UserTesting built the unmoderated testing category. Credit where it's due: they pioneered video-based user research at scale and built a massive panel. For years, if you wanted fast video feedback from real users, UserTesting was the default.
But the credit-based pricing model has pushed a lot of teams to look elsewhere. The common complaints we hear: credits expire before you use them, testing your own customers costs the same as testing strangers, observer seats require paid licenses, and the bill climbs fast once you move past basic unmoderated tests.
The bigger issue? UserTesting is really a panel plus unmoderated testing tool. If you also need a participant CRM, moderated interview scheduling, surveys, card sorts, a research repository, or AI analysis, you're bolting on 4-5 additional tools. That's where the real cost lives, not just the UserTesting invoice, but the total research stack.
Here are 7 alternatives worth evaluating, each strong in a different way.
Before we get into alternatives: UserTesting still wins in specific scenarios. If mobile app testing is your primary use case, where you need people testing native iOS or Android apps on their actual devices with screen recording, UserTesting's mobile panel and testing infrastructure is okay.
If those are your core needs, switching will create more problems than it solves.
That said, most teams we talk to do 70% or more of their research with their own customers, not a third-party panel. And that's where the alternatives get interesting.
Best for: Teams where most research involves their own customers and who want to stop paying for 5 separate tools.
Great Question covers what UserTesting does (unmoderated tests, panel recruitment) plus everything it doesn't: moderated interview scheduling, surveys, card sorts, prototype tests, a research repository with AI analysis, and a built-in participant CRM with Salesforce/Snowflake sync.
The own-customer recruitment piece is what matters most for UserTesting switchers. About 90% of enterprise research involves your actual users, not random panel participants. UserTesting charges the same credit rate regardless, so you're paying $75 or more for an interview with YOUR customer. Great Question integrates with your customer data directly, so you build research panels from your user base without per-session credits eating your budget.
The pricing model is fundamentally different. Unlimited studies versus per credit with expiration. Flight Centre moved from 5 UserTesting seats to 136 or more researchers on Great Question and saved $300,000-$400,000 annually. That's what happens when the per-seat model meets an organization trying to spread research skills.
Brenna Zumbro, Senior UX Researcher at Procare, made the switch: "I couldn't control recruitment, and scheduling was really frustrating with UserTesting. For me, that was my big catalyst to find a better solution."
Beyond recruitment, it includes a full research repository with AI analysis (auto-transcription, theme detection, highlight reels) and governance controls (role-based permissions, participant contact limits, audit logs) that UserTesting simply doesn't have.
Pricing: From $99/user/month, with transparent pricing and no expiring credits. Free observer seats allow unlimited stakeholders without paid licenses.
Limitations: The external panel integrates only with User Interviews, a supplier of 6M+ participants.
Best for switching from UserTesting when: Most of your research involves your own customers but you still want panel access, you're tired of expiring credits, and you want to stop paying for 5 separate tools.
Best for: Design teams that primarily run prototype tests and want quantitative usability data.
Maze has built product adoption in the design community. The Figma integration works like: import your prototype, define tasks, and get click paths, heatmaps, task completion rates, and misclick analysis. If your research is mostly "did users understand this interface?" rather than "what are users' unmet needs?", Maze is fast and efficient. Check the tool buyer's guide for more on prototype testing platforms.
What stands out:
The quantitative focus separates Maze from the more qualitative tools. You get usability scores, benchmarks, and statistical significance indicators. Design teams love having numbers to back up their design decisions. "87% task completion on the new checkout flow versus 62% on the old one" is a lot more convincing than "participants seemed to find it easier."
It also supports surveys, card sorts, tree tests, and five-second tests, though these feel like add-ons rather than core strengths.
Pricing: Generous free plan for individuals. Paid plans are per-seat.
Limitations: Maze is a prototype testing tool with some extras, not a research platform. No moderated interviews, no participant CRM, no recruitment from your own customer base, no research repository, no AI analysis. If you're leaving UserTesting because of tool fragmentation, Maze doesn't solve that: it just swaps one point solution for another. You'll still need 3-4 tools around it.
No external panel either. You're sourcing participants yourself or bolting on yet another tool for recruitment.
Best for switching from UserTesting when: Your primary use case is prototype testing and you want quantitative metrics, not broad research capabilities.
Best for: Teams doing longitudinal research, diary studies, or mobile-first ethnographic research.
dScout owns a niche that neither UserTesting nor most alternatives touch well: diary studies. If you need participants documenting their experiences over days or weeks, uploading videos, photos, and journal entries from their phones, dScout is the tool built for that. Their "missions" framework makes it easy to structure multi-day research with clear prompts and deliverables.
What stands out:
The mobile experience for participants is genuinely good. Participants download the app, receive prompts, and submit video, photo, or text responses on their schedule. For "show me your morning routine" or "document every time you encounter this problem" research, it works significantly better than trying to build this in other tools.
dScout also has a solid panel, though skewed more toward US consumers.
Pricing: Custom, not published, and generally not cheap. dScout positions as a premium tool.
Limitations: Expensive for what you get, arguably more expensive per-feature than UserTesting. If you're leaving UserTesting partly because of cost, dScout is a lateral move at best. The tool is also narrower than UserTesting: diary studies and video-based qualitative research are the core, but there's no surveys, card sorts, prototype testing, or quantitative output. No repository, no AI analysis. You're replacing one specialized tool with a different specialized tool and still need everything else around it.
Best for switching from UserTesting when: Diary studies and longitudinal mobile research are a significant part of your research program. For anything else, this isn't it.
Best for: Small to mid-size teams that want fast remote testing without enterprise pricing.
Lyssna (formerly UsabilityHub) offers a lean set of remote testing tools: five-second tests, click tests, surveys, preference tests, card sorting, tree testing, and first-click analysis. It's simpler than UserTesting, faster to set up, and meaningfully cheaper.
What stands out:
Speed and affordability. Set up a five-second test or preference test in minutes, recruit from Lyssna's panel, and get results the same day. The interface is clean, the learning curve is minimal, and the pricing starts lower than most competitors.
Good for quick-turn design validation: "which of these two homepage designs communicates our value prop better?" Design teams that need fast signal without a heavy research process will find it efficient.
Pricing: From $75/user/month. Panel credits purchased separately.
Limitations: Lyssna is a remote testing tool, a pretty basic one compared to UserTesting. No moderated interviews, no participant CRM for your own customers, no repository, no meaningful AI analysis. Enterprise features like SSO, audit logs, and advanced permissions are limited or unavailable. If you're a team of 15 or more researchers, you'll outgrow Lyssna within a quarter. And the methods are lighter-weight: you're trading UserTesting's video-based depth for quick surface-level tests.
Best for switching from UserTesting when: You mostly run quick remote tests (five-second, preference, card sorts) and want to cut costs significantly. Just know you're also cutting capability.
Best for: Teams that need a recruitment solution and are happy assembling their own tool stack. Spoiler alert: you can get recruitment for cheaper by going directly through Great Question.
User Interviews is a participant recruitment platform with a strong panel. Post a study, define your screener, and get matched with qualified participants, often within hours. Their "Research Hub" feature adds basic participant CRM capabilities for managing your own customer panels.
What stands out:
The panel quality is consistently good. Participants show up, they're engaged, and the screener matching works well. For teams that have their research tools sorted but struggle with finding the right participants, User Interviews solves that specific problem well.
Pricing: Per-session pricing for panel recruitment. Research Hub has its own pricing tier.
Limitations: User Interviews is recruitment, that's it. No study creation, no analysis, no repository, no AI features. You're using it alongside your interview tool, your survey tool, your repository, and your analysis tool. That means you're now paying for 5 or more products where you used to pay for one. The "Research Hub" for own-customer management is basic compared to purpose-built participant CRMs. And the per-session pricing adds up fast at volume.
Best for switching from UserTesting when: You like your current research tools and just need better or cheaper participant recruitment. But be honest about the total cost of the resulting stack.
Best for: UX teams focused on navigation, site structure, and information architecture.
Optimal Workshop is the go-to for card sorting, tree testing, and IA research. If your primary research question is "can users find things in our navigation?" or "how should we structure this content?", the specialized tools here are deeper than what you'll find in generalist platforms.
What stands out:
The tree testing analysis is good: dendrograms, success scores, path analysis, and first-click data specific to navigation structures. Card sorting results include similarity matrices and cluster analysis that would take hours to do manually. For IA-focused research, these specialized visualizations matter.
Pricing: From $107/user/month.
Limitations: Optimal Workshop does IA research and literally not much else. It doesn't have a platform type approach to research. It's an add-on tool, not a replacement for anything. You'll still need UserTesting (or something like it) for all your non-IA research. The pricing at $107/user/month for such a narrow scope is hard to justify unless IA is 50% or more of your research program.
Best for switching from UserTesting when: IA research is your primary activity. But honestly, you're probably not "switching from UserTesting." You're adding Optimal Workshop alongside whatever replaces UserTesting.
Best for: Researchers who prioritize high-quality moderated interview experiences with stakeholder observation.
Lookback focuses on making moderated research sessions excellent. Screen sharing, video, notes, timestamps, live observer rooms. The core moderated interview experience is polished. Stakeholders can watch live and leave timestamped notes without disrupting the session.
What stands out:
The in-session experience for both moderator and observer is the best of the dedicated tools. Timestamped notes sync to the recording, making it easy to find key moments during analysis. The observer experience lets stakeholders feel involved without being in the room.
Pricing: Custom pricing.
Limitations: Lookback is a moderated research tool and nothing more. No unmoderated testing, no surveys, no recruitment panel, no repository, no AI analysis. The company has been noticeably quiet on product updates. It's unclear how much active development is happening. In a market moving toward platform consolidation, betting on a narrow, slow-moving point solution feels risky for long-term planning.
Best for switching from UserTesting when: Moderated interviews are your primary method. But for most teams, this is a tool you'd add on top of a platform, not one you'd switch to.
Start with the honest question: what do you actually use UserTesting for?
If you mainly use UserTesting for its panel (external recruitment): Great Question (get User Interviews recruitment for cheaper).
If you research your own customers (not panel participants): Great Question. This is the use case where UserTesting's model breaks down hardest: charging panel rates for access to your own users. GQ's Salesforce/Snowflake sync and built-in CRM change the economics entirely.
If you want to consolidate your full research stack: This is where the alternatives get thin. Most tools on this list replace one piece of UserTesting while adding new gaps. Great Question is the only option that replaces UserTesting and the 3-4 tools you run alongside it. Learn more about research operations to understand how tool consolidation transforms team efficiency. ServiceNow went from 15 research tools to 7 and cut recruitment time from 118 days to 6 after consolidating.
UserTesting doesn't publish pricing. Based on industry reports and customer conversations, expect $15,000-$50,000 or more annually depending on credit volume, features, and contract terms. Credits expire at the end of your contract period. This is the primary cost concern teams raise: paying for credits you don't use.
Yes, but the approach varies. Great Question has the deepest own-customer support with Salesforce, Snowflake, and API integrations for importing and managing your customer panel. User Interviews supports "Research Hub" for your own contacts. Most other tools (Maze, Lyssna, Lookback) let you share a test link with your own users but don't have CRM-style participant management.
UserTesting acquired UserZoom in 2022 (after the Thoma Bravo acquisition). They've been integrating the products, but some teams still reference them separately. If you're evaluating "UserZoom alternatives," the same tools on this list apply: Great Question, Maze, dScout, Lyssna, User Interviews, Optimal Workshop, and Lookback.
The technical migration is relatively quick (1-2 weeks) since UserTesting doesn't hold much persistent data. Your sessions and recordings may not export cleanly. The bigger effort is re-establishing your research workflows and, if applicable, migrating your customer panel to a new CRM. Teams typically report 3-4 weeks to be fully operational on a new platform.
For pure panel size and demographic breadth, User Interviews have the strongest external panels. Great Question integrates directly with User Interviews, which has a 6M+ panel. But the more relevant question for most teams is: do you really need a third-party panel, or should you be recruiting from your own users? If it's the latter, the panel comparison is less important than CRM integration and own-customer recruitment features.
Jack is the Content Marketing Lead at Great Question, the all-in-one UX research platform built for the enterprise. Previously, he led content marketing and strategy as the first hire at two insurtech startups, Breeze and LeverageRx. He lives in Omaha, Nebraska.
