The Impossible Trinity of UX: Quality, Speed, and Cost

Sam Saenz
2 min readAug 26, 2024

Explore The Triple Constraint Model in UX Design and UX Writing

The Triple Constraint Model

Have you seen the Triple Constraint model floating around? It’s popular in project management but applies to much in life including UX Writing and UX Design.

Rarely can you have all 3 factors; good, fast, and cheap. Usually, you can only pick two because of the inherent trade-offs associated with time, cost, and quality.

Let’s break down The Triple Constraint Model

Fast + Cheap= Not good

If you focus on time and cost, you often sacrifice quality.

Quickly produced UX copy and design generally won’t produce a good user experience. Adequate time for research, benchmarking, and testing is crucial to ensure a positive user experience. Combining rushed work with limited testing can further compromise the quality of the final product.

Good + Cheap = Not fast

If you focus on quality and cost, you sacrifice time.

High-quality UX copy and design may take longer to create, especially if extensive user research and testing are involved. And if the work is not prioritized by time or money this could also impact its production speed.

--

--

Sam Saenz
Sam Saenz

Written by Sam Saenz

UX Content Designer (https://samsaenz.com), Travel & Food Writer (https://eatwelladventureoften.com), and NLP (mindset) practitioner in Miami, Florida.