User Expectations and Interface Response Times
Posted Monday, June 28th, 2010 at 10:36 am by Amy (20 posts)
While the ability to innovate with technology and create interesting and interactive elements on a site has progressed, a recent post on UseIt.com shows the amount of time we have to capture a user’s interest has not.
One site, which was tested using an eye-tracking study, demonstrates how a slow-loading promotional banner plus a large number of widgets on the site, create confusion for the user rather than the engagement opportunities that were intended.
Long page load times can cause user drop-off
When you think about your own site, what do you know about the load times — and the corresponding distractions that might result from slow-load times? The UseIt article gives some helpful guidance on how to get at those questions.
If you don’t read the full article, here’s a helpful tidbit:
… From UseIt.com ….
The 3 response-time limits are the same today as when [Jakob Nielsen] wrote about them in 1993 (based on 40-year-old research by human factors pioneers):
0.1 seconds gives the feeling of instantaneous response — that is, the outcome feels like it was caused by the user, not the computer. This level of responsiveness is essential to support the feeling of direct manipulation (direct manipulation is one of the key GUI techniques to increase user engagement and control).
1 second keeps the user’s flow of thought seamless. Users can sense a delay, and thus know the computer is generating the outcome, but they still feel in control of the overall experience and that they’re moving freely rather than waiting on the computer. This degree of responsiveness is needed for good navigation.
10 seconds keeps the user’s attention. From 1–10 seconds, users definitely feel at the mercy of the computer and wish it was faster, but they can handle it. After 10 seconds, they start thinking about other things, making it harder to get their brains back on track once the computer finally does respond.
A 10-second delay will often make users leave a site immediately. And even if they stay, it’s harder for them to understand what’s going on, making it less likely that they’ll succeed in any difficult tasks.
Interesting stuff. Check out the full article here: http://www.useit.com/alertbox/response-times.html
July 8th, 2010 at 11:53 am
How interesting! Are there tools out there to help you measure response times, to see where they fall within this range?
July 12th, 2010 at 1:12 pm
For the three response times that are mentioned in the article, 0.1, 1 and 1-10 seconds you can actually observe these without a tool.
There are some useful sites out there that will help you breakdown your general page load times, though, and that will provide insight into how fast your page – and the specific elements on the page – are loading. Here is one that I’ve used in the past:
http://www.websiteoptimization.com/services/analyze/