Product & DesignFree
PRD Generator for Product Requirements
Describe the feature in a few lines and get a PRD your team can review: the problem, success measures, ranked requirements, non-goals and open questions.
River's PRD generator turns a feature idea into a product requirements document your team can review. Describe what you are building and why, and add whatever you already know. River writes the problem, the goals and how you will measure them, the requirements in priority order with acceptance tests, the non-goals, and the questions nobody has answered yet. Every figure you did not supply is marked as an assumption to confirm, so the draft never passes off a guess as a fact.
Most PRD templates hand you headings and leave the hard part blank. Here each requirement arrives with a priority word that means something, Must, Should or May, and a test an engineer or designer can check it against. Non-goals are written as decisions with a reason, and open questions get a suggested owner. If you are still collecting asks from several teams, the stakeholder requirements and conflict finder sorts out the clashes first, then this writes the document.
This is for product managers writing their first spec at a new company, founders handing a feature to a contractor, and designers or engineers who end up owning the document because nobody else will. Use it before the kickoff meeting, while the idea is still cheap to change. Once the PRD is agreed, user stories with acceptance criteria break it into backlog items, and a feasibility and scope assessment weighs it against engineering's estimate.
What a PRD is for, and where most go wrong
A PRD exists to settle arguments before they turn into rework. The questions it must answer are short: what problem, for whom, how you will know it worked, what is in, what is out, and what is still undecided. Most documents fail on the last two. A team that never wrote down that guest editing is out of scope will discover the disagreement in week three of the build, when changing course costs real time instead of one sentence in a document.
Priority labels are the next weak point. P0, P1 and P2 have no shared definition, so under deadline pressure everything becomes P0. Requirement words with fixed meanings travel better. RFC 2119, the internet's long-standing note on requirement levels, defines them: MUST is an absolute requirement, SHOULD allows valid exceptions once the full implications are understood, and MAY is truly optional. A requirement marked Should tells an engineer they have room to push back, and obliges them to say so.
Here is an illustrative example from a team adding guest access to shared boards. One requirement reads: guests can view a shared board without an account; test it by opening the link in a private browser window. A non-goal reads: guest editing is not in this release, because the churn feedback is about seeing work, not changing it. An open question reads: do guest links expire by default, owner the security lead. The PRD template shows a complete worked version.
How it works
Describe the feature
A few lines on what you are building and why, plus any evidence or constraints you already have.
River drafts the PRD
Problem, goals, ranked requirements with tests, non-goals and open questions, built from what you gave it.
Check the assumptions
Every figure or decision you did not supply is marked, so you know exactly what to confirm.
Refine in chat
Ask River to tighten the scope, add a requirement, or turn the Must items into user stories.
What your PRD includes
- A problem statement naming who is affected and the evidence you gave, with gaps clearly marked
- Goals paired with how you will measure them, and any missing baseline flagged to confirm
- Requirements ranked Must, Should or May, each with a test someone can check it against
- Non-goals written as decisions with reasons, so scope arguments happen now rather than mid-build
- Open questions with a suggested owner, and assumptions flagged instead of presented as facts
- A one-page brief or a full PRD, depending on how much detail your readers need
Common questions
What should a PRD include?
At minimum: the problem and who has it, goals with a way to measure them, requirements in priority order, what is out of scope, and the questions still open. Longer PRDs add user flows, risks and a rollout plan. The test for any section is whether a reader would make a different decision without it. If not, cut it.
How long should a PRD be?
As short as it can be while still settling the decisions. A small change often fits on one page: the problem, three to six requirements and the non-goals. A feature that spans several teams can run five pages or more. Pick the one-page brief when the team already agrees on the problem, and the full PRD when it does not.
What is the difference between a PRD and user stories?
A PRD describes the whole feature and the reasoning behind it, so people can agree on scope. User stories cut that scope into pieces a team can build and test one at a time. Write the PRD first, then break the Must requirements into stories. River can do that next, in the same conversation, from the PRD it just wrote.
Will it invent numbers or research I do not have?
No. River uses the evidence you give it, such as ticket counts, churn reasons or interview notes, and marks every other figure as an assumption to confirm. A success measure without a starting point appears as a baseline to confirm rather than a made-up percentage, so nothing in the draft can be mistaken for data you collected.
Should a PRD include the technical design?
Mostly no. The PRD says what the feature must do and why; the people building it decide how. Include constraints that limit their options, such as working with your existing sign-in or not touching billing before March. Architecture belongs in a separate design document, because mixing the two usually means neither gets reviewed properly.
Can I use it for something that is not software?
Yes, as long as it has users and a scope to agree. Teams use the same structure for an internal process, a new service tier or a physical accessory. Describe what you are building in plain words, and River adapts the requirements and their tests to it, for example a checklist step instead of a screen.
Sources
Built by
Chandler Supple
Co-founder & CEO, River
Chandler has spent the last six years working in AI, building tools for millions of users and Fortune 100 companies. In 2025, he co-founded River to build a new kind of operating system for AI agents.
PRD Generator for Product Requirements
Describe what you need, add any files you have, and your workspace opens with the work already underway.