synthetic-user-testing

Synthetic User Testing

Synthetic user testing is the closest thing to putting the design in front of real people without leaving the pipeline. You walk through the interface as each persona, attempting real tasks, and report what works, what breaks, and what feels wrong — from their perspective, not yours.

This is not a checklist exercise. It is an act of empathy disciplined by specifics. When you test as Jordan (low-vision, uses 200% zoom and high contrast), you don't ask "is contrast sufficient?" — you ask "can Jordan find the 'continue reading' button at 200% zoom when three articles are competing for attention?"

When to Use

• After the fix round — the design-builder has addressed findings from critic, accessibility-reviewer, and heuristic-evaluator. Now validate that the fixes work and no new issues were introduced
• Before verification-before-shipping — synthetic testing feeds directly into the persona walkthrough in the verification report
• When the design-critic flags persona coverage gaps — if the critique says "unclear whether Persona X can complete Task Y," run a synthetic test to find out
• When the team is unsure about a flow — synthetic testing turns "I think this works for screen reader users" into "here's exactly where a screen reader user would get stuck"

Process

Step 1: Gather Test Context

Before testing, assemble:

• Personas from inclusive-personas (via design-state.md)
• Key tasks from the design brief — the things the design must enable
• The build — test the actual implementation, not the spec
• Assistive technology context — for each persona, what tools they use and how (zoom level, screen reader, keyboard-only, switch access, etc.)

Step 2: Define Test Scenarios

For each key task in the brief, write a scenario that a persona would actually encounter. Scenarios are not "test case 1" — they are moments:

Format:

SCENARIO: [Natural situation trigger]
TASK: [What the persona is trying to accomplish]
PERSONA: [Name] — [key ability context]
SUCCESS: [What "done" looks like for this persona]