Loading screens work better at mid-range speeds. Stanford researchers tested how fast animations should move during website waits, and the answer surprised them.
Yu Ding from Stanford's business school got annoyed watching a CNN logo linger on his TV screen. That irritation sparked research into what keeps users engaged when they wait for content to load.
Wait Times Still Plague Digital Experiences
Survey data from 195 people showed 45% left a site or app after hitting unexpected waits. Mobile pages averaged 9-second load times in 2023 despite 90% US broadband coverage.
Geography makes it worse. Websites load five to eight times slower in China compared to domestic access. African download speeds trail global averages substantially. Under 50% of Latin American households have broadband.
Google found that bumping load time from 1 to 3 seconds increases bounce probability by 32%. Stretch that to 10 seconds and bounce probability jumps 123%. Sites exceeding 3 seconds shed 53% of mobile traffic.
Testing Across Different Speeds
The research team ran experiments with 1,457 participants across three initial studies. Animation speeds ranged from 10,000 milliseconds per rotation (slow) down to 400 milliseconds (fast). Moderate speeds hit 2,000 milliseconds per rotation.
Wait times varied from 7 to 30 seconds depending on the experiment. Devices included both computers and mobile phones.
Results stayed consistent. Moderate speed animations produced shorter perceived wait times than static images, blank screens, slow animations, or fast animations. The pattern held across different animation types and wait durations.
One experiment used a colored wheel animation with a 17-second wait on computers. Another tested square-shaped animations during two 7-second waits on mobile devices. A third tried ring-shaped animations with two 9-second waits on phones.
All three showed the same outcome.
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Facebook Campaign Tests Real Clicks
A field test using Facebook ads reached 3,874 users who clicked through to sunscreen information. Each person faced a 20-second wait before the page loaded, with animation speed randomly assigned.
The moderate speed group had 44.5% click-to-landing rates. Static images got 37.5%. Fast animations reached 38.9%.
That means 18.7% more people waited through moderate animations versus static images. Compared to fast animations, moderate speeds beat them by 14.4%.
Inattention patterns backed this up. People viewing moderate animations clicked away from the browser window 74% of the time during waits. Static image viewers did this 86.9% of the time. Fast animation viewers hit 79.1%.
A separate conversion test invited people to complete a voluntary second survey after finishing an initial study. The second survey required a 30-second wait with no extra payment.
Completion rates: 67.2% for moderate animations, 49.6% for fast, 32.2% for static images.
Why Moderate Speed Works
Fast moving objects blur when they exceed certain speeds. The human visual system stops processing individual movements, turning rapid motion into streaks. Research in visual perception established this years ago.
Moderate speeds stay distinct. Each rotation remains visible and trackable. This grabs attention without overwhelming the eye.
An experiment with 147 undergraduates proved the attention angle. Students solved 10 math problems while animations played. Those watching moderate speed animations answered fewer problems correctly (4.69 on average) than people seeing static images (5.62 correct) or fast animations (5.67 correct).
The moderate speed group also reported paying more attention to animations. On a 7-point scale, they scored 5.22 for attention versus 3.24 for static and 4.45 for fast.
Stress levels rose with any animation compared to static images, but didn't differ between moderate and fast speeds. Boredom showed no correlation with animation speed. Motivation stayed flat across all conditions.
Attention drove the whole effect.
Product Ratings Shift Too
A mobile shopping test with 361 university students mimicked Amazon's interface. Students browsed 10 backpacks, viewed details for products they wanted, then picked a favorite. Six randomly selected students would win their chosen backpack.
Each product detail page showed a 7-second animation before loading. Animation speed varied by user.
Students rated products they viewed higher after moderate animations (63.02 on a 100-point scale) compared to static images (58.06) or fast animations (59.88). Products they didn't click to view showed no rating differences across animation speeds, all hovering near 29 points.
The effect only touched products people actively engaged with.
What Sites Actually Use
Research assistants catalogued 100 popular websites. Thirty-two showed nothing during waits. Four used progress bars. Five displayed static text or images. The remaining 59 used repeated animations with average wait times of 5.71 seconds.
Mobile apps leaned heavier on animations. Out of 59 apps examined, 57 used repeated animations. Average wait times stretched to 11.16 seconds on mobile.
Animation speeds across these sites ranged from 333 milliseconds to 6,161 milliseconds per rotation. Average speed hit 1,219 milliseconds. Most companies picked speeds without testing.
Data from a chat service company illustrated wait consequences at scale. The firm handles over 1.3 million monthly chats for 4,000+ businesses. Analysis covered 4.53 million chat sessions over eight months.
Wait time before agent connection averaged 13.17 seconds. Every additional 5 seconds of waiting reduced customer engagement. Message sending dropped 1.75%. Activity engagement fell 1.53%. Customers became 8.64% less likely to receive agent messages.
When Speed Stops Mattering
Two scenarios eliminated the animation speed effect entirely.
First, telling users exact wait duration upfront. When 1,159 participants saw "Please wait for around 9 seconds," animation speed no longer influenced perceived wait time. Uncertainty about duration is required for the effect to manifest.
Second, animations combining multiple speeds. Testing with 1,148 users showed that when a fast circular shape paired with a slower color change, speed effects disappeared. The dual attention elements cancelled out speed advantages.
Atypical animations did the same thing. While standard circular loading wheels showed strong speed effects across 1,135 users, unusual animations like mixing bowls with stirring motions made speed irrelevant. Novelty captured attention regardless of pace.
Post-tests confirmed these animations scored as significantly more uncommon than typical circular designs.
Network Congestion Won't Disappear
AI expansion stresses networks further. High performance computing systems with heavy message passing already experience 40% increases in execution time when networks congest. Technology advances but so does demand on infrastructure.
The research found no interaction effects between animation speed and either age or gender across experiments. Effects held consistently across demographics.
Ding and his co-researcher Ellie Kyung from Babson College published findings in the Journal of Consumer Research. They recommend companies test within their own contexts rather than applying universal millisecond targets.
Optimal speeds vary by use case. News sites might need different approaches than shopping platforms. But the core principle applies broadly: animation speed affects click-through rates, conversion rates, and product evaluations in measurable ways.
Most firms ignore this completely or pick speeds arbitrarily. That leaves easy optimization opportunities untapped when implementation costs nothing extra.
Notes: This post was edited/created using GenAI tools.
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by Asim BN via Digital Information World
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