elevate user experience, drive growth, and inform smarter design decisions.
In today’s hyper-competitive digital landscape, a product’s success isn’t just about what you build—it’s about how you build it and how your building stacks up against what’s already out there. That’s where competitor research UX comes in.
Whether you’re designing a fresh experience or revamping an existing one, understanding what your rivals are doing (well or poorly) is critical. It helps you spot opportunities, avoid mistakes, and align your UX strategy with both user needs and market realities.
What is Competitor Research UX?
At its core, competitor research with a UX focus is about analysing the user experience of your direct and indirect competitors: their websites, apps, flows, features, interactions, and customer journeys—to uncover what works, what doesn’t, and how you can do things differently (and better).
According to the Baymard Institute, a UX competitive analysis is “the process of researching major competitors to gain insight into their UX performance…the goal is to improve your product’s UX design by examining specific elements and features in competing products.”
Similarly, the Nielsen Norman Group explains competitive usability evaluations as comparing your product against competing designs to learn what’s working and what’s not.
In simpler terms: competitor research UX = “look around, learn from what others are doing, and figure out how you can craft an experience that wins”.
Breaking it down
When you do competitor research UX, you’re typically looking at a mix of:
- Direct competitors: Businesses offering the same or very similar product/service, serving the same user segments. These operate in your exact market space targeting your audience.
- Indirect competitors: Those offering different products/services but solving similar user problems or serving similar goals in adjacent markets.
- Benchmarking: What are standard experiences in the industry? What are baseline expectations? (e.g., checkout flows, filtering, search)
- Gaps & opportunities: What are competitors missing? What are users complaining about? What can you do better?
- Strengths & weaknesses: What are competitors doing well? Where are they falling short?
Why Competitor Research UX Matters
You might ask: “Can’t we just focus on our users and not worry about competitors?” While user-centred design is essential, neglecting the competitive context is a risk. Here’s why:
1. Understand expectations & market standards
Users don’t only compare your product to your marketing—they compare it to everything else they use. By evaluating competitors, you can understand what “good” looks like in your space and design accordingly. As Baymard puts it, you’ll discover “what user experiences are standard in your market.”
Recent industry data shows that 80% of mobile applications cluster in the “mediocre” category for UX performance, highlighting the significant opportunity for differentiation through superior user experience.
2. Identify what works (and what doesn’t)
By analysing competitors’ UX, you glean insights into usability issues they suffer, patterns they rely on, features they emphasise—and either replicate the good or avoid the bad. Nielsen Norman Group emphasizes: “Data on what works well or poorly on other sites saves you from implementing useless features and guides UX investments.”
3. Spot gaps & differentiate
If everyone in the market is doing the same thing, you risk being “me too”. Competitor research UX helps you uncover unmet user needs or weak competitor offerings you can exploit—innovation through gap analysis.
4. Make informed design decisions & reduce risk
Instead of guessing what users want, you have empirical evidence from competitor behaviours and flows. It helps you prioritise, influence stakeholders, and avoid costly mis-steps.
5. Align UX with business and marketing strategy
UX doesn’t live in a vacuum. Competitor research links user experience to competitive positioning, product strategy, and business goals. It ensures you’re not only solving user problems but doing so in a way that positions you effectively in the market.
When to Conduct Competitor Research UX
There is no one “perfect” time—but there are key moments where it becomes crucial:
At the start of a new product / feature
Before you invest heavily in design or development, competitor research UX should sit early in the discovery phase. According to UXtweak: “It is best to conduct a UX competitive analysis when you are in the early stages of the design process of your digital product.”
Periodically / iteratively
Markets change, competitors evolve, user behaviour shifts. It’s not a “set-and-forget” activity; the best teams revisit competitor UX research at key milestones (e.g., design refresh, new market entry, major version update). Baymard notes: “Since new players in the market can emerge at any time and existing competitors continually make design changes, it’s a good idea to make competitive analysis an ongoing, iterative process.”
Other triggers
- Preparing for a major UX redesign
- Entering a new geographic market
- Launching into a new vertical / user segment
- After receiving user feedback complaining about “the competition looks better”
- When conversion / retention numbers stagnate
- When industry benchmarks shift significantly
How to Conduct Competitor Research UX – Step by Step
Here’s a structured framework you can apply. You can scale or tailor it depending on budget, time and business size—but the major steps remain the same.
Step 1: Define objectives & scope
Before diving in, clarify why you are doing this and what you need to learn. Good questions:
- Which user journeys or flows are we concerned about? (e.g., onboarding, checkout, subscription)
- What competitor segments do we care about (direct vs indirect)?
- What are our key metrics/focus? (e.g., task completion time, errors, drop-off, delight)
- What question do we want to answer? (e.g., “Why are users switching to competitor X?”, “How can we improve our checkout compared to others?”)
This aligns with UXtweak’s recommendation: “Start by deciding what you want to learn from your UX competitive analysis.”
Step 2: Identify competitor set
Create a list of competitors you’ll evaluate. Nielsen Norman Group recommends analyzing 2-4 competitors for most evaluations, while Baymard suggests starting with 5-10 competitors in your space. A practical sweet spot is typically 3-5 competitors for manageable depth of analysis.
Include:
- Direct competitors: same target users, similar product/service
- Indirect competitors: may serve same user pain but in different ways
- Consider leaders in adjacent industries for inspiration
Step 3: Define evaluation criteria and flows
Decide which flows/features/interactions you’ll evaluate. Example criteria:
- Homepage / entry experience
- Sign-up / onboarding process
- Key conversion flow (purchase, subscription)
- Navigation and information architecture
- Search/filter / discovery
- Checkout / payment
- Mobile vs desktop experience
- Accessibility / performance
- Micro-interactions and feedback
- Error handling / recovery
UXtweak emphasizes: “Identify key features and flows… define the most significant flows and identify features that users interact with.”
Step 4: Collect data
This is where you dive into competitor experiences and gather insights. Methods include:
- Heuristic evaluation of competitor sites/apps (apply usability heuristics to their flows)
- Usability testing (if possible) on competitor products—have real users perform tasks on those sites/apps and observe what happens
- Screen recordings, walkthroughs, screenshot capture of competitor flows
- Gather publicly available information (reviews, ratings, user feedback, social comments)
- Benchmarking metrics (load times, conversions, error rates if available publicly)
- Tools: UXtweak, UXPin, Maze, competitor site audits
Step 5: Analyse findings
Once data is collected, you need to synthesise it. Some common frameworks:
- SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats) applied to each competitor. UX-specific twist: what strengths/weaknesses do they show in user experience?
- Comparative matrix: competitor vs competitor vs your product across criteria
- Gap map: where are the user needs not being met? Where are competitors failing?
- Trend/pattern identification: What repeat issues appear across multiple competitors?
- Opportunity identification: Where can you differentiate?
Step 6: Translate to actionable recommendations
Data without action = wasted investment. You should conclude your research with:
- Prioritised UX improvements (e.g., quick wins vs longer term shifts)
- Strategic opportunities (e.g., “We can lead by offering X that none of them do”)
- UX roadmap input: design sprints, usability tests, prototypes
- Stakeholder report: clearly communicate competitor insights, implications, business impact
Baymard emphasises this: “Once you’ve completed your evaluation… summarise your findings and present them to your stakeholders… Use visual elements to make your report easy to understand and take action on.”
Step 7: Monitor & iterate
As earlier noted, competitor landscapes evolve. Set a cadence (e.g., annually or bi-annually) for revisiting competitor research UX, especially when launching new features or entering new markets.
Key Methods & Tools for Competitor Research UX
Here are some of the methods and tools to deploy when executing competitor research UX:
Methods
- Heuristic evaluation: expert review of competitor flows against known usability heuristics. Nielsen Norman Group emphasises this in their competitive evaluation work.
- Usability testing (on competitor flows): recruiting users to carry out tasks on competitor sites/apps and learn from errors, drop-offs.
- Screenshot/capture walkthrough & benchmark matrix: simply navigating competitor products and capturing key flows/features for comparison.
- User review analysis: reading app store reviews, Google feedback to detect competitor pain points.
- SWOT and gap analysis: synthesising strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, threats in UX context.
- Analytics comparison: where publicly available, comparing performance metrics across competitors.
Tools & Platforms
- UXtweak: Offers templates for competitor UX analysis that outline goals, competitor list, flows, tasks, and matrices
- Baymard Institute: Provides comprehensive guides and benchmarking research
- UXPin, Maze: Platforms for testing and prototyping competitor flows
- Hotjar, FullStory: For understanding user behavior patterns
- SimilarWeb, SEMrush: For traffic and engagement metrics
Turning Insights into UX Strategy & Design
Let’s explore how to go from raw competitor research UX data to real design and business value.
Prioritisation
Once you have a list of findings (competitor strengths, weaknesses, gaps), you will likely have dozens of observations. Use criteria such as:
- User impact (how many users this affects)
- Business value (revenue, retention, cost savings)
- Effort/complexity (how hard to fix or build)
- Competitive leverage (how differentiating this is)
Then map them in a quadrant: high impact/low effort = quick wins; high impact/high effort = strategic projects; low impact/high effort = re-evaluate; etc.
Incorporate into design sprints & roadmaps
Findings should inform:
- Design briefs (e.g., “Competitor A’s checkout has 5 steps; user feedback says this is too long → we’ll aim for 3”)
- Wireframes/prototypes (introduce features or flows that exploit competitor gaps)
- Usability tests (test your new design against competitor flows)
- Metrics & KPIs (benchmark against competitor performance)
Communicate to stakeholders
Competitor research UX isn’t just for designers—it’s a tool for marketing, product, development and senior leadership. Translate your findings into “what this means for our customer, what this means for our business, and what we recommend”. Use visuals: competitor screenshots, comparison charts, heatmaps.
Continuous improvement
Use competitor research UX as part of your UX maturity model. As your organisation grows, integrate competitor UX insights into regular UX reviews, product strategy meetings, and user research cycles.
Real-World Applications: How Competitor Research UX Delivers Value
Let’s consider practical examples of how this kind of research delivers measurable impact.
Example 1: E-commerce checkout optimization
Scenario: An e-commerce site conducts competitor research UX and finds that leading players offer guest checkout, visual progress bars, fewer form fields (average 8 vs. their 15), and mobile-optimized flows.
Insight: Their audit reveals a longer checkout process, lacks progress indicators, and shows validation errors on mobile that competitors handle gracefully.
Action: Redesign checkout to match market expectations: reduce fields to 9, add progress bar, implement inline validation, optimize mobile experience, and add a “recommended items” upsell at confirmation.
Result: Typical outcomes include 15-30% reduction in cart abandonment and 10-20% increase in mobile conversion.
Example 2: SaaS onboarding transformation
Scenario: A B2B SaaS platform discovers through competitor research that the market leader offers a 5-minute interactive onboarding wizard with contextual tooltips, while their product requires 10+ manual setup steps.
Insight: User interviews reveal that onboarding speed and ease significantly influence product adoption and trial-to-paid conversion.
Action: Redesign onboarding as an interactive wizard, streamline to 5 key steps, add progress tracking, incorporate micro-tutorials, and implement smart defaults.
Result: Common improvements include 40% faster time-to-value, 25% higher activation rates, and significant reduction in support tickets.
Example 3: Mobile app navigation overhaul
Scenario: Mobile app competitor research reveals that top performers have simplified navigation (average 4 main tabs vs. their 7), clear micro-interactions, and support for voice search.
Insight: Their app uses complex nested menus causing user confusion and higher drop-off rates.
Action: Overhaul mobile UX with streamlined 4-tab navigation, add bottom navigation bar, implement voice search, improve touch targets, and enhance visual feedback.
Result: Typical improvements include 20-35% increase in mobile retention and 40% reduction in navigation-related support queries.
These examples illustrate the value of competitor research UX: it’s not about copying what others do, but understanding user expectations and market context, identifying where you can leap ahead, and executing with purpose.
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