Rethinking Product Quality: Understanding Quality as an Experience, Not a Number

In product development conversations, the word quality is used constantly—and often imprecisely. It is spoken about as if it were a measurable ingredient, something that could be poured into a product in greater or lesser amounts. But quality is not something you can put in a measuring cup. It is not a single metric, score, or specification.

Quality is an experience.

This distinction matters, especially for business leaders responsible for defining products, funding development, and making trade-off decisions. When quality is misunderstood, teams optimize the wrong things, overspend where it does not matter, and underdeliver where it does.

Quality Is Not “High” or “Low”

It makes little sense to describe most products as having high or low quality without context.

Consider two vehicles:

• A delivery box truck

• A fully loaded crew-cab pickup truck

No reasonable person would say the delivery truck is “lower quality” than the pickup. They are simply designed around different qualities. One emphasizes durability, cargo capacity, low operating cost, and ease of maintenance. The other emphasizes comfort, performance, aesthetics, and personal status.

Each vehicle succeeds—or fails—based on how well it delivers the experience expected of its class.

Quality, then, is not a universal ladder where products climb higher or sink lower. It is a multidimensional space where different qualities matter to different users in different contexts.

Quality Lives in the User Experience

From a user’s perspective, quality is what they encounter when using a product. That experience includes far more than whether something works or breaks.

Quality may include:

• Feelings: confidence, satisfaction, delight, annoyance, frustration

• Burdens: weight, complexity, worry, effort, mental load

• Transformations: feeling professional, empowered, capable, prestigious, or “at home”

A product can technically function perfectly and still deliver a poor quality experience if it violates expectations or imposes the wrong burdens. Conversely, a product may be simple—even austere—and still feel deeply satisfying if it aligns with what the user values.

Expectations Define Quality

A quality experience must fit the expectations of the product’s category.

A quality delivery vehicle:

• Does not need leather seats or premium audio

• Does need a durable interior, ample rack space, smart tie-down options

• Does need predictable reliability and low cost per mile

A quality luxury SUV:

• Should envelop the user in comfort and refinement

• May intentionally signal higher operating costs as part of its status

• Should minimize effort and maximize perceived control and prestige

Neither is “better.” Each is well-designed—or poorly designed—relative to what the user expects and values.

Why “High Quality” Usually Means “Reliable”

In many business discussions, the phrase high quality product is used as shorthand for high reliability. And reliability is, without question, an important quality. Products that wear out early, fail unexpectedly, or require excessive maintenance erode trust and damage brands.

But reliability is only one quality among many.

Other qualities—such as simplicity, emotional resonance, aesthetic restraint, or symbolic value—do not lend themselves to “high” or “low” labels. They require thoughtful balance, not maximization. In fact, over-optimizing one quality often degrades another.

Designing the Right Qualities—On Purpose

The most successful products are not those that maximize every attribute, but those that intentionally optimize the right qualities for their intended users and market position.

At Lei Systems, we help our partners step back from vague quality goals and ask more meaningful questions:

• What experience should this product deliver?

• Which qualities truly matter to our users—and which do not?

• Where should we invest, and where should we deliberately refrain?

By clarifying the optimal quality profile early, organizations make better decisions throughout development—aligning engineering, design, cost, and strategy around a shared understanding of success.

Quality is not a number.It is the experience your product delivers—every time it is used.