Too many UX teams spend months redesigning screens because the requirements were so vague that everyone clung to their own private interpretation of “done,” like conspiracy theorists comparing UFO sightings.
It’s a costly loop: debates erupt, stakeholders shift positions like politicians in a scandal, and user stories morph into ghost stories nobody wants to revisit.
Avoid Technical Jargon
Acceptance criteria should read like something your user would recognise in their daily life — not like a page torn from a developer’s manual on network protocols.
For example, instead of writing “System returns 200 on successful POST,” it’s clearer to say, “After clicking ‘Submit,’ the user sees a confirmation message saying ‘Your profile was updated.’”
Criteria written in human language help bridge conversations between design, tech, and business, ensuring everyone pictures the same outcome instead of talking past each other.
Case Study
Avoid Subjective Disputes
“Done” should be measurable, observable, and testable — not something left open to philosophical debate over who “feels” a screen is “intuitive enough.”
Vague words like “easy,” “modern,” or “delightful” cause endless subjective squabbles; instead, anchor criteria to visible outcomes like “The form has no more than 3 fields per step.”
Think of good acceptance criteria as a contract: they’re the shared yardstick that settles arguments before they even start.
Case Study
Define “simple” in concrete terms to avoid redesigns.
Capture Edge Cases and Error Handling
Users rarely follow the “happy path”; they type emojis into name fields, lose Wi-Fi halfway through checkout, or hit backspace until your app cries.
For instance, acceptance criteria might specify: “If the connection drops during payment, the user sees a message explaining the failure and is offered a retry button.”
Anticipating edge cases in your criteria prevents expensive rework later — and spares your team the horror of discovering an angry Twitter thread from a user stuck in a blank error state.
Case Study
Conclusion
Clear UX acceptance criteria aren’t just a checkbox in Jira — they’re the invisible glue keeping designers, developers, and business folks aligned, so what ships is what users actually need.
Investing effort up front saves time, money, and collective headaches, transforming requirements from cryptic riddles into a shared vision everyone can deliver on.