What is an affinity diagram?

Gathering feedback on design projects is like tidying a cluttered room. How do you find the input you need or know what's important? An affinity diagram provides the big-picture view you need to structure thoughts, group related ideas, and surface actionable insights. Once you organize the chaos, it’s easier to spot breakthroughs.

Read on to find out how to read and use affinity maps for design thinking, explore affinity diagram examples, and start affinity mapping with FigJam.

What is an affinity diagram?

An affinity diagram, also called an affinity chart, streamlines team brainstorming by grouping ideas based on similarities and themes. Each idea, jotted on a sticky note, is sorted into clusters that reveal common connections.

These diagrams foster collaboration, identify patterns, and aid decision-making by structuring complex data. Powerful for complex problems, affinity diagrams organize scattered ideas, encourage group discussions, and uncover hidden insights, making them invaluable for creative problem-solving.

How to read an affinity diagram

Affinity diagrams are also called affinity maps, affinity charts, or the K-J method, after their inventor, anthropologist Jiro Kawakita—but most affinity maps are actually group efforts. A brainstorming session facilitator records each idea, clusters similar ideas, uncovers key insights, and plans next steps. Collaboration among key stakeholders is essential in this methodology.

Affinity diagrams help you organize a large amount of information into related groups under category headings. Color-coding highlights similar ideas, revealing natural relationships among different data points—as you can see in this FigJam affinity diagram example.

When to use affinity diagrams

Whether you're a designer, product manager, or UX design researcher, affinity diagrams can help you synthesize and reconcile feedback. Imagine you're a team leader who's just completed a brainstorming session. What do you do next? When you're overwhelmed with input, affinity mapping can surface underlying patterns so you can decide next steps.

Benefits of affinity diagrams

Affinity diagrams help you synthesize a large number of ideas into a neatly organized roadmap of insights, bringing structure to real-time brainstorming sessions. As patterns emerge, team members can spot opportunities to improve user experience. With a glance at your affinity diagram, stakeholders get a clearer view of complex issues for more informed decision-making.

The 5-step affinity diagram process

You can complete your affinity map in 5 simple steps.

Step 1: Start brainstorming ideas.

Write down each idea or piece of data on a separate sticky note or card, and stick it on a physical or digital whiteboard. To get the ideas flowing, check out qualitative data you've collected from surveys, user interviews, and other UX research.

Step 2: Group similar ideas.

Look for relationships among individual ideas to come up with related groupings. This step should be done silently, to concentrate on grouping ideas with common themes. It's okay if you end up with "loners," or ideas that don't fit into a group. At this stage, the focus is on grouping, not ordering.

Step 3: Apply headings.

Invite team members or stakeholders to suggest a name or heading for each grouping of ideas. Discuss any surprising patterns you spot and debate where controversial notes or loners belong. On header cards, briefly summarize each category.

Step 4: Form supergroups.

If you spot recurring themes across categories, you could merge them into larger categories, called supergroups. You can also organize related groups into columns under a super header. This helps you identify overarching themes, recurring pain points, and key insights.

Step 5: Reflect and plan next steps.

Once you've organized your affinity diagram, write a problem statement at the top. Now you’re ready to extract insights and plan your next steps. Review common themes and groupings, and title each category and supergroup. Discuss the patterns you've discovered, how they relate to user research, and what next actions they suggest.

4 ways to use your affinity diagram

Now that you've covered the basics, here are four ways to put your affinity mapping skills into practice:

1. Solve complex problems. Affinity diagrams collect ideas, data, and opinions from team members to help you find new approaches to complex issues.
2. User research. An affinity diagram organizes raw data into common themes and key insights you can use for interviews, surveys, and usability tests.
3. Project planning. Use affinity diagrams for project management to group tasks, assign roles, and prioritize activities.
4. Product innovation. Product and design teams use affinity diagrams during the design thinking process to consider user needs, rank design ideas, and prioritize product features for a more user-centered design.

Ace affinity diagrams with FigJam

To optimize your next brainstorming session, try this affinity diagram template with your team in FigJam. When you're ready to put ideas into action, Figma's strategic plan templates give your team the direction they need to succeed.

Ready to start affinity mapping?