This tutorial lists and compares the top Usability Testing tools to help you select the best Website Usability Testing tool for web applications:
Usability Testing Tools validate the website or application for user experience (UX) and provide insights for better digital experiences. These tools will help you to make fast and confident decisions at every stage of the product life cycle. TrueList UX statistics say that 55% of companies perform any user experience testing but intentional & strategic UX can take up the conversion rates by 400%.
Recommended Reading => A Complete Guide to Usability Testing
Another thing that should also get considered is the result you are interested in, collecting quantitative user data, or getting qualitative information. Also, the company should be able to protect sensitive data while performing online tests.
Table of Contents:
What Is Usability
A website or a software application should be usable; this is the core idea of usability. Usability is something that helps the user who is having zero knowledge about how to access the website or any software application in all manners.
A website is said to be usable if it possesses the features such as ease of access, speed, and efficiency, good to see the design, fast and easy recovery from errors, remember the user, etc.
Usability Guidelines:
The following guidelines are useful to understand what does software usability exactly mean:
- Provide useful content.
- Establish user requirements and understand user’s expectations.
- Avoid unsolicited graphics.
- Information should be usable directly, readable, and printable if required.
- Intimate about the time required for downloading and time outs.
- The homepage is enabled with all important options, navigations, links, images, scrolling, and paging, etc.
- Design for common browsers with relevant differences.
- The design commonly used screen resolutions.
- Simple background with clickable areas wherever necessary.
- Use videos or animation for a better understanding of the object.
- Check for web contents, instructions, acronyms, and abbreviations.
- Organize information.
- Display only the necessary amount of information.
- Making use of colors for grouping similar items.
- Check for controls such as list boxes, radio buttons, widgets, etc.
- Users should be allowed to see their information.
- Ensure search results.
- Inform about available search options, search result filtrations, automatic search hints.
- The search option should be available on each page.
- Use of interactive designs, select the right number of users and prioritize tasks.
- Use well-defined prototyping technology.
- Display the list of related items and display each.
Usability Testing is performed to examine the user interface along with learnability, efficiency, memorability, error, satisfaction.
Let us see an example to understand why Usability Testing is necessary. Consider your visit to a website for flight reservations. While booking a ticket for the onetime journey you come across certain issues like:
- Difficulties to have flight information.
- Unable to navigate to the ticket booking page.
- Improper links.
- Confusion with company offerings and services.
- Appropriate payment gateways are unavailable.
These are some issues that turn away the user and reduce the productivity of the system that causes huge loss. To avoid such ambiguities and complications, usability testing is necessary to perform.
List Of Top Usability Testing Tools
Here is the list of best Usability Testing Tools:
- CrazyEgg
- Userzoom
- Loop11
- Optimizely
- TryMyUI
- UserTesting.com
- Qualaroo
- Usabilla
- UserFeel
- Userlytics
- Validately.com
- UXtweak
Several online user testing tools are also available to perform usability testing. You just need to mention the concerned system URL and all will be done for you online.
In this tutorial, we are reviewing the best Usability testing tools to test any aspect of your web application or website.
#1) CrazyEgg
Features:
- CrazyEgg is the click-based usability testing tool.
- Typically it is divided into four parts such as
- Heatmap: Records where each visitor clicks on the webpage.
- Scroll map: Shows how far down the user scrolls each page.
- Overlay: Breaks the number of clicks on each page and element on that page.
- Confetti: Provides detailing of components and search items.
- It is easy to set up using JavaScript places on each page.
- Reports generated can be shared via a read-only link only.
- Easy to use and prices on a monthly basis.
Website: CrazyEgg
#2) Userzoom
Features:
- Userzoom is a user experience research platform to test and measure user experience on websites, apps, and prototypes.
- It is an all-in-one, powerful, and intuitive platform.
- Userzoom provides insights for every stage of the product development lifecycle.
- It can provide quick user feedback on design concepts and prototypes.
- It is for UX Researchers, designers, product managers, and marketers.
- It is useful for all your UX insights needs.
- It encrypts the data with AES-256 bit.
- It provides rapid results and automated reports.
Website: Userzoom
#3) Loop11
Features:
- Loop11 is a free usability testing tool that allows non-moderated remote usability testing.
- Data is displayed in the form of reports containing task time, path analysis, etc.
- Need not load software on the website.
- Easy to use and understand and do not require any coding.
- Can be used on any website and provide real data.
Website: Loop11
#4) Optimizely
Features:
- Optimizely provides easy and quick editing of images, text, and colors appearing on the website.
- Helps to schedule multivariate testing.
- Immediately deploys technology changes into customized code.
- Once generated a line of code by Optimizely, no need to modify it again.
- Tracks measurable actions like clicks, conversations that can be defined.
- Can create additional user accounts easily along with project organization.
Website: Optimizely
#5) TryMyUI
Features:
- TryMyUI provides standalone and customizable tests.
- It is a price-based usability testing tool.
- It can track mouse movements and keystrokes and serve the System Usability Scale Questionnaire.
- TryMyUI is also useful for mobile testing.
- It provides basic features, advanced filtering, quantitative data, and collaborative analysis.
- It can allow you to test with your testers.
Website: TryMyUI
#6) UserTesting
Features:
- UserTesting.com is a panel-based usability testing service.
- Provides testers feedback for questions asked by users regarding the website they visit.
- Testers provide their feedback in the form of flash videos or written summary.
- Fast and low cost but no ability of follow-up questions.
- Ability to rate each tester that serves quality information for user/researcher.
Website: UserTesting
#7) Qualaroo
Features:
- Qualaroo provides inline smart way surveys that help to ask questions on the specific webpage.
- Qualaroo is built by the people who created CrazyEgg.
- Allows choosing type of response, participants.
- Allows several questions and responses via email notification.
- Need to add code once to the website to launch a survey that does not require any further support from web developers.
Website: Qualaroo
#8) Usabilla
Features:
- Usabilla is a non-moderated remote usability tool built by Usabilla B.V.
- Tracks user’s mouse clicks along with qualitative and quantitative data.
- Usabilla provides data results as visual reports of heat maps.
- Data can be downloaded in PDF, CSV, TEXT or XML format.
- Easy to set up but does not provide follow-ups for questions while testing.
Website: Usabilla
#9) UserFeel
Features:
- UserFeel is a service used for Remote Usability Testing.
- Offers usability testing through multiple languages along with the English language and records mouse movements.
- Video coverage and voice-over commentary are some additional features of UserFeel.
- Easy, fast, and affordable.
Website: UserFeel
#10) Userlytics
Features:
- Userlytics is the remote user testing platform. It will give you feedback from real users for your website, application, or prototype.
- The platform will help you to optimize the Information Architecture of websites, mobile/desktop apps, and prototypes.
- It can provide Picture In Picture Recordings, Automated Transcription, Hyperlinked Annotations, and Highlight Reels for unmoderated and moderated UX testing.
- It provides Quantitative and Qualitative Metrics.
- It provides the features of PII Protection that will let you block screen recording during sensitive moments in the user experience test journey.
Website: Userlytics
#11) Validately.com
Features:
- Validately is a user testing tool with a dedicated platform, recruiting services, and automated reporting.
- It will let you use your exact test participant criteria and unlimited screener questions. Validately can recruit in 5 business days for your moderated research.
- Validately is specially built for user testing and it will conduct moderated research studies at every stage of product development and validates hypotheses early and often.
- Its testing platform has research tools like screen sharing, note-taking, clip creation, video sharing, etc.
- It is for testing prototypes, websites, and native & desktop/mobile (iOS & Android) apps.
- It can allow unlimited observers to join live sessions.
Website: Validately
#12) UXtweak
Features:
- UXtweak is a powerful usability testing tool for unmoderated user testing on your website.
- With UXtweak’s Features you can:
- Watch your respondents complete tasks on your website or test prototypes using the feature RePlay Tasks for remote unmoderated studies.
- Record your users with our session recording feature Replay Visitors.
- Conduct a card sorting study using our feature CardSort.
- Conduct a tree testing study using our feature TreeTest.
- Studies can be complemented by using questionnaires before and after the study.
- With its SmartSearch feature, you can search your session recordings for specific interactions such as clicks on specific elements or typing in input fields.
- Easy recruiting of respondents – UXtweak’s Recruiter widget allows you to recruit your real website visitors directly from your website. Alternatively, you can send your potential respondents a link to the study.
- UXtweak is very respondent friendly – they don’t need to install nor upload anything.
- Friendly pricing.
The tools/apps listed above are the most popularly used usability testing tools. There are many other used accordingly and the list gets extended every day.
We have listed some other usability testing tools with their details below:
#13) GTMetrix
GTMetrix is the usability testing tool concerned with page speed. It analyzes the causes for page or site to slow down. Also, it easily identifies images, CSS, or any script error. It helps to keep track of page performance, if the page performs poorly it generates an alert. It has the ability to test the page from multiple regions.
Website: GTMetrix
#14) BrowserShots
BrowserShots verifies the performance of the website in various browsers and their various versions like Cross Browser testing. Its system requirements are Pentium III 500 MHz, RAM 256MB, Software: Python, VNC Server on Linux, Python Win32 API, on Mac NetPBM or app script.
Website: BrowserShots
#15) iPerception
iPerception provides real-time analysis and scheduled reports. An additional feature is added as a ‘Feedback Scorecard’. It has multiple design templates with 32 supported languages apart from English. It provides well-defined SSL encryption. It is built as best SAAS Research Platform
Website: iPerception
#16) Morae
Morae is a usability testing tool for Windows OS. It can record user interaction including mouse movements, keystrokes, etc. It is divided into two modules, i.e. Observer Module that displays sessions and the Manager Module that analyzes & edits usability tests. It is easy and useful to perform research. It is expensive and does not support Mac OS.
Website: Morae
#17) ClickTale
ClickTale is a paid service that helps to record the user’s keystroke, mouse clicks, movements, and the time taken by the user to visit and explore the entire webpage. It shows aggregate data in the form of a heat map or reports.
The heat map displays Red/Hot colored areas to determine where users spend a long time and Blue/Cold colored areas to determine where they spend the least amount of time. Form Analytics is the best feature to display aggregate form fields.
Website: ClickTale
#18) FiveSecondTest
FiveSecondTest is owned by UsabilityHub. It is designed to capture the first impression of visitors to the site which takes only five seconds. You can ask questions regarding website design just by uploading screenshots. Testers take five seconds to provide a response and the responses are collected by UsabilityHub.
Website: FiveSecondTest
#19) ChalkMark
This tool is used for checking UI prototypes such as terminologies and navigations. Also, it provides support for sharing images with users to get their feedback. Like CrazyEgg it also uses a Heatmap to locate mouse clicks.
Website: ChalkMark
Conclusion
Usability Testing is necessary to ensure whether the system works with its intended users. This testing is generally performed simultaneously with the development life cycle thus helps to improve the design of the system consistent with technology concern.
It plays a major role in proving your website best amongst several. Once assured with the effectiveness and efficiency of the website means assured with user’s satisfaction.
Hope you will find this usability testing tools list useful.
Research Process:
- Time taken to research this article: 28 Hours
- Total tools researched: 25
- Top tools shortlisted: 18