Infinite Scrolling: When to Use It, When to Avoid It

Imagine your website has a lengthy list of items, orders, data entries, or search results. Of course, you currently have a shedload of filtering, grouping, and search parameters. But when it comes to facilitating and expediting the scan through data, you must utilize UX/UI design services and assist clients in finding relevant items.

Initially, your may want to stick with traditional pagination. However, sooner or later, you start wondering if infinite scroll could be a smart choice to consider based on your use case. We all have strong opinions about the infinite scroll, most of which are not particularly constructive.

Before jumping straight into when to use and avoid the infinite scroll, let us look at what this technique is and its benefits and drawbacks.

Table of Content📃
Infinite Scroll
Benefits
Downside
Use Infinite Scroll If
Not so Good Idea to Use
Options to Infinite Scroll
Ending thoughts

What Is an Infinite Scroll?

A technique known as infinite scrolling restricts the browser scroll bar to display the lowest reach point of a page. By scrolling down the page, the user can see more content. With the “Load More” option, users can continue or stop infinite scrolling with either continuous or shortened scrolling. Pinterest, Facebook, and Twitter are popular social media sites with infinite scrolling. Using this infinite scrolling technique, each of these sites keeps information populating into feeds, so there is no end to their content.

Depending on the size and type of content, this technique can be effective or cumbersome. However, it is recommended to go through the requirements of the project to make sure that during website or app development mistakes don’t lead to bigger blunders.

Benefits of Infinite Scrolling

Minimal interruptions

Perhaps infinite scrolling’s major upper hand over pagination is that it causes fewer user disturbances. Sometimes even brief interruptions like using the Next tab to view more information on another page can cause users of social and eCommerce platforms to switch between tasks. The impact of disruptions may differ based on the category of user activity. Minimization of interruptions is crucial for social media, entertainment, and news sites since they can have a satisfying transition and motivates them to remain attentive.

Discreet Browsing

When users’ main activity is to leisurely skim through a social networking site’s feed, infinite scrolling is a logical decision. The relevance of each piece of material is nearly equivalent in this case, and timing is a priority as fresh updates are constantly available.

Visually oriented

Visual web pages were created for infinite scrolling. In the Pinterest style, an infinite number of images may be displayed.

There are no restrictions on the quantity, types, or formats of pictures. Everything may fit neatly like a huge jigsaw to create an eye-catching look. To further captivate consumers, graphics can be blended with additional aspects like text, color, or UI tools.

Infinite scrolling is most frequently used on websites with lots of visual material. Websites that use infinite scroll repeatedly feature content related to design, photography portfolios, and photo-sharing services. Aggregated content is also often used, as seen on Tumblr and some e-commerce websites.

Suitable for touchscreen devices

Particularly on smart devices, infinite scroll might give users the impression of a smoother experience. Mobile gadgets seem to be designed exclusively for swiping. Exploration can be constrained by pagination in terms of load time, which is a frequent driving force for users of tablets and mobile devices.

Drawbacks of Infinite Scrolling

This leads users to become disoriented

Instead of breaking up its inventory into pages that each showcase a dozen or so things, imagine that an eCommerce site employs infinite scroll to show all of its merchandise on a single page.

If a user finds a product they like, they may click on it to examine it on a different page. And if they want to keep surfing, they will click the “back” button in the hopes of going back to where they were. Generally speaking, though, they won’t. In reality, they will go back to the beginning of the preceding section. They must scroll down one more to return to the position they were in before clicking.

By employing a control click to generate new tabs for content without affecting their spot in the scroll, clever web users avoid this annoyance. However, any design that counts on users using sophisticated strategies to avert an unpleasant interaction must be re-evaluated.

Higher page load 

Infinite scrolling websites frequently take more time to load because of the constant stream of fresh content. When users return to a list after engaging in pogo-sticking (see above), a lot of content may need to be loaded if websites attempt to do the proper approach and maintain tracking of users’ locations on the page.

Mobile users (whose connectivity can be unpredictable) and anyone using a device in a low-bandwidth area or with a limited data plan, frequently experience issues with the slow pace.

Subpar SEO performance

The last but most serious problem with infinite scrolling is that it adversely affects your website’s SEO results. It is because search engine crawlers are unable to access all the content below the first section of a page. Google bots do not load all the content and overlook a significant amount of content. In addition, scrolling endlessly slows down page speed, an influential SEO factor.

Issues related to accessibility

Customers with accessibility concerns may encounter significant issues as a result of infinite scrolling. Since keyboard-only users must “tab” around the content; link by link, to reach the end of an infinite scroll. This makes it more difficult for them to browse the web due to the sheer amount of information that can be displayed on a single page. On the other side, users of screen readers will only be able to view the first “chunk” of the list and cannot force the loading of additional content.

When to Use Infinite Scroll?

It works best for websites and applications with significant amounts of content created by users (such as Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest, and Instagram). Pagination, meanwhile, is ideal for goal-oriented websites and apps where users search for a specific item.

The nature of the content is a consideration when choosing a browsing strategy. “Do you have more images compared to text? Because people can scan and process images much faster than words, Google Images uses infinite scroll. A search result takes much longer to read. This explains why the pagination method still used in their Google Search results is more conventional.

When to Avoid Infinite Scroll?

Because limitless scrolling can lead to user interactions, we do not advise it in situations where users will want to use the listing page’s content to:

• Locate a certain piece (e.g., searching for a particular article or product)
• Analyze the items on a lengthy list (e.g., compare several products on the same list)
• Examine only a handful of the first few options on the list (e.g., choose a few of the most relevant results)

If you have a sizable customer base from regions with limited connectivity, infinite scrolling is not the right solution.

Substitutes to Infinite Scroll

Load more buttons

Users are frequently prompted to view more results by load-more buttons that are typically positioned beneath a section of content. It provides both a logical halting point and the option to go on. 

Pagination

The most obvious method of organizing web material is pagination. It breaks up the content into separate pages, each of which is only partially filled with items. It is simple and provides users with what they want. 

Additionally, it gives consumers a feeling of where things are situated. For instance, a person searching for a scarf on an eCommerce site might reach page four and see that there aren’t many options left and remember that their preferred choice was on or around page two. With pagination, going back to the spot where that particular scarf was may be done quite easily.

Guidelines for Infinite Scrolling

When designing a better infinite scroll, here are some tips to keep in mind: 

• Always incorporate a footer reveal when using an infinite scroll.
• Allow users to return to their browsing at a later time.
• You could try combining “load more” and infinite scroll.
• Think about combining pagination with infinite scroll.
• Explore the possibility of enabling users to bookmark or pin objects or areas of interest.

Closing Thoughts

It is just bizarre to make a vague statement like, “Use Infinite Scroll to generate traffic and gain popularity”  There isn’t a perfect navigation type that meets the needs of both UX and SEO. The best course of action is to carefully investigate all the aspects, grasp the objectives of your website, and combine pagination, infinite scroll, and Load More to identify the best possible option. Likewise, contact us for the flamboyant navigation style.