User Interview Questions: 20 Examples and How to Run Them

Author: Inputly

What are the best user interview questions?

The best user interview questions are about the past, not the future. "Walk me through the last time you did X" produces facts, while "Would you use X?" produces politeness. Start broad ("Tell me about how you handle this today"), then zoom into the moments that surprise you, and finish with one or two product questions only after you understand the job. Twenty questions is the right number to have prepared; asking all twenty is usually a mistake, because the best interviews follow the user instead of the script.

20 user interview questions you can adapt

Opening and context

1. "Tell me about your role and what a typical week looks like."
2. "What tools do you use to get this done today?"
3. "How did you solve this problem before our product existed?"

Behavior and workflow 4. "Walk me through the last time you [core action]." 5. "What was the hardest part of that?" 6. "What did you do before deciding to use our product?" 7. "What stops you from doing this more often?"

Pain points and workarounds 8. "What is the most frustrating part of your current setup?" 9. "What workaround do you use when the tool does not do what you need?" 10. "What did you almost give up on last week?" 11. "What makes you switch tools or start over?"

Product experience 12. "What did you expect before your first session, and what actually happened?" 13. "Which feature could you not live without?" 14. "Which part of the product do you avoid?" 15. "When did you last consider leaving, and what changed your mind?"

Priorities and signals 16. "What would you do next if you had an extra hour a week?" 17. "What is the one thing we should fix first?" 18. "Who else on your team faces the same problem?"

Closing 19. "Is there anything I should have asked about?" 20. "Can I follow up with you when we build this?"

How do you run an interview that stays honest?

Ask one question at a time and then be quiet. The first silence after an answer is where the real reasons live, so resist the urge to fill it with a better question. Never ask leading questions ("Don't you think onboarding is slow?") and never pitch your product mid-interview, because a user who is busy being sold stops being a source. Take notes on behavior, not on what users claim they would do. And close every interview by asking permission to follow up, because the second conversation is where the deepest insights usually surface.

What do you do with interview findings?

Turn every interview into feedback items the team can act on, and merge them with the feedback you collect at scale. Interviews give you the why behind the votes: one user explaining the billing workflow they hate is worth a hundred anonymous ratings. Write a two-page summary per interview round (what users said, what it means, what to build or stop building) and share it with the team. Then decide, because an interview that does not change a decision was a social call.

Frequently Asked Questions

1. Should you interview users yourself or hire a researcher? Founders and PMs should do early interviews themselves. The empathy you build informs every roadmap decision afterwards. Hire help when you need volume and rigor.
2. What is the difference between a user interview and a usability test? An interview explores behavior and motivation. A usability test watches a user attempt specific tasks. Run interviews to learn what to build, tests to learn if what you built works.
3. How do you stop users from telling you what you want to hear? Ask for stories instead of opinions and reward honesty explicitly: "The most useful thing you can tell me is what is broken."
4. Should you pay interview participants? A small gift card or credit is standard and improves attendance. Never pay per positive answer, that turns the interview into a purchase.
5. What questions should you never ask? Anything answerable by analytics ("How often do you log in?"), anything hypothetical ("Would you pay for this?") and anything leading. Your product data answers the first; only a real purchase answers the second.

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