What is a Minimum Lovable Product? (Plus, MLP vs. MVP)

Last updated: September 2024

A Minimum Lovable Product (MLP) is an initial offering you build with the intent of delighting customers from the start. It goes beyond what is required to make a product functional, aiming for a lovable experience instead. The goal is not to make people say, "Well, it works." It is for them to exclaim, "This is brilliant!"

Aha! co-founder and CEO Brian de Haaff first introduced the concept of the Minimum Lovable Product in 2013, then expanded on it in his bestselling 2017 book, Lovability. He argued that pursuing an MLP is fundamental to cultivating customer happiness, which leads to long-term business growth.

In this way, the Minimum Lovable Product serves as a counterpoint to the Minimum Viable Product (MVP). Just like it sounds, an MVP is the most basic version of a product, with just enough features to be usable and viable in the market. Many companies create an MVP as a way to quickly launch a product with limited functionality and promise to add more later. However, it is rare that this promise is kept in customers' best interests. Companies might add more features, but fail to consider what customers actually need. Or meaningful updates never come at all, leaving customers frustrated with the bare minimum and driven to seek alternative solutions.

Build more lovable products — try Aha! software.

Shifting from an MVP to an MLP mindset is how many successful product teams deliver more value to their customers from the moment a product launches — receiving lasting adoration and loyalty in return. This guide will help you learn how to embrace this way of thinking. Keep reading or skip ahead here:

Why is a Minimum Lovable Product important in product development?
MLP vs. MVP: A closer look
What is an example of a Minimum Lovable Product?
How to build a Minimum Lovable Product

Why is a Minimum Lovable Product important in product development?

You did not become a product manager to deliver something your customers merely tolerate — you became a product manager to build something they love.
Brian de Haaff
Co-founder and CEO, Aha!

Customers today have more options than ever. In particular, their relationship with technology is highly transactional. If a customer's experience with your product leaves them feeling unsatisfied, unheard, or uninspired, they will quickly move on to find something better.

A Minimum Lovable Product can help you to avoid this fate. It offers a way to differentiate your product in a crowded marketplace — from the very first interaction a customer has with your company to the product experience itself. That is because an MLP approach requires you to do the following before you build anything:

Deeply consider what customers care about.
Understand the problems they have.
Explore how to make their lives better.

Many companies bypass this upfront research, opting to launch quick and learn later. But when you pause to consider the customer experience as a whole and strive for love at every stage, customers will not only purchase your product or service — they will also want to see your company thrive.

Keep in mind that we are still talking about the "minimum" here. Lovability grows over time. You will continue to make your product more lovable as you learn more about your customers and build upon your initial product offering. But starting with a Minimum Lovable Product mindset means you will be more likely to continue prioritizing meaningful solutions over the baseline requirements.

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MLP vs. MVP: A closer look

The Minimum Lovable Product builds on the concept of the Minimum Viable Product, while simultaneously rebutting it. Both involve moving fast and iterating over time. But only the MLP approach focuses on offering something highly valuable to customers from the start.

This is reflected in each approach's supporting principles. Here is an overview of the key differences between the MLP and MVP:

A table showing the differences between a Minimum Lovable Product versus a Minimum Viable Product

In short, a Minimum Lovable Product allows you to be far more confident in what you build for customers (even when other product alternatives exist) because you have a deeper understanding of the problem to you want to solve. That means you can be more disruptive with your decisions and dedicate meaningful effort to creating a product customers will truly enjoy.

The Minimum Viable Product is more about getting to market quickly and cheaply before other alternate solutions emerge. The problem to solve is hazy. The goal is to learn and increment as you go. This creates a high likelihood of pivots down the line, often resulting in a lean effort from the team — as well as a lack of clarity on what you are building toward and what customers actually need.

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What is an example of a Minimum Lovable Product?

Have you ever been part of a beta or early-access program for a product? Did you feel a rush of joy or excitement when you gave things a try? If so, then you have probably encountered your own example of a Minimum Lovable Product. That is the type of reaction you are looking for when you build an MLP, and it only comes from understanding upfront what your users truly need and care about.

But let's use a more concrete example of a product we know very well: Aha! Roadmaps. We introduced Aha! Roadmaps in the same year that we first wrote about the Minimum Lovable Product. It is part of our company philosophy to live by our values — so it was important for us to get our MLP right.

Here is a look at our MLP mindset behind launching Aha! Roadmaps and how it carries through to today:

Product

Aha! Roadmaps: The complete product management solution (launched in 2013)

What made it a Minimum Lovable Product?

At the time, many product managers were frustrated with flimsy strategies and cumbersome spreadsheets. Some alternative solutions existed, like project management software, but none that truly supported the work of product development.

A functional roadmapping tool would have been our MVP. But we knew that our customers' challenges ran deeper. We felt that product managers deserved something more — to be happy at work, and to "get their mojo back."

We championed a "goal-first" approach and built this into our initial offering, incorporating features that allowed product managers to set strategy in addition to building brilliant roadmaps.

Within a few short months, our Minimum Lovable Product generated more than 150 customer meetings, 600 beta registrations, and more than 50,000 blog readers.

How do we still make it lovable?

Our product roadmap for Aha! Roadmaps (and our entire suite) continues to be driven by customer needs. We continuously collect and review feedback, stay rapidly responsive, and release new functionality to customers weekly.

In addition, we track product value and lovability itself as business metrics. As a result, we have helped more than one million product builders achieve more since Aha! Roadmaps launched.

To get a closer look at how we build Minimum Lovable Products, check out The Aha! Framework: our proven methodology for product development. In the guides mentioned next, you can see what types of activities happen at each stage of The Aha! Framework and how you can begin to adopt this approach on your product team.

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How to build a Minimum Lovable Product: Tips for product managers

Love might seem like a squishy way to measure product success, especially compared to "viability." It is easy to tell if something is usable or not. But lovable? That is harder to pinpoint.

So, what is product love, and how do you build it? It helps to break down such an abstract idea into more discrete components. In this excerpt from Lovability, you can learn about the 10 building blocks of lovability — starting with a foundation of trust and building toward passion and loyalty for your product.

The 10 building blocks of lovability are pictured here in a pyramid format

As you can see in the graphic, lovability is about far more than functionality alone. Utility is only the base of the pyramid. If you want to build something truly lovable, you must consider all that goes into a customer's impression of your product — from the support you offer to the salespeople they interact with. (We call this the Complete Product Experience.)

You need to deeply understand your customers and wholeheartedly embrace the MLP mindset in order to work your way up this pyramid. To get started, try these tips for building a Minimum Lovable Product:

Get curious: Do not guess about what customers value. Ask them directly. Start with: What do you care about? What problems are you facing? What would make your day better?
Know your market: Develop an understanding of the landscape you are in before you build for it. Then, focus on meeting your target customers' needs before expanding to others.
Define your purpose: Distill what you learn about your customers and market into a vision for what you want to achieve (and write it down).
Focus on the whole: Remember that your product is not just a collection of features, but also all of the various touchpoints with your company throughout the entire customer journey. Think about how to shape these interactions to reinforce your MLP vision.
Build to last: Make confident architectural decisions in response to customers' needs or problems — trust the commitment you have made to your solution.
Dedicate effort: Do not cut corners. Invest the effort and resources needed to serve your customers well from the start.
Measure love: Choose a way to track your product's lovability. For example, use a scoring system to measure the value of what you deliver, set a goal for positive reviews, or conduct customer satisfaction surveys (you could even collect love notes, like we do).

Bonus tip: templates can help kick-start your MLP mindset. For example, completing a proof of concept can be an effective way to flesh out a concept, document what problems you hope to solve, and consider how a new product or feature can support your goals before you build it. Creating a value proposition is another way to think more deeply about your product's unique benefits for customers beyond the functionality alone. Try out both in Aha! software.

Proof of concept template

Start using this template now

Value proposition template

Start using this template now

You will know when you have built a Minimum Lovable Product. There will be signs: customers smiling and proclaiming their enthusiasm, people seeking you out to learn more versus the other way around, and even you yourself dreaming about building something that has never been done before. Getting to this point takes more thought and time than building an MVP. But this investment is always worthwhile. It is the best way to increase your chances of making customers for years to come.