A minimum viable product, or MVP, is a product with enough features to attract early-adopter customers and validate a product idea early in the product development cycle. In industries such as software, the MVP can help the product team receive user feedback as quickly as possible to iterate and improve the product.

It was first talked about by a man called Eric Ries who introduced it as part of his Lean Startup Methodology and describes it as the version of a new product that allows a team to collect the maximum amount of validated learning about customers with the least amount of effort.

A company might choose to develop and release a minimum viable product because its product team wants to:

• Release a product to the market as quickly as possible
• Test an idea with real users before committing a large budget to the product’s full development
• Learn what resonates with the company’s target market and what doesn’t

This has been done by businesses like Airbnb as they created a minimal website about their own apartment and where able to find pay customers who where looking to stay there. Today Airbnb is one of the biggest property app on the market for booking holidays.