A partially created user story has been added to the product backlog and you are asked to review it. So far, it includes a user description, along with the interactions required and the business value. According to best practices, which of the following is a recommended addition?

• A. Acceptance criteria
• B. Date to be delivered by
• C. Complexity of the development required
• D. Any dependencies on other user stories

Answer: (A)

The main concept being tested is how acceptance criteria define when a user story is truly complete. Acceptance criteria turn a user story into a testable contract: they spell out concrete conditions that must be met for the story to be considered done, which guides development, ensures a shared understanding, and provides a clear basis for QA to verify the feature. They make the required behavior explicit from the user’s perspective and help the team avoid ambiguity about what “done” means. For a sample feature like login, acceptance criteria might specify that a valid user is redirected to the dashboard after login, invalid credentials yield a clear error message, and the behavior remains consistent across devices. The other options—a delivery date, an assessment of development complexity, or a note about dependencies—are useful in planning or context, but they don’t define the completion conditions of the story itself in a way that supports testing and validation.