What Is a UX Researcher? How to Become One, Salary, Skills.

UX researchers are responsible for studying and understanding what users of a system or product need and want. UX researchers use their findings to improve the design of goods, software and services. Here’s what to know about a UX researcher’s salary, needed skills and how to become one.

What Is a UX Researcher?

UX researchers study user behavior to answer important questions about how digital products and services are designed and how customers interact with them. The goal of a UX researcher is to improve a product or service through their findings. Some of the key insights UX researchers must uncover about users include their demographic information, how they use a product, what they get from a product and what issues they may have with the product. 

What Do UX Researchers Do?

UX researchers are tasked with learning what motivations, needs and behaviors users have when interacting with a product or service. The two main types of UX research are quantitative and qualitative. The goal of quantitative research is to identify the experience of a user by looking at data, such as click-through rates on landing pages, for example. The goal of qualitative research is to understand why users behave the way they do, and for this, UX researchers rely on field studies, moderated usability tests and user interviews.

UX Researcher Responsibilities

• Design, organize and implement user research projects, including A/B tests, field studies, user surveys, user interviews and usability tests.
• Analyze and synthesize qualitative and quantitative research to create and report findings.
• Present findings to designers, developers, leadership and stakeholders. 
• Collaborate with product and design teams and provide actionable feedback. 

Day-to-Day Responsibilities of UX Researchers

• Craft user research plans.
• Develop budgets and timelines for research projects. 
• Recruit targeted users.
• Conduct user interviews. 
• Create user surveys. 
• Organize usability tests.
• Conduct field studies.
• Analyze results from interviews and surveys. 

UX Researchers Within a Company

UX researchers are typically part of the product development team within a company. They often collaborate with leaders on the product team and design to create research plans, analyze results and data from surveys and questionnaires and make product recommendations. 

Importance of UX Researchers

UX researchers help companies understand the needs and wants of their customers as they approach the product or service. Without thoughtful UX researchers, companies will overlook the most important part of the design process: empathy. 

What Skills Are Needed to Be a UX Researcher?

Qualifications to Be a UX Researcher

• Experience designing and executing user research.
• Knowledge of UX design principles.
• Strong understanding of statistics and data.
• Experience with user research tools and software.

UX Researcher Prerequisites

• UX researchers usually hold a bachelor’s degree in psychology, statistics, human-computer interaction, information systems or a related field. 
• A portfolio of previous user research projects. 

UX Researcher Hard Skills

• Data analysis.
• Math and statistics.
• UX research methods and software tools. 
• User testing. 
• Basic design skills.

UX Researcher Soft Skills

• Empathy and curiosity.
• Interpersonal communication and writing skills.
• Problem solving and critical thinking skills.
• Collaboration and teamwork skills.

Tools and Programs UX Researcher Use

• Google Forms 
• UserZoom
• Dscout
• Hotjar
• Google Optimize
• Optimal Workshop
• Typeform
• Lookback
• Maze
• Miro

How to Become a UX Researcher

UX Researcher Education and Experience

UX researchers can come from a variety of different backgrounds; there isn’t one set degree that is necessarily best for UX research. Studying technology or behavioral and social sciences can all be relevant to UX research, as an understanding of tech and how humans interact with it is central to the role.

Outside of education, volunteering to run UX research projects for local businesses and non-profit organizations, as well as participating in hackathons, may be helpful experience in developing a UX research portfolio.

UX Researcher Certificates and Courses

• UX Bootcamps to Know
• Google UX Design Professional Certificate
• UX Researcher Certificates and Courses
• General Assembly UX Design Immersive
• Northwestern UX/UI Boot Camp

UX Researcher Career Path

Although UX researchers can come from many different educational backgrounds, starting a UX research career with an internship is a great first step in the field. UX researchers may later take on roles such as UX designer or UX engineer.

UX Researcher Salary and Job Outlook

UX research is a growing field, with 41 percent of researchers only having five years of experience in the field. But the size of UX researcher teams is expected to grow too. Of UX researchers surveyed by User Interviews, 71 percent said there are five or more researchers on their team.

The full compensation package for a UX researcher depends on a variety of factors, including but not limited to the candidate’s experience and geographic location. See below for detailed information on the average UX researcher salary.