Anyone that has done qualitative user research (a lot of UX researchers) thinks the whole “synthetic users” thing is mostly useless and possibly actively dangerous. Bain published a more positive report that’s not terrible and worth a read. And in the spirit of keeping an open mind (and models become better fast), it may be that these things are becoming useful. I am still doubtful/conflicted about the real-ness of any insights you might get from AI representing users though. But if emotions are represented realistically in LLMs, maybe synthetic users can become a useful thing.
# May 19, 2026