Does Back Button Hit Url Again
"How practice I become dorsum? Simply printing 'Back'. Navigation, this isn't groovy to exist honest. And now information technology'due south brought me back to the women's. OK. Don't like this."
During all our usability studies nosotros've observed how users, both novice and expert, rely extensively on the browser "Back" button. Indeed, the "Back" button has long been a staple of web navigation, and users' often decades-long feel with using it has caused them to develop a very specific mental model of how it should behave.
Often this has severe usability implications when many common web design patterns — such every bit overlays, anchor links, dynamically injected views, subconscious content, etc. — have a default technical structure that breaks users' expectations for how the "Back" push button is supposed to piece of work. In fact, our benchmark reveals that 59% of e-commerce sites gets at to the lowest degree ane of these 4 user expectations wrong in terms of how they technically back up utilise of the "Back" button.
The consequences of breaking the user's expectations of how the browser "Back" button should bear can be dire. During our usability tests, it has been the direct cause of abandonment, with users leaving exam sites with much swearing and cursing (even from the calmer examination users).
In this article we share our large-scale usability research and discuss our findings regarding:
- How users wait the "Dorsum" button to work
- Result i: Overlays & Lightboxes (37% of sites don't do this)
- Issue two: Filtering & Sorting (27% of sites don't practice this)
- Issue three: Accordion Checkouts
- Event 4: Product Folio to Product Listing navigation
- five other views afflicted by "Back" button issues
- A simple solution to all of this
While the solution is simple, it's surprisingly often neglected in the implementation phase — fifty-fifty on the largest websites, every bit you'll see beneath, and especially on mobile sites.
How Users Wait the "Back" Button to Piece of work
The short version: users expect the "Dorsum" push button to take them back to what they perceived to be their previous page. The notion of perception is the primal factor here, since in that location'south frequently a difference between what is technically a new page and what users perceive to be a new folio — which tin create discrepancies between where the user expects the "Back" push button to take them and where information technology actually takes them.
Generally, we've observed that if a new view is sufficiently different visually, or if a new view conceptually feels like a new page, it will be perceived as one — regardless of whether information technology technically is a new folio or not. This has consequences for how a site should handle common product-finding and -exploration elements similar overlays, filtering, and sorting. For case, if users click a link and 70% of the view changes to something new, virtually will perceive this to exist a new page, even if it's technically still the same page, just with a new view loaded in.
Much the same way users accept little technical understanding of website security and, instead, go with their gut feeling (learn more), they similarly bear witness footling appreciation for the (often arbitrary and infinitesimal) distinctions of when a new view is technically a new webpage or simply an expanded chemical element on the existing folio. And therein lies the rub: the browser "Back" button takes the user back to their previously visited URL, which isn't necessarily the same every bit what the user perceived to exist their previously visited folio.
Users therefore often rely on an element'south visuals, its context, and prior site experience when shaping their expectation of when something is a new webpage vs a slightly altered element on the same folio. It'southward the outcome of this hidden snap judgment that determines where the user expects the browser "Back" button to take them.
4 of the Most Common "Back" Button UX Pitfalls
Below is a walkthrough of the four website elements nosotros most often detect to be implemented in means that pause user expectations — that is, where the user isn't sent dorsum to what they perceived to be their previous page when using the browser "Back" push button.
- Overlays & Lightboxes (37% of sites don't do this)
- Filtering & Sorting (27% of Sites Don't Do This)
- Piano accordion Checkouts
- Returning to the Product List from the Product Folio
(Our introduction to the UX design process and workflow explains how UX designers determine and lucifer user expectations.)
ane) Overlays & Lightboxes (37% of Sites Don't Do This)
Overlays and lightboxes are by design meant to convey a new page that's laid on top of the previous page. It should, therefore, come up as no surprise that users perceive these as separate pages and expect the browser "Back" button to bring them back to the original page. Alas, during testing, the vast majority of user-initiated overlays at the tested sites did not close equally the users clicked the browser "Back" button, merely instead sent them mode back past the overlaid page.
This user expectation of "click 'Back', get out overlay" was observed during testing on both desktop and mobile sites, for all types of overlays. For example, site-initiated newsletter–sign upwards requests, image gallery overlays, or live conversation offers. Thus users should always be exited from an overlay when clicking "Back", and returned to the folio the overlay is on peak of (not the previous page).
It'southward worth noting that users' likely apply of the "Dorsum" button to get out an overlay varies in proportion to how prominent the site-provided "Close" element is (e.g., an "X" to go out the overlay). Very prominent "Shut" elements are probable to exist used more frequently past users compared to inconspicuous "Close" elements, and thus the strain on the "Back" button is reduced when overlays have highly prominent "Close" elements. Of form, users should still be exited from the overlay when clicking "Back", fifty-fifty if provided with a prominent "Close" element.
"I don't know how to get out of this…'Back' button? And so that took me all the way back to the hoodie-finding section [the product list]." A user tried to exit an image gallery overlay by tapping the "Back" button (first image), only she was taken back to the production list instead (second paradigm). (The site-provided "Dorsum" link was actually hidden by the "Install App" ad.)
During mobile testing, nosotros observed users having more than difficulty closing overlays using site-provided "Close" elements, frequently due to hit area issues, with the "X" often existence placed close to the edge of the screen, or an "Install App" ad roofing a "Shut" element (see our commodity on Deemphasize 'Install App' Ads or Avoid Them Entirely). Thus mobile users are more likely to use the "Back" push to close overlays compared to desktop users, and it's even more important that their expectation of exiting the overlay is supported when tapping "Back".
2) Filtering & Sorting (27% of Sites Don't Do This)
A user on Amazon taps "Back" afterwards applying three filters (kickoff image). This removes the final-applied filter, and it'south now shown that there are 2 filters applied (second prototype). Tapping "Back" after applying filters should brainstorm removing the applied filters.
Filtering and sorting generally yield an entirely new product list and users therefore perceive each of these deportment as a distinct view. Fifty-fifty when the filters or sorting directions don't invoke a folio reload, nosotros nonetheless found during our large-scale usability report of Product Lists & Filtering that the users by and large perceive each discrete iteration of their filtering as a new view (most likely because it is a user-initiated action and each iteration produces a new set of results).
This underscores how users don't make technical distinctions between what is and isn't a new page, but rather rely on what they perceive to be a new folio. Filtering and sorting, of both categories and search results, should therefore support that users flick back through each list state by using the browser "Back" button, and the sorting directions should also exist changed to the previously set sorting management.
"I guess I'll go dorsum…" A user at JBL sorted a product listing of headphones by price from depression to high (first image). After exploring a production on a product page, she decided she wanted to go along browsing, and tapped to go back to the product list (second image). Even so, she tapped twice: this led her to be taken back to the product list and also changed the sorting management — but the sorting direction was just changed on the dorsum finish, every bit the sorting direction nonetheless read "Cost: (Low To Loftier)" (third image). As she said, "The filter [sorting management] took away even though it says it is still working…They are non in filter [sort] social club…The ones I was looking at, I can't find them." Such technical bugs were quite mutual during testing, and acquired dubiety for users with regards to product listing sorting.
Notwithstanding, it's of import to note that during testing in that location were many instances of users tapping "Back" and a filter beingness removed or a sorting direction being changed — simply this wasn't communicated to users on the front end cease. In other words, while tapping the "Back" button technically did remove a filter or change a sorting direction, it appeared to users that nothing had changed, every bit the (now removed) filters were still shown as applied or the sorting direction shown didn't match the actual sort order of the product listing. This obviously will lead to confusion for users, who volition wonder whether their "Back" push button click or tap has been successful when in that location's a mismatch betwixt their actions and what they see displayed in the interface.
If filtering or sorting is in an entirely separate interface — which is very common on mobile sites — it'due south critical that tapping "Back" while in the interface acts as an "Exit" link would (i.e., similar to exiting an overlay). That is, users should be returned to the view they had been looking at just prior to opening the filtering or sorting interface, after tapping the "Back" push button from inside the interface.
3) Accordion Checkouts
Contrary to what one might think, accordion checkouts are non perceived every bit a one folio checkout with multiple collapsed sections. Instead the vast majority of users perceive them equally a multistep process with summaries (more than on how users perceive accordion checkouts). This tin plough out problematic on sites where the accordion steps are technically implemented every bit a single page with ane URL, as users wanting to go backwards to a previous checkout "pace" (eastward.g., to edit previously entered data) will be sent all the manner back to the cart.
Instead, it's cardinal that piano accordion checkouts ensure that the browser "Back" push takes users back to the previous viewed step — regardless if it's technically the aforementioned or a dissever folio.
4) Returning to the Product List from the Product Page
"When you use the "Back" push, it takes you right back to the outset. Rather than where y'all left off." This user spent significant time during testing scrolling down the Walgreens product list refinding products after tapping back from product pages.
Many users volition look through a corking number of products in social club to find what they are looking for, and this will include some back-and-forth betwixt the product list and the production details pages. Users who are not taken back to where they were previously on the product listing — for example, back to the middle of the product list, rather than the top — have to get through the dull process of refinding the last place they were. During testing this was observed to be especially hard for mobile users due to the more cumbersome procedure of scrolling.
When users are taken to the top of the product listing, rather than to where they were before visiting the product folio, they get disoriented and must refind where they were in the product list. Not but is this tedious — users must redo all the work they had previously done by scrolling the product list again — but it can besides exist challenging to remember exactly where they were before visiting the product page (east.g., if the production list is a selection of blueish dresses with like simply not identical styling, or similar-looking role chairs).
"When yous utilize the "Dorsum" button, it takes you correct back to the showtime. Rather than where you left off."
Users brought to the top of the product list may have to scroll through many items before they find the right place in the list. Depending on the product-loading schema of the site, the difficulty in refinding the product can range from moderate to farthermost.
Regardless of the product-loading schema used, if the process of refinding the correct place in the product list is likewise time-consuming and troublesome, users may well surrender.
Simply it doesn't stop in that location. The above four examples are typical mismatches where users oftentimes wait one thing to happen notwithstanding sites are implemented in a way that causes something else to happen. Withal, this type of misalignment goes across those common examples. Mostly you should lookout out for all new views states initiated by the user which either expect like, or conceptually feel similar, a separate page.
When information technology comes to overlays, filtering, or sorting, testing shows that how users expect the "Dorsum" button to behave is consistent, and thus what should be shown to users after clicking "Dorsum" is clear-cut. In that location are, withal, other views users see during product finding and exploration where what should exist shown to users after clicking the "Back" button isn't then obvious. Five of these are discussed below.
5 Other Views Affected by Browser "Back" Push Issues
When information technology comes to overlays, filtering and sorting, accordion checkouts, and going dorsum to the production list from a production page testing shows that how users expect the "Back" button to behave is consistent, and thus what should exist shown to users after clicking "Back" is articulate-cut. There are, still, other views users encounter during product finding and exploration where what should be shown to users afterwards clicking the "Back" button isn't and so obvious. Five of these are discussed below.
Note: this listing isn't meant to be exhaustive, merely more illustrative of "grayness" areas where special consideration should be given to how the "Back" button should perform in a given context.
- Multistep processes within a page
- Expanding content
- Ballast links
- Truncated content
- Variations on the product page
ane) Multistep Processes Within a Page
one) Multistep processes within a page. A user during a previous round of testing on Sears was interacting with a multistep shipping estimator on a production page (the "Delivery Options" box). He went through several steps, before clicking the browser "Back" button. Even so he was but scrolled upward to the pinnacle of the page, rather than being taken to the previous pace in the shipping estimator, as he had expected. He then clicked the site-provided "dorsum" link in the shipping figurer and was able to footstep backwards through the process.
It's often difficult to determine what to evidence users later on they click the "Back" button when they're interacting with a multistep process embedded within a page — for example, shipping estimators, production-finding wizards, questionnaires, etc. While some users may assume they'll be taken to the previous page, others will assume they'll be taken to the previous step in the procedure.
The design of the embedded process itself likely highly influences user expectations. For instance, when a procedure takes up more than 50% of an interface — which volition very often be the instance on mobile — many users are probable to await that after clicking "Dorsum" they'll see the previous footstep in the procedure, non the previous page.
However, the length of the process is also a factor here. It's non difficult for users to click dorsum through, for instance, a iii-footstep process, fifty-fifty if they had expected the "Back" button to take them to the previous page. Hence the consequence of forcing all users to do this aren't so grave. If, on the other hand, the process is lengthy — for example, a vii-step process — then the human activity of clicking dorsum becomes much more boring if, for case, users have to click back through half dozen separate views to finally get back to the previous page they were on.
Lastly, if the embedded wizard will lose any significant amount of information the user has typed when the back push is used, then the consequences of not taking users to the prior step also increase profoundly.
Thus, the size and prominence of the embedded process, the length of the process, and whatever potential data loss of large amounts of user-provided information should be considered when deciding whether each step in the procedure should have its own split up URL (requiring users to click back through each stride in the process) or not (where clicking "Back", even if a user is several steps into a process, returns the user to the previous folio, or alternatively exits them from the process).
2) Expanding Content
ii) Expanding content. In one of our first rounds of testing of navigation, a user was exploring image thumbnails in IKEA'south "Seating Solutions". Each thumbnail expanded to make full the entire folio width when clicked. Having expanded the first thumbnail (first epitome), the user expanded another thumbnail, but and so wanted to go back to the start prototype, and clicked the browser "Back" button (2d image). The "Back" button however took him all the mode dorsum to the principal category folio, rather than back to the starting time image he expanded (3rd epitome), as the expanded options weren't part of the browser history.
Expanding content could include elements such as thumbnails expanding to larger images, or a line of text expanding to a paragraph. However, the expanded content doesn't appear to the stop user the fashion an overlay does, where the page background is dimmed, and it's quite clear that i page is "overlaid" on another. Therefore, with expanding content users could reasonably interpret the expanded content as either a new view or simply the same view, with some content that's been inverse.
Not using expanding content, but instead switching to an overlay, where it's clear what to take users to when they click the "Back" button (i.eastward., go out them from the overlay and return them to the page they were on), may exist the easiest solution in some contexts (if both UI types are otherwise as attractive to use). Otherwise, like to multistep processes embedded in pages, much depends on how prominent the expanding content is. If it takes up a big part of the interface then many users will interpret it as a separate page, and thus each slice of content should have its own separate URL.
iii) Anchor Links
3) Anchor links. A user on a Target product page tapped the review star average at the tiptop of the page (first image), and was jumped downward to the reviews section (2d image). Being satisfied with the reviews, the user tapped "Back" simply wound up in the product list, rather than back at the top of the product folio equally she intended (tertiary epitome). She refound the product listing detail she was interested in, tapped to go back to the production page, then added the production to her cart.
When information technology comes to anchor links, much depends on whether users are immediately jumped downwards the page when the anchor link is tapped or if they are smoothly scrolled to the new position on the page. Testing reveals that if users are jumped downwardly the page, and then tapping "Back" should return them to the previous position on the folio.
For example, if a user is jumped downward to the reviews section later on tapping a reviews star average at the meridian of the product page, then they should exist returned to the top of the product folio when "Back" is tapped. This is due to the fact that when users are jumped down a page, they tend to lose overview of where they are after the jump, and they can remember they are indeed on an entirely new page (especially on mobile sites). Returning them to where they originally were when they tap "Back" ensures that they don't become too disoriented.
Even so, it's less clear-cutting if a user is smoothly scrolled down the page. Since users are scrolled down the page, they retain an overview of where they came from as they go to a new location. Therefore they're much less likely to completely lose overview compared to users who are jumped downward the folio.
Thus, some users who've been smoothly scrolled to a new position on a page may feel like a site isn't coming together their expectations if afterward they tap "Back" they aren't brought back a folio, but rather returned to their previous location on the page. As they've been smoothly scrolled, they know where they are — they could hands scroll upward if they want to, only by tapping "Back" they're signaling their intention to become back a page instead. (Note that it's recommended that users always are smoothly scrolled, rather than jumped, when tapping an anchor link.)
Thus, the detail context in which the "Back" button would exist tapped after a user has been smoothly scrolled later on tapping an anchor link should be taken into account. If a user is on a mobile site, and it's a very long product page, and there's no "Dorsum to top" option, and then it probable makes sense to take users to the anchor link that was tapped, rather than dorsum a page, when they tap the "Dorsum" push.
Alternatively, if there are many anchor links on a page (pregnant a user could potentially bounce around the page for awhile when tapping "Back", if many of the anchor links accept been tapped), or if the page isn't very tall, then taking users back to the anchor links could be disruptive, and information technology may simply be ameliorate to return them to the previous page instead.
4) Truncated Content
iv) Truncated content. A user at Overstock was exploring a product page, and in the process she tapped to expand truncated content (get-go paradigm). Ready to get dorsum to the product listing, she scrolled to the top of the page and tapped "Back" (second image). However this brought her back to the content she had only been viewing in the middle of the page (third image). She tapped "Back" over again and this time was returned to the product list. Taking users back to a link they tapped to expose truncated content results in a jarring user feel.
Truncated content that'south expanded when users tap a link or button shouldn't be a separate URL that users revisit when they tap "Back". For example, it's quite common on mobile product pages to offer a couple of lines of text or a paragraph of the product description, so hibernate the rest behind a "More than" link. While this can make product pages more scannable, users should exist taken back to the previous page, rather than back to the previous content, when they tap "Back".
Expanding truncated content isn't plenty of a "view change" where users would expect to exist taken back to that area of the page when tapping "Dorsum". Consider besides giving users more of an overview of where they are when they tap to aggrandize the content by smoothly expanding the new content (e.1000., by gracefully expanding the content, rather than abruptly jumping to the new content).
five) Variations on the Product Page
5) Variations on the product page. "OK that's abrasive…Merely trying to get dorsum to the lipstick folio where we were [the product list]. Am I just non belongings it [the browser "Dorsum" button] down right?" A user at Sephora tapped the "Back" push multiple times but cypher seemed to happen, beyond the folio moving up slightly (showtime prototype). She then opened her browsing history by holding the "Dorsum" button, and was able to return to the product list this way (second prototype). Prior to tapping the "Dorsum" button the user had been exploring the color swatches, and from the browser history it appears Sephora had implemented each color variation as a split URL. Nevertheless the product image never changed for the user when she tapped "Dorsum" (just it had when she was initially exploring the swatches).
Product variations should be combined into i product list item. Users can then explore the variations on the product page. Whether or not those variations should have separate URLs, notwithstanding — and thus users would step back through each previous variation they had already explored when tapping "Back" — again depends on the context.
When there are mostly few product variations, in particular color, for users to consider, then having them every bit split URLs may be the best choice, every bit most users wouldn't have to tap "Back" more than a few times to get to the bodily previous page (often the product list or search results page). While some users will be slightly annoyed at having to tap back 2 or 3 times to go dorsum to the previous page, others will likely be more severely annoyed if they tap "Back" to go to a previously viewed variation and are instead kicked off the product page entirely.
This could go a much more disruptive experience if, for instance, they're not returned to where they had previously been in the product list — forcing them to refind the product they had only been viewing.
If each variation has its own separate URL, however, it'south critical that the product image changes after each tap of the "Back" push button. Otherwise, users will be tapping "Back" with no indication that anything is happening in the interface (even if they are technically seeing different URLs). This is a recipe for disaster, equally virtually users will assume the site is "stuck" or volition merely exist unclear why it appears that their actions are having no outcome.
If, nevertheless, there are dozens of variations — for instance, lipstick shades — then it can get a more ho-hum practice to step back through potentially dozens of "pages" to finally get back to the previous page the user was on. If information technology's decided that tapping "Back" skips previously viewed variations and instead sends users back to the previous page they were on, then it'due south critical that users are returned to where they were in the product list (if that was the previous page) and then that refinding the product is easy. A list of "Recently Viewed" items could be helpful too.
The Solution
The good news is that HTML5 provides for a relatively straightforward solution: the HTML5 History API. More than specifically, the history.pushState() role allows a site to invoke a URL change without a page reload, pregnant the site tin align the browser "Dorsum" button behavior to lucifer user expectations. (The reverse is besides possible: to modify the URL without invoking an entry in the user's history.)
At Skechers.com the "Load More than" implementation actively addresses the "Back" button consequence by rewriting the URL each time users click the "Load More than" button. Consequently, as users click the browser "Back" button on a production folio they are taken back to the right position in the production listing (e.thou., to "page 3").
This means that when opening, for example, an overlay, the site tin invoke a history change in the user's browser, allowing the user to "get back" from the overlay view by using the browser "Dorsum" button. And this of course goes for anything, including user-initiated overlays and lightboxes, AJAX-based pagination, filtering and sorting of lists, accordion checkouts — any chemical element which the user would expect to have invoked a browser history but technically hasn't.
Therefore, use the history.pushState() to create a new entry in the user's browser history for whatever view that the user will perceive equally a new page (i.e., any view that is sufficiently different visually or conceptually to be perceived every bit such). This way, y'all can ensure that site behavior and user expectations align.
In summary: Use history.pushState() to make certain your site invokes "Back" button beliefs that aligns with the user'south expectations. Specifically, ensure that any visual change the user will perceive every bit a new page is added to their browsing history, regardless of whether information technology'southward technically a new page or not. This includes, but is non limited to:
- Overlays/lightboxes
- Filtering and sorting selections
- Accordion checkout steps
- Product list location
Additionally, some new views are "grey areas", and the prominence of the view and other factors need to be considered when deciding whether to implement the new view as a new "page". These include
- Multistep processes within a page
- Expanding content
- Anchor links
- Variations on the product page
Truncated content should in general never be implemented every bit a new "page" using history.pushState().
Users rely on an chemical element's visuals, its context, and prior site experience when shaping their expectation of when something is a new webpage vs. is a slightly altered element on the same page. It's therefore disquisitional to support users' "Back" button expectations to avert unintended detours and changes that during testing were oft a direct cause of abandonment. Despite the severity of the issue and the somewhat simple solution, 59% of sites that don't support at least i of the 4 core "Dorsum" button expectations.
This article presents the research findings from just one of the 580+ UX guidelines in Baymard Premium – become full access to learn how to create a "State of the Art" e-commerce navigation feel.
Source: https://baymard.com/blog/back-button-expectations
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