Customize Your PRD

Product Overview

Product / feature name, one-line description, owner, status, version, date and stakeholders.

Why it matters: Reviewers need to know what this is and who owns it before anything else.

Problem Statement

The user problem, who experiences it, frequency, severity and cost.

Why it matters: Everything downstream is only defensible if the problem is stated precisely.

Evidence & User Research

Interviews, surveys, tickets, analytics, customer feedback and market research.

Why it matters: Separates a product decision from an opinion.

Target Users / Personas

Primary and secondary users, needs, pains, goals and jobs-to-be-done.

Why it matters: Every requirement is held against a specific user, not an audience.

Current Experience / Existing Solution

Today's workflow, tools, manual workarounds and alternatives.

Why it matters: Today's workaround is the real competition.

Product Vision & Goals

User goals, business goals and product goals, kept distinct from features.

Why it matters: Goals decide trade-offs when scope is cut.

Non-Goals / Out of Scope

What this release will not solve and what is intentionally deferred.

Why it matters: Unstated non-goals are the most common source of scope creep.

Success Metrics

Primary, secondary and guardrail metrics with baseline, target and method.

Why it matters: Without measurable criteria you cannot tell whether the product worked.

Research Insights

Observation, evidence, interpretation and product implication per insight.

Why it matters: Shows the reasoning between raw research and product decisions.

Assumptions

Validated, unvalidated and high-risk assumptions.

Why it matters: Names the beliefs that could invalidate the product.

Open Questions / Decisions Needed

Question, why it matters, owner and status.

Why it matters: Makes unresolved decisions explicit instead of silently assumed.

Proposed Solution

Solution overview, core experience, capabilities and intentional exclusions.

Why it matters: The product decision itself, stated once and clearly.

User Journeys / User Flows

Happy path, alternative paths, error states, edge cases and recovery.

Why it matters: Flows expose the states requirements forget.

Feature Prioritization

Feature, problem solved, priority (P0/P1/P2), rationale and dependencies.

Why it matters: Turns a flat feature list into a sequencing decision.

Functional Requirements

Uniquely identified requirements with priority, source, story, criteria and dependencies.

Why it matters: The contract between product and engineering.

User Stories

As a [user], I want [action], so that [outcome] — with persona, priority and links.

Why it matters: Keeps requirements attached to user value.

Acceptance Criteria

Given / When / Then criteria that are testable.

Why it matters: Defines done in a way QA can verify.

UX / Design Requirements

Navigation, hierarchy, interaction, accessibility, content and required states.

Why it matters: Design needs states, not screenshots.

Edge Cases

Missing input, no results, conflicts, permissions, failures, AI uncertainty, abandonment.

Why it matters: Edge cases are where trust is won or lost.

AI / ML Requirements

AI capability, inputs, knowledge sources, grounding, output, behaviour, guardrails, human oversight, evaluation, failure modes and cost.

Why it matters: For an AI product this is the specification; everything else is packaging.

Engineering Requirements

APIs, data, auth, permissions, integrations, performance, scalability and security.

Why it matters: Surfaces the technical decisions the PM must not make alone.

Analytics & Instrumentation

Event name, trigger, properties and purpose, connected to goals and metrics.

Why it matters: Metrics without instrumentation are aspirations.

Risks & Mitigations

Risk, probability, impact, mitigation, owner and status.

Why it matters: Names what could go wrong while it is still cheap to prevent.

Dependencies

Engineering, design, data, AI/ML, third parties, security, legal, compliance and GTM.

Why it matters: Dependencies are the most common cause of slipped launches.

Product Readiness Summary

Overall readiness plus problem, user, business, requirements, UX, engineering and measurement scores.

Why it matters: Diagnostic, not an approval gate — it shows what is still missing.