Great retrospectives start with great questions. The right questions help your team reflect deeply, share honestly, and identify meaningful improvements. The wrong questions lead to surface-level discussions that waste everyone’s time.

This collection of 50+ retrospective questions is organized by category and situation, so you can find the perfect questions for your next retrospective.

Quick Navigation

• Opening & Check-In Questions
• What Went Well Questions
• What Didn’t Go Well Questions
• Learning Questions
• Team Dynamics Questions
• Process Questions
• Forward-Looking Questions
• Closing Questions
• Deep Reflection Questions

Opening & Check-In Questions

Start your retrospective with these questions to get everyone engaged:

1. In one word, how would you describe this sprint?
2. On a scale of 1-10, how was this sprint for you? Why?
3. What’s one thing you’re grateful for from this sprint?
4. If this sprint were a weather pattern, what would it be?
5. What emoji best represents your experience this sprint?
6. What’s your energy level right now (high/medium/low)?
7. What are you hoping to get out of this retrospective?

Facilitator tip: Give everyone 30 seconds of think time before asking for responses.

📖 Explore more: sprint retrospective questions

What Went Well Questions

Celebrate successes and identify practices to keep:

8. What’s one thing that went really well this sprint?
9. What made you proud this sprint?
10. What was our biggest win?
11. What practice should we definitely continue?
12. When did we work best together as a team?
13. What surprised you positively this sprint?
14. What would you tell other teams to try based on this sprint?
15. What process or tool made your work easier?
16. When did you feel most productive?
17. What risk did we take that paid off?

💡 RetroFlow makes capturing these insights easy—free, no signup required.

What Didn’t Go Well Questions

Identify problems and areas for improvement:

18. What was frustrating about this sprint?
19. What slowed us down?
20. What would you do differently if we could redo this sprint?
21. Where did we struggle?
22. What blocked your progress?
23. What caused the most confusion?
24. What did we commit to but not deliver? Why?
25. When did communication break down?
26. What process caused friction?
27. What warning signs did we ignore?
28. What technical debt caused problems?

Learning Questions

Focus on growth and knowledge gained:

29. What did you learn this sprint?
30. What did you learn about our codebase?
31. What did you learn about our users or customers?
32. What skill did you develop or improve?
33. What assumption proved wrong?
34. What would you want to learn more about?
35. What experiment did we try? What did we learn?
36. What do we know now that we wish we’d known at sprint start?

Team Dynamics Questions

Explore collaboration and relationships:

37. How well did we collaborate this sprint?
38. Did everyone feel heard?
39. How was the communication within our team?
40. Did we help each other when needed?
41. Were there any unresolved tensions?
42. How effectively did we make decisions together?
43. Did we celebrate our wins together?
44. How well did we onboard or support new team members?
45. What could improve our team dynamics?

Process Questions

Evaluate your ways of working:

46. Are our ceremonies (standups, planning, etc.) valuable?
47. Is our sprint length appropriate?
48. How effective were our code reviews?
49. Did our Definition of Done serve us well?
50. Are we estimating accurately? If not, why?
51. How well did we manage our backlog?
52. Did we have clear acceptance criteria?
53. How was the handoff between team members?
54. What meeting would you change or eliminate?

Forward-Looking Questions

Plan for improvement:

55. What’s one thing we should try next sprint?
56. What would make next sprint better?
57. What should we stop doing immediately?
58. What do we need more of?
59. What do we need less of?
60. What’s the biggest risk for next sprint?
61. What would you like to learn next sprint?
62. What support do you need?
63. What experiment should we run?

Adapting these questions for a distributed team? Our remote retrospectives guide covers virtual facilitation.

Closing Questions

End the retrospective thoughtfully:

64. What’s your key takeaway from this retrospective?
65. On a scale of 1-5, how valuable was this retrospective?
66. What action item are you most excited about?
67. Is there anything we didn’t discuss that we should have?
68. How are you feeling as we head into next sprint?
69. What’s one word to describe your mood now vs. at the start?

Deep Reflection Questions

For when you need to go deeper:

70. Why do we keep having the same problems?
71. What are we avoiding talking about?
72. If we were starting this project over, what would we do differently?
73. What’s the biggest threat to our team’s success?
74. Are we building the right thing?
75. Is our pace sustainable?
76. What would our users say about this sprint?
77. Are we proud of the code we’re writing?
78. What would make you excited to come to work?
79. If you could change one thing about how we work, what would it be?
80. What’s holding us back from being a high-performing team?

Questions by Format

For Start Stop Continue

• What should we start doing?
• What should we stop doing?
• What should we continue doing?

For 4Ls Retrospective

• What did you like?
• What did you learn?
• What did you lack?
• What do you long for?

For Mad Sad Glad

• What made you mad?
• What made you sad?
• What made you glad?

For Sailboat

• What’s our wind (pushing us forward)?
• What’s our anchor (holding us back)?
• What are the rocks (risks ahead)?

Questions for Specific Situations

After a Difficult Sprint

• What made this sprint particularly challenging?
• How did we support each other through difficulties?
• What would have made this easier?
• What should we do differently to prevent this?

After a Successful Sprint

• What specifically led to our success?
• How do we replicate this?
• What should we celebrate?
• What lucky breaks did we have vs. what was skill?

For New Teams

• What’s one thing you’ve learned about a teammate?
• Are our working agreements serving us?
• What norms should we establish?
• How can we build more trust?

After a Release

• How do users feel about what we shipped?
• What would we do differently in the next release?
• What should we prioritize for fixes?
• Did we meet our release goals?

Tips for Asking Better Questions

Do’s

• Ask open-ended questions — “What happened?” not “Did X happen?”
• Give think time — Allow 30-60 seconds of silence
• Follow up — “Can you tell me more?” or “What’s an example?”
• Ask one question at a time — Don’t stack questions
• Use neutral language — Avoid leading questions

Don’ts

• Don’t ask leading questions — “Don’t you think we should…”
• Don’t interrupt answers — Let people finish
• Don’t answer your own questions — Wait for the team
• Don’t ask closed questions — “Was the sprint good?” (yes/no)
• Don’t ask blame questions — “Whose fault was…”

How to Choose the Right Questions

Team Situation	Best Question Types
New team	Icebreakers, trust-building, norms
After failure	Blameless, learning-focused
Remote team	Connection, communication
Low energy	Fun, engagement-focused
High conflict	Safety-focused, neutral
Successful sprint	Celebration, replication
Stagnant team	Deep reflection, forward-looking

Frequently Asked Questions

What are the best retrospective questions?

The best retrospective questions depend on your goal. For general reflection, try “What helped us make progress this sprint?” For deeper issues, ask “What is one thing we keep avoiding?” For action focus, use “What is the smallest change that would have the biggest impact?”

How many questions should you use in a retrospective?

Use 3-5 questions per retrospective. Too many questions dilute the discussion. Pick one main question per phase: one for reflection, one for analysis, and one for action planning.

Should retrospective questions change every sprint?

Yes — rotating questions prevents retro fatigue and surfaces different insights. Keep a few favorites in rotation but introduce at least one new question each sprint to keep the discussion fresh.

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