Comparing research platforms
Maze vs UserTesting: Which is right for your company?
Maze, a UserTesting alternative, helps companies build the right products faster by making user insights available at the speed of product development.
Maze vs UserTesting: Introduction
When it comes to research with your users, choosing the right platform can make all the difference. Maze and UserTesting are two popular platforms in the market, but which is the better choice for your organization?
UserTesting is a platform driven by video-based human insight, more focused on traditional moderated research through in-depth interviews. It still heavily relies on video interview scheduling and manual qualitative analysis to extract insights. It does not offer qualitative reporting.
Maze is an AI-first end-to-end platform enabling collection of both qualitative and quantitative insights at an expert-level allowing you to make more confident decisions at the pace of product development. It auto generates reports, analysis and themes allowing you to collect and share insights faster.
In this detailed comparison, we’re covering how both these platforms compare to each other in key points such as:
- User-friendliness - How easy will this platform be to onboard with my team or organization? Will this help democratize our user research?
- Versatility - Is this a true end-to-end platform? Does it facilitate both quantitative and qualitative research methods? How well does this platform integrate with the design tools we use?
- Product decision making - How easily and quickly can we analyze results and customize insight reports to make important decisions?
Platform comparison (from G2 reviews)
Maze | UserTesting | |
|---|---|---|
Overall rating (G2) | 4.5/5 out of 90+ reviews | 4.5/5 out of 600+ reviews |
Ease of use | 9.0 / 10 | 8.5 / 10 |
Ease of setup | 9.6 / 10 | 8.6 / 10 |
Product direction | 8.4 / 10 | 8.1 / 10 |
Pricing |
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Maze vs UserTesting: Main differences
What really sets Maze and UserTesting apart for teams doing research?
Type of platform
UserTesting focuses on collecting insights from video interviews and recordings, more time-consuming to conduct and review.
Maze is an end-to-end research platform that supports both moderated and unmoderated testing, and allows companies to deliver better digital experiences by incorporating user feedback into all stages of product development.
Time to insight
UserTesting's reporting/analytics are perceived as lacking and focused on collecting insights from moderated video interviews and recordings.
Maze’s AI-first technology auto generates reports, analysis and themes allowing you to collect and share insights faster. This allows you to make more confident decisions at the pace of product development.
Research democratization
UserTesting has a difficult and long adoption process and forces a limited amount of engagement through a small amount of licenses.
Maze is an enterprise-ready, user-friendly platform, enabling every designer, product team, and researcher company-wide to make product decisions based on user insights.
Maze vs UserTesting: Feature comparison
Features
Maze
UserTesting
Maze
Prototype testing
Integrations with design tools
Adobe XD, Axure, Figma, Sketch
Adobe XD
Adobe XD, Axure, Figma, Sketch
Video / screen session recording
Tree testing
AI functionalities
Card sorting
5-Second testing
Surveys
Live website testing
In-product surveys
Automated reports
Granular reporting
Maze vs UserTesting: Participant management & recruiting
Features
Maze
UserTesting
Maze
Tester panel
Panel advanced criteria
400+ targeting attributes
Unknown number of attributes
400+ targeting attributes
Panel country coverage
150+ countries
35 countries
150+ countries
Custom screener questions
Participant management database
Self-recruiting
Custom email research campaigns
UserTesting: Deep feedback at a cost
UserTesting provides a way to collect feedback, analyze results, and share findings without sacrificing time or risking expensive rework. It's a platform designed for individual in-depth projects and for those focused on qualitative research. With UserTesting, you can:
Collect responses through video recordings, which can be time-consuming to schedule, script, and review
Complex pricing structure doesn't allow teams to scale research. It becomes unpredictable and expensive to add extra seats, run studies of different types/blocks, or enroll in extra support services
Leverage a large panel of 1 million testers (many unverified according to user reviews)
Integrate with project management tools like Optimal Workshop, Slack, Trello, Jira, Outlook, and Google Calendar
Maze: The end-to-end research platform
Maze is intuitive enough for designers and product managers to use, while still having the methodological rigor that researchers need. Easier to setup (9.6 vs 8.6 rating on G2) and with the power to round up valuable feedback all in one place, Maze helps you deliver truly customer-centric products faster.
Gather both quantitative and qualitative feedback through methods like moderated studies, card sorting, live website prompts, and heatmaps, leveraging both numerical and behavioral usability data
Create team spaces, assign roles, and work together on mazes from the outset, with projects ranging from user surveys to usability tests
Choose recruitment options that fit your needs, from our Maze Panel powered by Prolific and Cint, to your own participant database with Reach, and specific Amplitude cohorts with in-product prompts
Integrate with leading product design tools like Figma, AdobeXD, Sketch, as well as other essentials in your toolkit like Slack and Amplitude
Maze vs UserTesting: Takeaways
At the end of the day, it comes down to which platform aligns better with your workflow and vision as a team.
UserTesting focuses on deeper, qualitative insights extracted from moderated interviews. According to customer feedback, it can take up to 12 weeks for UserTesting feedback to arrive, compared with Maze’s window of just 3 hours. While the recent acquisition of UserZoom allowed them to tap into the quantitative/unmoderated space, technically it can take years before it provides a seamless, "all-in-one" platform experience. Additionally, they currently restrict the types of study/blocks you can run concurrently, so it can quickly become a very expensive option to scale research across your company.
On the other hand, Maze is an intuitive, cost-effective choice for teams who need a blend of qualitative and quantitative research to inform everyday product decisions. With AI-powered tools for both moderated and unmoderated studies integrated within the same platform, Maze gives product teams a scalable way to uncover user insights at speed and feed them across the entire product development cycle. Additionally, its rich, automated, and fully customizable reports outperform UserTesting's manual process, so findings are easy to come by and even easier to share.
Why do product and design teams choose Maze over UserTesting?
All-in-one holistic platform
Get the full picture faster with a breadth of native quantitative and AI-powered quantitative research methods that anyone in your team can quickly put live, and deliver value to customers more often.
Intuitive & user-friendly
Say goodbye to clunky platforms and steep learning curves. Maze is an easy-to-use platform with native functionalities whose tests can be carried out on any device, enabling quicker testing and easier adoption by your team.
Robust, customizable reporting
In tools like UserTesting, you spend hours analyzing data manually to build reports. Maze's reports are automated, visually-rich, and fully customizable. Filter and categorize information in detail to uncover patterns and share valuable insights with stakeholders.
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Our team transitioned away from UserTesting to Maze at the start of the year, and it's been an invaluable tool for making us more customer-centric in a fast, actionable way. We've reduced the time it takes to run a study from an average of 12 weeks down to just 1 week.
Heidi Brown
Director of Product Design and User Research at Classy
Frequently asked questions
Who is Maze for?
Who is Maze for?
Anyone working in a product team should be empowered to do research—whether you’re a designer, researcher, product manager, or other.
Maze is used by teams that want to empower everyone to collect actionable user insights to make informed decisions, and share learnings across their whole organization.
Why choose Maze over UserTesting for user research?
Why choose Maze over UserTesting for user research?
Product managers, designers, and researchers pick Maze over UserTesting for several reasons:
- Maze is more intuitive & user-friendly. It allows for easy rollout and adoption at all levels - even some more complex elements like design prototypes are straightforward to test and analyze.
- Maze is a truly all-in-one research platform. It balanced quantitative and qualitative insights better by incorporating quantitative (time on task, completion/abandonment/error/etc rates) and behavioral usability data (clickstreams and heatmaps).
- Maze has a more robust reporting. Maze's reports are automated, visually-rich, and fully customizable. One can filter and categorize information in detail to uncover patterns and share valuable insights with stakeholders.
How can I start using Maze?
How can I start using Maze?
Feel free to signup for a free account at Maze to play around with the platform. If you still have questions about how Maze works or how it can help your organization, get in touch with our product experts.
Can I request a demo?
Can I request a demo?
Absolutely! Tell us a little about your company here and we’ll connect you with someone in our team.
Don't settle for legacy user research
Maze gives product teams a scalable way to uncover user insights at speed and feed them across the entire product development cycle.