Competitive benchmarking in UX research is a structured way to compare your digital experience with the experiences offered by other products that target the same users.
With competitive benchmarking, you run the same tasks across multiple websites, apps or prototypes, then compare results using consistent UX metrics, such as task completion rate, time on task and happy paths. This gives you a clear picture of where your experience leads the market and where it can improve.
Userlytics supports the full spectrum of UX methodologies, including remote usability testing, information architecture optimization and surveys, which are ideal building blocks for competitive benchmarking studies.
Why should I consider a Competitive Benchmarking strategy?
In most UX studies you learn how users experience your own product. Competitive benchmarking adds an extra layer of context. It helps you answer questions like:
- How easy is it for users to complete a key task in our product compared with top competitors
- Do our flows feel more intuitive, slower or more confusing than alternatives
- Which parts of the experience stand out as strengths in the market
UX benchmarking in general focuses on measuring and comparing usability metrics over time or across products. In a competitive setup, those comparisons are made between your product and selected competitors, across one or more devices (desktop, native app, web app, for example).
The outcome is a set of data backed insights that make conversations with stakeholders more concrete.
When To Use Competitive Benchmarking
Competitive benchmarking is especially useful when:
- You are planning a redesign and need a starting point for your UX goals
- You want to position your product as more intuitive or efficient than the market
- Stakeholders ask “How do we compare to X or Y” and you need evidence
- You are tracking UX performance over time as new competitors enter your space
You can also combine competitive benchmarking with longitudinal UX benchmarking (also known as diary-studies), comparing against competitors and previous versions of your own product for an even richer view of performance.
How Competitive Benchmarking Works With Remote User Testing
Userlytics supports remote moderated and unmoderated studies on websites, mobile apps and prototypes. This makes it a strong option when you want to compare several digital experiences in a consistent and scalable way.
Below is one recommended way to structure a competitive benchmarking study using Userlytics. Depending on your goals, scope and internal processes, your UX Consultant at Userlytics may suggest adjustments to this setup.
- Define your objectives and competitors
Start by clarifying:
- The key user journeys you want to focus on, for example sign up, onboarding, product discovery or checkout
- The competitors or alternative solutions you want to include, typically two or three main players in your market
- The markets or user segments that matter most for this comparison
- Design parallel tasks across experiences
Create a study plan in Userlytics where participants:
- Receive realistic scenarios, for example “You want to compare pricing for plan X” or “You need to register for an account”
- Complete equivalent tasks on each competitor website, product or prototype
- Answer a short set of customizable follow up questions, such as perceived ease of use, satisfaction and trust.
Keeping scenarios and tasks as similar as possible across experiences helps you build fair and meaningful comparisons.
- Recruit the right participants
Use a shared target profile for all products in the benchmark. You can recruit from the Userlytics global panel or invite your own users through custom invites.
- Collect behavioral and attitudinal data
During the sessions, Userlytics captures:
- Screen and video recordings for each task
- Task level metrics such as success or failure, time on task and task completion
- Post task and post study ratings using standardized or custom UX scales
This combination of behavioral and attitudinal data helps you understand both what users do and how they feel about each experience.
- Analyze results side by side
Within the Userlytics platform you can:
- Compare key metrics such as task success rate, time on task, completion rate and satisfaction scores across products
- Use video clips and highlight reels to illustrate differences in user behavior during presentations
- Combine quantitative scores with qualitative insights, such as recurring friction points that appear more often in specific journeys
- Make preference questions to compare competitors, in order to understand user preferences and potential improvements based on users’ experiences.
If your organization uses the ULX® Benchmarking Score, you can also include this proprietary index as part of your study to provide a single comparable UX score for each product or version.
Metrics To Use In Competitive UX Benchmarking
A competitive benchmarking study in Userlytics typically combines task level, study level and qualitative metrics.
Task level metrics
These focus on what happens during each activity:
- Task success rate
- User’s assessment of task success
- Time on task
- Task completion and drop off
- Number and severity of observed usability issues
Study level metrics
These help you summarize the overall experience:
- Standardized UX scales such as SUS (System Usability Scale), NPS (Net Promoter Score) or SEQ (Single Ease Question)
- Overall satisfaction or perceived ease of use
- Willingness to continue using the product or recommend it to others
When ULX® is part of your setup, you also get a composite UX score and detailed results for the underlying constructs and attributes, which can be tracked over time and compared across products.
Qualitative signals
Qualitative data brings depth to the numbers:
- Verbal feedback during think aloud sessions
- Comments in open ended questions
- Emotional tone and themes identified by features such as sentiment analysis and AI UX analysis
- Feedback on competitors preference
Together, these elements give you both a scoreboard and a story for each experience you benchmark.
Best Practices For Running Competitive Benchmarking Studies
To get reliable and actionable results, keep these practical tips in mind:
- Align on goals and definitions
Make sure stakeholders agree on:
- Which journeys and tasks are in scope
- What “success” means for each task
- Which metrics will be used to judge performance
Clear alignment early in the process avoids confusion when you present results.
- Keep tasks and instructions consistent
Use similar wording, scenarios and scales across products whenever possible. Small changes in how you phrase a task or question can influence user behavior and ratings.
- Control for device and context
Specify devices and environments clearly. For example, if you compare a native mobile app and a mobile website, define exactly how participants should access each version.
- Manage order effects
When possible, randomize or rotate the order in which participants see each product. This helps reduce learning effects and makes comparisons fairer.
- Combine metrics with rich evidence
Numbers are powerful, but stakeholders often remember examples. Use:
- Video clips of key moments
- Highlight reels that show patterns across participants
- Annotations and notes that point to specific issues and opportunities
This makes your competitive insights easier to understand and act on.
Turning Competitive Insights Into UX Action
The goal of competitive benchmarking is not only to generate rankings or charts. It is about informing better decisions across product, design and strategy.
You can use your benchmark to:
- Prioritize UX improvements that have a clear relationship with conversion, retention or satisfaction. If possible, match them with your own funnel metrics.
- Validate new design directions against industry leaders and direct competitors
- Build stronger business cases for UX by showing concrete performance gaps and opportunities
Because Userlytics supports ongoing UX testing and benchmarking, you can repeat your competitive study periodically and track how your UX evolves over time, both on its own and in relation to the market.