A webinar review: Maze - The future of UX research

Having had more free time than I’m comfortable with lately, I decided to try and use the resources available to better understand the UX research market; one of these ways was reviewing the Maze Annual UX Trends and Insights for 2025 Report, and attending the subsequent webinar. 

When I first heard about the webinar, I was genuinely intrigued. Maze’s annual survey is a collection of insights into the shifting landscape of UX research. I was expecting a deep dive into trends, challenges, and best practices shaping the field. 

They kicked things off with broad-stroke statistics: industries adopting UX research, demographics, etc, but these felt more like a loose conversation starter than a true insight session. I found myself wanting more depth: What do these numbers mean for the future of UX? Where were the outliers or surprising shifts?

They then moved on to the AI adoption, discussing how and where UX researchers are integrating AI into their daily workflows, a trend that’s undeniably growing. This is when I felt the webinar turned into a more AI-focused chat, and it quickly became clear that AI was the star of the show. While I appreciate that Maze recently launched AI-assistive tools, and they did avoid overt sales speak, the tone was distinctly promotional. It felt more like a soft product endorsement than an unbiased exploration of the field. There was a strong impression left that AI tools were useful, could assist in different ways and were a positive addition to a researcher's toolkit. I had tuned in expecting conversations about new UX research methods, real-world case studies, maybe even challenges faced by practitioners, but those took a backseat in the conversation.

To be clear, I'm not anti-AI; I just haven’t formed a strong stance yet. But I expected a broader dialogue. The dominance of AI in the discussion made the session feel one-dimensional, particularly when the Q&A doubled down on AI queries instead of branching out into other compelling insights from the report.

I will say that the Maze employees did advocate for consideration of ethics when using AI, the moderate use with human oversight etc, but I left the webinar with mixed feelings: informed about AI, yes, but underwhelmed overall. The rich tapestry of UX research insights promised by the report felt sidelined. It was a missed opportunity to explore the full spectrum of where the field is heading.