Why User Research Demand Is Climbing
Maze's Future of User Research Report, based on responses from over 1,200 product professionals gathered between December 2023 and January 2024, points to 2024 as a turning point for how teams gather and use customer insights. The headline finding: 62% of respondents say demand for user research has grown over the past 12 months.
The increase tracks with the broader adoption of continuous product discovery, research democratization, and the wave of layoffs and reorganizations across tech. Emma Craig, Head of UX Research at Miro, connects the trend to heightened economic uncertainty. Under pressure to outperform competitors, she observes a "shift towards more risk-averse attitudes, where organizations feel they need to 'get it right' the first time." Research becomes a risk-mitigation tool, clarifying both product and business strategy before commitments are made.
Research Inform Decisions Across The Lifecycle
User research insights are no longer consumed by design teams alone. While design (86%) and product (83%) remain the primary consumers, the report shows marketing, executive teams, engineering, data, customer support, and sales all draw on research results for decision-making.
Roberta Dombrowski, Research Partner at Maze, frames the underlying purpose plainly:
"At its core, research is about learning. We learn to ensure that we're building products and services that meet the needs of our customers. The more we invest in growing our research practices and team, the higher our likelihood of meeting these needs."
Clear Payoffs, Persistent Hurdles
The return on consistent research effort is measurable. 85% of respondents say user research improved product usability, 58% report higher customer satisfaction, and 44% saw increased customer engagement.
Yet translating insights into business metrics remains the weak spot. While 73% of teams now track research impact, 41% still struggle to link insights to measurable business outcomes. The other major friction points are time and bandwidth constraints (62%) and recruiting the right participants (60%).
Scaling Through Training And Tools
To meet rising demand, 75% of teams plan to scale their research in the coming year. The intended levers are more studies, AI tooling, and training that pushes research skills across the org.
Janelle Ward, Founder of Janelle Ward Insights, argues the organizational upside extends beyond product quality. She notes that scaling research builds a broader research mindset, adding:
"Not only will external benefits like competitive advantage come into play, but employees inside the organization will also better understand how and why important business decisions are made, resulting in more transparency from leadership and a happier and more thriving work culture for everyone."
Democratization Broadens The Research Pool
Research is spreading beyond dedicated researchers. In addition to UX research professionals, product designers (61%), product managers (38%), and marketers (17%) now run research at their companies.
The payoff for democratization is strategic influence. Teams with a democratized research culture report markedly stronger impact: they are 2× more likely to say research shapes strategic decisions, 1.8× more likely to say it affects product decisions, and 1.5× more likely to say it sparks new product opportunities.
The Researcher Becomes An Educator
Democratization doesn't eliminate the researcher role — it transforms it. Scaling research that way requires guardrails, meaning not everyone can run any type of study. The researcher's job shifts from purely technical execution to an educational role, guiding the organization's learning and curiosity.
To gatekeep quality without being a bottleneck, user researchers train peers on research methods and best practices. Approaches include shadowing a researcher on a live project, running mock interviews, or leading collaborative analysis workshops. That frees researchers to hand off tactical work — like usability testing — to designers and product managers, and refocus on foundational studies that inform product and business strategy.
Current Tooling And Techniques
The report also maps the current stack. Maze (46%), Hotjar (26%), and UserTesting (24%) lead among user research tools. Method-wise, teams rely most on user interviews (89%), usability testing (85%), surveys (82%), and concept testing (56%).
Morgan Mullen, Lead UX Researcher at User Interviews, notes that method choice follows project cycles. Most teams don't overhaul information architecture regularly enough to need tree testing or card sorting, but they ship new features often — explaining why usability testing is a workhorse rather than a niche activity.
AI Turns Research Into A Scalable Process
AI adoption is no longer experimental in this space. 44% of product teams already use AI tools for research, with another 41% planning or wishing to adopt them.
ChatGPT leads the pack, used by 82% for research tasks, followed by Miro AI (20%), Notion AI (18%), and Gemini (15%). On standalone research platforms with embedded AI, Maze AI (15%), UserTesting AI (9%), and Hotjar AI (5%) are the most common.
Automating The Tactical, Keeping The Strategic
AI's value concentrates in the tactical lane. Over 60% of respondents use it for data analysis, 54% for transcription, 48% for generating research questions, and 45% for synthesis and reporting. The reported dividends are efficiency: 56% say team efficiency improved, 50% see faster project turnaround, and 35% report freeing time for the human and strategic aspects of research.
Still, AI handles time-consuming chores, not interpretation. Kate Pazoles, Head of Flex User Research at Twilio, frames AI as an assistant rather than a replacement. The real value, she says, lies in connecting the dots and surfacing insights with a nuance only experienced UX researchers can deliver.
Maze co-founder and CEO Jonathan Widawski expects AI's footprint to keep expanding within those bounds:
"AI will be able to support the entire research process, from data collection to analysis. With automation powering most of the tactical aspects, a company's ability to build products fast is no longer a differentiating factor. The key now lies in a company's ability to build the right product — and research is the power behind all of this."
A Strategic Role For Researchers
Two forces — democratization and AI — are converging on the same outcome: a repositioned research function. The report's closing outlook casts user researchers less as knowledge gatekeepers and more as strategic partners and facilitators who teach teams how to engage customers and convert insights into decisions.
The structure supports research quality and accuracy when non-researchers run studies, while giving researchers room to tackle complex, strategic questions. The wider effect is an organizational research mindset that elevates decision-making and, as Ward suggests, fosters a healthier work culture. For teams weighing the effort of scaling research, the survey data offers a concrete case that the investment in learning pays off across usability, loyalty, and long-term product direction.
