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Nearly 18 years ago, Optimal helped define what UX research could be, pioneering practices and tools that would become industry standard and change how teams worldwide better understand their users. As the industry has evolved, so has Optimal, expanding the platform, advancing participant recruitment, and building Optimal Intelligence AI to accelerate insight to action.
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Now, we’re at the edge of another major shift. With the launch of the Model Context Protocol (MCP), we’re entering a new realm, moving from traditional research workflows to AI-powered intelligence.
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What is MCP (Model Context Protocol)?

Research data is one of the most valuable assets in any organization, but until now, it has been scattered across studies and reports, time-consuming to search and synthesize, and different to search or reuse. MCP now changes that for research teams. 
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Model Context Protocol (MCP) enables you to connect your Optimal research directly to AI tools, like ChatGPT, Claude, or Cursor, to explore and analyze your data seamlessly. Insights can go beyond data downloads, dashboards, or static reports. Access your insights and explore further with natural conversation.
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Get instant insights for questions like: 
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• “Based on all the research I’ve run in Optimal, what are the biggest UX opportunities for our product?” 
• “What usability issues have been identified by studies conducted in the past 3 months?”
• “What themes appear across onboarding studies?”
• “What research already exists about navigation improvements?”
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What MCP Unlocks (Beyond Search)

With MCP-connected tools, you can:
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• Analyze studies: Understand patterns, findings, and trends across research automatically.
• Cross-study synthesis: Identify recurring themes across multiple studies in seconds.
• Pull key insights: Extract findings from individual studies without manual review.
• Search & explore research: Filter studies by creator, title, participant group, or timeframe.
• Analyze transcript insights & sessions: Surface usability issues, pain points, and behavioral patterns.
• Turn insights into deliverables: Automatically format findings into summaries and stakeholder-ready outputs. Get more ideas here.
• Connect with other tools & workflows: Use MCP along with your AI tool's existing integrations to create alerts and automate next steps e.g. create a Slack notification when a participant completes a study, share milestones, create a JIRA ticket and follow-up tasks.
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From Early UX Research to AI-Native Intelligence

The evolution is clear.

We started by helping teams understand users through early UX research methods.
We helped formalize how research is conducted, analyzed, and shared.
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And now, with MCP in Optimal, we’re helping teams move beyond analysis altogether toward conversational, AI-driven research intelligence.
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Log in to Optimal, connect with your AI tools, and get the most value from your research or book a demo to start building your research repository with Optimal.

We recently hosted a live webinar introducing Optimal's new Usability Testing tool, a powerful solution that brings multiple research methods together in a single study, helping you get better insights, faster.

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Looking for the highlights? We've rounded up answers to the most common questions from the session.

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What is Usability Testing?

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Optimal's new Usability Testing tool is a mixed-methods research tool that brings Prototype Testing, Live Site Testing, and Surveys into a single, end-to-end study workflow. Instead of treating each method as its own initiative, you can combine them inside a single study to allow participants to move naturally between tasks, experiences, and questions.

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With this tool, you can compare multiple prototypes side by side, benchmark a current live experience against a redesigned concept, evaluate a competitor's experience, and more. And researchers get everything analyzed in one place with AI-powered summaries, task results, video clips, and evidence-backed insights surfaced automatically.

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Is Usability Testing supported for mobile testing?

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Yes, participants can complete Usability Testing studies on mobile devices using their mobile browser or the Optimal Participant App. If screen recording is required, participants are prompted to download the Optimal Participant App, available for both iOS and Android. 

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Do you have to use multiple methods, or can you run just one?

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You can keep it simple and run a single survey, a standalone prototype test, or a live site session on its own. Or, mix methods or run multiple of the same method, such as multiple prototypes or live website tests in one study. The tool supports however your study needs to be shaped.

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Can you run bilingual studies?

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Usability Testing currently supports over 30 languages enabling what participants see and guiding how AI models interpret responses, generate summaries, identify themes, and surface insights. Today, studies are configured around a single language, so participants are expected to respond in the chosen language. That said, multilingual study support is something we're exploring for our roadmap.

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Are participants recruited once across all methods, or separately for each?

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Just once. From the participant's perspective, this looks and feels like a single study regardless of how many methods are included. They move through the experience naturally from start to finish.

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To what extent can sections and questions be randomized?

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Section-level randomization shuffles the order of any sections, while question-level randomization works within a specific section, shuffling the order of tasks and follow-up questions. Both are supported, giving researchers the flexibility to reduce order bias, particularly useful when comparing multiple experiences.

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Can you test multiple prototypes within the same study?

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Yes, with no limitations on the number of prototypes you can link to a single study so you can add multiple Figma prototype sections and connect a different prototype to each one.

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Can you reorder sections and questions in a study?

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Given that Usability Testing studies can grow complex, the ability to reorder things quickly was a priority. You can reorder individual tasks and questions within a section, and sections themselves by dragging them in the Build panel.

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How effectively can Usability Testing scale across a business?

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Scaling research isn't just about running more studies, it's about helping more people across the business access insights, understand them, and use them to make decisions. With Usability Testing, product managers, designers, and stakeholders can quickly understand what happened and why without having to see hours of recording through the automatically generated highlight reels, key quotes, and transcripts.

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Watch the full webinar

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If you want to experience the full walkthrough, demo, and Q&A, watch the recording to see Usability Testing in action and pick up tips and best practices straight from the session.

👉 Watch the full webinar here.

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Coordinating user interviews shouldn’t feel like a full-time job. Between juggling calendars, chasing confirmations, and sending reminders, scheduling can be the hidden bottleneck in research velocity and quietly consume the time you actually want to spend talking to customers. 
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If you want to run more interviews and generate insights more consistently, simplifying your scheduling process is one of best ways to remove friction and streamline your workflow.
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Save time and streamline your workflow

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What does a simpler workflow look like? 

With a tool like Optimal’s Interviews Scheduler, you can:
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• Invite participants via a booking link or email
• View upcoming and completed sessions in one place
• Connect with tools you already use like Google Calendar, Microsoft Outlook, Google Meet, Zoom, and Microsoft Teams.
• Let participants reschedule themselves. No back-and-forth emails.
• Add collaborators and automatically notify everyone of changes.
• Set session limits and calendar buffers.
• Automate email invites, reminders, confirmations, and thank-you messages.
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It’s everything you need to manage interviews without the chaos.
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Calendar integrations: Avoid conflicts and save time

With the Interviews Scheduler, you can sync your availability with Google Calendar and Microsoft Outlook in real time. Connect your own calendar or your team’s to ensure every busy slot is accounted for. Avoid double bookings, block out busy times, and keep everything in one place. 

Once set up, your availability automatically updates, and participants can book directly into open slots, eliminating the back-and-forth. Plus, depending on your preferences, your sessions will either sync directly to your calendar or come through as an .ics file in the confirmation email, saving you one more step.
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Seamless video conferencing integrations

The Interviews Scheduler integrates directly with Zoom, Microsoft Teams, and Google Meet.

When someone books a session:

• A video link is automatically generated
• It’s added to the calendar invite
• Everyone receives confirmation details
• Sessions can be automatically recorded

No copying links. No switching between tools.
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Built for research teams

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The Interviews Scheduler isn’t just about booking time slots. It’s about removing friction from your research workflow.

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With integrations at its core, you can:

• Keep your calendar, video tools, and participants in sync
• Reduce manual coordination
• Eliminate scheduling errors
• Focus on insights instead of admin

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Whether you’re running one-off interviews or managing weekly research sprints, the Interviews Scheduler helps you move faster and stay organised.

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Ready to give it a try? Log in to your Optimal account and get started or book a demo to learn more.

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