Short answer: yes.
For a first Design Sprint, we always recommend 5 days. The duration of 5 days is what ensures that a Sprint can deliver the maximum value. However, there is always a way to adapt and shorten the Design Sprint to your needs of course.
The Design Sprint takes a process that can sometimes drag on for months, and condenses it into just 5 days. We can compare a Sprint with a well-constructed recipe. If you take one ingredient away or skip a step, the result won’t have the same taste. To shorten a Design Sprint is to take the risk of missing an important stage.
The Sprint book was written by Jake Knapp and John Zeratsky in light of more than 150 Sprints conducted with various companies. In our experience (more than 60 Sprints to date) we also validate the 5-day Sprint as the best for return on investment (ROI).
When is it ok to shorten Design Sprint?
A team that has already gotten used to Sprints led by an experienced design sprint facilitator can certainly reduce the Sprint to 4 days. In cases where a second Sprint is dedicated to the same project from a previous first Sprint, it might even be possible to shorten it to 3 days.
Finally, it is also possible to use and combine Design Sprint exercises to create Custom 1, 2 or 3-day Workshops. In this case, we avoid calling it a Design Sprints, but simply a User Experience (UX) workshop.
The 1-day Sprints referred to on our website are theoretical trainings (methodology) and cannot be compared to an actual 5-day Sprint.
Our 1 day Sprints are theoretical trainings (methodology) and cannot be compared to an actual 5 days Sprint.