quickstart

A quickstart, or quick start guide, is a concise, task-oriented introduction designed to help a new user begin using a product with minimal friction. It focuses on a small, representative workflow that demonstrates core functionality and yields a tangible result, such as a running program, a generated file, or a visible configuration.

A typical quickstart includes prerequisites or system requirements, installation or setup steps, a minimal example or command sequence, expected output, and pointers to more detailed documentation or troubleshooting.

Quickstarts are common in software documentation, developer portals, and cloud platforms. They differ from full tutorials or getting-started guides in that they prioritize speed and a single end-to-end scenario rather than comprehensive coverage.

Design considerations include clarity and brevity, explicit prerequisites, minimal configuration, platform-specific instructions when necessary, testable commands, and quick links to deeper topics. Providing common errors and their resolutions helps users recover quickly.

Common forms include language or framework quickstarts, CLI tool quickstarts, cloud-service quickstarts, and hardware device quickstarts. Used effectively, quickstarts reduce time-to-value and improve onboarding for new users.