Research methods

Card sorting

Understand how participants naturally group information to help shape navigation, content structures, products or service categories.

Questions this method can help explore
  • How would users naturally group our content or products?
  • Which services do participants expect to find together?
  • What structure best reflects users’ mental models?
Useful when
  • Designing or refining information architecture
  • Understanding natural content relationships
  • Exploring category and grouping expectations
What to prepare
  • A focused set of cards representing content, products or concepts
  • Any fixed categories required for a closed or hybrid sort
  • A clear participant instruction for how cards should be grouped
What you can learn
  • Which items participants commonly group together
  • Where different mental models appear
  • What category structure may better match user expectations

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