Clause 6.1: General
The quality-in-use model looks at the system in its context of use rather than at the product alone.
What clause 6.1 is
The quality-in-use model looks at the system in its context of use rather than at the product alone. The second edition aligns it to the 2023 quality-in-use standard and relabels the top characteristic as risk mitigation, with sub-characteristics that include societal and ethical, health, human life, economic and environmental risk mitigation.
What the 2023 edition said
The first edition based its quality-in-use clause on the base model of the time and used freedom from risk as the top characteristic.
What the second edition changes
The model aligns to the separate 2023 quality-in-use standard. Freedom from risk becomes risk mitigation, and the sub-characteristics are reorganised around the kinds of risk.
The FDIS text is not public. The change line above is read from the public draft, which is not the FDIS and may differ. No clause level diff is invented here. The ISO stage record is the authority for the dates.
Why it matters to the buyer
The relabelling matters because risk mitigation is broader and more explicit than freedom from risk. It brings economic, environmental and health risks into the quality conversation, and it makes the link to the organisation's risk register direct.
What to write in the requirement
Write the context of use, then map each quality-in-use characteristic to the risk it mitigates. Use the same risk language as the organisation's risk register so the two documents can be read together.
Evidence a reviewer asks for
A reviewer will ask which risks the quality-in-use requirements are meant to reduce and where those risks are recorded.
- Context of useThe users, the task, the setting and the affected groups, with the date the context was confirmed
- Risk mapEach quality-in-use characteristic linked to the risk it mitigates and to the risk register entry
- Evaluation planHow each characteristic will be measured in use, with the method and the threshold
Where it commonly fails
- The context of use is generic
- The quality-in-use requirements do not connect to the risk register
- Freedom from risk is still the only frame
What to do before publication
Re-map the quality-in-use requirements to risk mitigation before the second edition publishes.
Read across
Source for clause 6.1: ISO/IEC 25059, Clause 6.1, retrieved 20 October 2026. The change line rests on the public draft of the second edition and ISO page 88234. The requirement, evidence and gaps are written from our record. Every source.