Using AI as a User Research Tool
Tool: Claude
Role: UX Designer and User Researcher
The Problem with Traditional Ideation
Ideation is one of the most time-sensitive phases of the design process. In a fast-moving product environment, the pressure to generate a wide range of concepts quickly often comes at the cost of depth. Brainstorming sessions are valuable, but they are bounded by who is in the room, how much time is available, and what the team already knows.
The question I wanted to answer was: can AI extend the ideation phase without slowing it down?
How I use Claude
Use Case 01:
Early divergent exploration
Before committing to a design direction, I use Claude to rapidly generate concept variations based on the design brief. I give it the user goal, the platform constraints, and known friction points, then ask it to propose multiple distinct approaches. This is not about getting the right answer from AI. It is about getting a wider spread of starting points than I could produce alone in the same window of time. I then filter, combine, and react to those concepts as the designer.
Use Case 02:
Edge case pressure testing
Once I have a concept direction I am exploring, I prompt Claude to think through it from the perspective of users who might struggle with it. What happens if the user is in a low attention state? What does this flow look like for someone who has never played this type of game before? What breaks if the user skips the onboarding? These prompts surface scenarios that might not come up until usability testing, giving me a chance to resolve them earlier in the process.
In Practice
Finding Pain Points and Accessibility Issues
For a recent mobile onboarding flow, I used Claude to generate eight distinct approaches to a disclosure and consent screen that had been causing significant user drop-off. Rather than spending a full sprint exploring each direction, I used the output to identify the two or three approaches most worth prototyping, cutting exploration time significantly while actually increasing the range of ideas on the table.
A second round of prompting simulated how different user types might react to each approach, flagging accessibility concerns and points of confusion before any designs went to testing.
In Conclusion
The Takeaways
AI does not replace the creative judgment a designer brings to ideation. What it does is remove the ceiling on how many directions you can explore before committing. Claude functions as a thinking partner in the early phase of design, helping me ask better questions and stress-test assumptions before I invest in building.