Have you ever found yourself spending way more time than you expected on Twitter, lured by more and more boredom-fighting tweets? If so, you’ve experienced the appeal of the Infinite Scroll. This technique became popular several years ago and was very common for a while. Many sites still use it. As it’s past the point of being a trend, now is a good time to look at this style to see where and when it might be useful.
One of the reasons infinite scroll didn’t become more popular is that there are several usability problems with it:
- Lost Footer – many users rely on links in the footer to find parts of the site that may not be easily findable in the top level navigation – such as how to find us, or careers. Without a footer as a fall back your top level navigation needs to work harder and requires careful consideration of navigational priorities.
- Lost Users – its difficult for a user to have a sense of where they are on an infinitely scrolling page. User research over the last few years has shown that people need to be in control of their browsing experience. They want to know where they’ve been, and how much there is to see so that they can decide if it’s worthwhile to continue. While continuous scrolling can be engaging, it can also be a hinderance to a user who is trying to perform a task or find something specific.
- Load time – depending on how your site is built, load time is more likely to be an issue with an infinitely scrolling page.
There are, however cases where infinite scroll can be effective:
- Where your content is mostly graphics. People process images much more quickly than text, so scrolling through large numbers of images is less work then the equivalent number of text items. This is why Google uses infinite scroll for its Image search, but traditional pagination for its other results.
- Where your users are browsers not seekers. Infinite scroll provides an easy browsing experience and the chance to discover new content with just a simple gesture.
- Where your content is constantly updating. If your content can take the form of a constantly updating timeline, then an infinite scroll can be a meaningful representation of your content – see Twitter, or Pinterest.
So is infinite scroll a good choice for a content-heavy site?
Probably not for most, but a compromise model may be a better choice. Many media sites have opted for very long pages where scrolling is required, but where it also has an end. On sites like Squarespace and the BBC you can clearly see the wide range of content, but you can also eventually reach a footer, and easily find your way back up to something you might want to read.
In any case, user research is key to identifying what will work best for your site visitors. You need to find out how they want to approach your content, and what style will assist them best.
Eldingo can help by performing user research, testing prototypes, and suggesting the best structure for your site. Or take one of our training courses to set you and your team up for successful testing in-house.
