Brainstorming 🧠 Prompts

SUMMARY

Purpose: Generate a wide range of creative, user-centred ideas quickly to solve design challenges.

Design Thinking Phase: Ideate

Time: 45–60 min session + 1–2 hours analysis

Difficulty: ⭐⭐

When to use:You're stuck in a solution rut or repeating familiar patternsYou need to explore multiple directions before converging on oneYour team needs alignment or momentum around a UX problem

What it is

Brainstorming in UX isn’t just throwing ideas around — it’s a structured, time-boxed method for generating a high volume of diverse solutions with a specific user goal or challenge in mind. It’s often used in the Ideation phase of design thinking and works best when participants suspend judgement, go broad, and build on each other's thinking.

📺 Video by AJ&Smart. Embedded for educational reference.

Why it matters

Brainstorming helps teams disrupt functional fixedness and discover non-obvious directions, especially when navigating complex problems or ambiguous product requirements. It supports divergent thinking before decisions are locked in, ensuring teams explore ideas that could differentiate product experiences.

When to use

• Kickstarting a new feature or redesign with multiple pathways
• Exploring how to meet a newly discovered user need from research
• Prioritising experience improvements in existing workflows/products

Benefits

• Rich Insights: Helps uncover user needs that aren’t visible in metrics.
• Flexibility: Works across various project types and timelines.
• User Empathy: Deepens understanding of behaviours and motivations.

How to use it

• Define a clear problem prompt: Make it specific enough to focus thinking, but open-ended to encourage diversity.
• Set time limits and roles: Try 5–10 minute bursts for individual and group ideation. Use a facilitator to keep things moving.
• Use structured brainstorming formats: Examples: “How Might We” questions, Crazy-8s, attempt inversion (worst designs), or mash-ups.
• Document all ideas without filtering: Quantity beats quality at this stage.
• Cluster, expand and evaluate after: Use affinity mapping or dot voting once the session ends to make sense of the ideas.

Example Output

Following a “How Might We” session on reducing anxiety in mobile payment flows, the team surfaced:

• Show short videos explaining complex steps before the checkout
• Create ‘undo’ option post-payment to reduce commitment friction
• Offer payment simulation to preview charges and flow
• Use friendly visuals to explain security features
• Let users choose between gesture and PIN for fast confirmations

Common Pitfalls

• Premature filtering: Team members self-censor or critique ideas too early, shutting down creativity.
• Vague prompts: Without a clear “How might we…” or problem frame, ideas become generic or misaligned.
• Unequal participation: Dominant voices overwhelm quieter participants. Use facilitation or silent idea generation to balance it.

10 Design-Ready AI Prompts for Brainstorming – UX/UI Edition

How These Prompts Work (C.S.I.R. Framework)

Each of the templates below follows the C.S.I.R. method — a proven structure for writing clear, effective prompts that get better results from ChatGPT, Claude, Copilot, or any other LLM.

C.S.I.R. stands for:

• Context: Who you are and the UX situation you're working in
• Specific Info: Key design inputs, tasks, or constraints the AI should consider
• Intent: What you want the AI to help you achieve
• Response Format: The structure or format you want the AI to return (e.g. checklist, table, journey map)

Level up your career with smarter AI prompts.Get templates used by UX leaders — no guesswork, just results.Design faster, research smarter, and ship with confidence.First one’s free. Unlock all 10 by becoming a member.

Prompt Template 1: “Spark ideas with a ‘How Might We’ prompt set”

Spark ideas with a 'How Might We' prompt set

Context: You're a UX designer working with a product team exploring solutions for a user friction point.
Specific Info: The problem is defined as [users dropping off during the onboarding flow due to confusion or overwhelm].
Intent: Generate a list of ‘How Might We’ questions that reframe the problem from different user, business, and tech angles.
Response Format: Return 10 unique ‘How Might We…’ prompts in a list.

If any problem definition or audience assumptions are unclear, ask clarifying questions before generating prompts.
Then, suggest one reframing method to generate even more ideas from a different angle.