A UX audit can cost €10 or $60,000, and both are sold under the same name. The difference is who does the work, how much of the product they look at, and what evidence sits behind each finding. Here are the prices published in 2026, what each level buys, what moves the number, and how to scope an audit so you pay for what you need.
Short answer
For a SaaS product, a solo senior designer charges about $1,500 to $5,000 for a UX audit, and a design agency about $8,000 to $20,000. Below that you usually get a checklist, not a diagnosis. Above it you pay for usability testing, more people, or a research firm's name on the report.
What a UX audit costs in 2026
These are published prices, from the cheapest option to the most expensive.
| Who does it | Published price | What you usually get |
|---|---|---|
| AI audit tool | Free to about $13 a month | Automated comments on screens or pages. Fast and cheap, but it does not know your users, your data or your goals. |
| Marketplace gig on Fiverr | Starting prices from €10 to €330 | A review of a few screens against a checklist. Quality ranges from useful to copy and paste. |
| Solo senior product designer | $1,500 to $5,000 | Your key flows reviewed by someone who has shipped SaaS, with ranked findings and the fixes. |
| Design studio with a fixed price | $2,000 to $6,599 | A packaged audit from a small team, usually with a walkthrough call and a roadmap. |
| Design agency | $8,000 to $20,000 | Several people, more flows and user roles, often usability testing and a workshop. |
| Research firm, such as Nielsen Norman Group | From $60,000 | Senior researchers, a detailed report and a name your board recognises. |
Krux, one AI audit tool, lists three plans, from free to $12.99 a month. Fiverr showed 520 gigs for "ux audit", and the 48 on the first page started at €10 to €330, half of them under about €80. Two SaaS design studios publish their audit prices: one starts at $2,000, the other charges a fixed $6,599 whatever the scope. Nielsen Norman Group's expert design review starts at $60,000 for one site or app, and at $80,000 with three competitors added. The solo and agency ranges come from my freelance product designer rates post.
What each price buys
Under $500: a checklist pass
An AI tool or a cheap gig compares your screens against general rules: contrast, spacing, labels, consistency. That catches real problems, and it is a fair first pass for a landing page. It cannot tell you why people leave after sign-up, because nobody looked at your funnel, signed up as a new user or asked what the product is for. Watch for reports that read the same for every client.
$1,500 to $5,000: a senior review of your key flows
This is the level most SaaS teams before Series B need. One experienced designer signs up as a new user, works through the core flows, reads your analytics, and ranks what they find by impact and effort. The output is a short list of what to fix first and why, not 80 screenshots. My sample UX audit report shows the format: every finding with the screen, the problem, the evidence, a severity, the effort and the fix.
$8,000 to $20,000: an agency team, usually with testing
The price goes up because more people work on it and the evidence gets stronger. Agencies at this level often add usability testing with five to eight real users, several user roles, and a workshop with your team. It is worth it when the product is complex, the stakes are high, or the team disagrees and needs evidence to settle it. Much of the extra time goes on recruiting participants, as I explain in UX audit vs usability testing.
From $60,000: a research firm
At this level you pay for senior researchers, a deep report and a name that carries weight in a board meeting or a procurement process. Large companies buy it for that reason. For a startup, the same money buys a senior audit and most of the fixes.
What moves the price
- Flows and user roles. An admin, a member and a guest see different products. Each role is close to a separate audit, so a product with three roles costs more than one with a single type of user.
- Evidence. An expert review is the cheapest. Reading your analytics adds time, session recordings add more, and testing with real users adds the most, mostly in recruiting.
- Deliverables. A list of issues is cheap. Ranked findings with fixes cost more, and Figma redesigns of the top issues more again. Ask which one a quote includes.
- Platforms. Web, iOS and Android are separate interfaces, so each one adds time.
- Seniority and region. A senior designer in Europe costs about half as much as the same person in New York. The rates post has the hourly numbers.
How to check a quote
Ask for the hours behind the price. At senior freelance rates of $90 to $150 an hour, a $4,500 quote buys 30 to 50 hours of work. That is enough to cover the core flows of a SaaS product properly, not every screen and every setting. If a quote promises the whole product in a weekend, something is being skipped.
Then ask four more questions:
- Can I see a sample report? If they cannot show one, you will not know what you are buying until it arrives.
- How are the findings ranked? A list of 80 issues without an order is homework, not an audit.
- Who does the work? At an agency, the senior who runs the sales call is not always the person who reviews your product.
- What happens after the report? A walkthrough with your team, time for questions, and whether the fee counts toward the fixes if you continue.
Is a UX audit worth it?
Work it out with your own numbers. Say 400 people start a trial each month and 10 percent become customers at $50 a month. If the audit finds an onboarding fix that lifts that to 12 percent, you gain 8 customers a month, and after a year about $4,800 more in monthly revenue, before churn. Even with the cost of building the fix on top, a $4,000 audit pays for itself within months. The figures are an example to show the sum, not a promise.
An audit is not worth it in three cases:
- Before you have users. With 20 users, talk to them. Five calls will teach you more than any review.
- When you already know the problem. If everyone agrees onboarding is broken, pay for the redesign, not a report that confirms it.
- When nobody can fix anything for months. Findings go stale. Book the audit when someone can start on the fixes within a few weeks.
How to spend less on an audit
- Start with one flow. Sign-up to the first useful moment is where most SaaS products lose people, and a single-flow audit costs a fraction of a full one.
- Do the free pass first. Run my SaaS UX audit checklist yourself and fix the obvious issues, so you pay an expert for the problems you cannot see. If your app was built with Lovable, Bolt or v0, start with the pre-launch checklist for AI-built apps.
- Give access and data on day one. A staging account, your analytics and a list of known issues. Every day spent waiting for access is a day you pay for.
- Fix the quick wins yourself. Most reports include changes your developers can ship without a designer. Keep the design budget for the big ones.
Where my audits sit
I quote each audit at a fixed price after a free call, once we have agreed the flows and user roles it covers, and the price sits in the solo senior band above. You get ranked findings with the fixes, Figma redesigns of the top issues, a prioritised roadmap, a recorded walkthrough and a live session, in 7 to 10 business days. The sample report shows what the findings look like.
Questions founders ask
Is a free UX audit worth it?
Treat it as a sales call with a deliverable. Nobody can spend 30 hours on your product for free, so expect a few annotated screenshots and a proposal. It can still show you how someone thinks before you pay them.
How long does a UX audit take?
One to two weeks for a solo senior, and longer at an agency. Usability testing adds time, most of it spent recruiting participants.
Can an AI tool replace a UX audit?
Not yet. AI tools comment on single screens. An audit is about flows, your data and what to fix first, which needs someone who understands your product and your business.
Should the audit fee count toward the redesign?
Some studios credit it if you hire them for the fixes, so ask. Either way, the report should stand on its own, so you can hand it to any designer or developer.
If you want a fixed quote for your own product, my SaaS UX audit starts with a free call to agree the scope.
Sources
- Krux, AI UX analysis plans and prices
- Fiverr, search results for "ux audit"
- Nielsen Norman Group, expert design review pricing
- Freelance product designer rates in 2026, for the solo and agency ranges
Prices checked on 8 November 2026. Marketplaces and tools change theirs often.
