What is the cost of usability testing?
It varies depending who is asked and sometimes I think according to who is doing the asking! It is curious that there is almost no information anywhere on the cost of these services. Prices these days vary a lot, and it depends on things like the length of the sessions, the complexity of the system, the extent and coverage of the testing, and the amount of detail required in reporting. Expect to pay between $1,000 and $1,500 per user. This might sound expensive but remember usability testing is very effective at gathering information from small numbers of users. You can conduct usability testing on 8 users for less than $10K and that should include a detailed report and debrief. This would be 8 sessions of about 75 minutes each. It can be less with a summary report and no debrief, which is sometimes more suitable. If you are paying more than this it is time to ask why.
