Should you use pagination or infinite scrolling? Your edge cases can help you decide
To solve an age-old design debate, consider what your user’s next step will be
I was dragged into an age-old debate when I drastically misunderstood an old prototype. I would not show my user 3–4 devices: I needed to show more than 500.
As a result, I asked the question many of us have in the past: pagination or infinite scrolling? These were the two design patterns used for large amounts of information, like search results or tables, and I had to choose one of them (since ‘load more’ wasn’t viable).
Like many designers, I believed it came down to preference. What I found, though, is that each pattern has different use cases, and choosing one requires understanding both the regular and edge cases.
Pagination is best for the ‘buying’ mindset
Pagination can feel old and clunky because it’s a design pattern from when tables and spreadsheets were often used in designs. The pattern has several flaws.
One of the primary flaws is that the controls break a user’s flow. For example, users must pause on a page, click a button, wait for it to load, and then sometimes scroll back up.
A couple of other considerations for designers to consider:
How many results are displayed by default (10/25/50/etc.)? Can the user change this?
Are users allowed to skip multiple pages (i.e., from pages 1 to 6)?
Where do you show the total amount of search results?
However, pagination is still used for one key reason: it’s helpful for users looking to purchase your organization’s content.
Pagination not only helps users figure out where they are: it also helps them keep track of where they found something.
Infinite scrolling is best for a “browsing” mindset
Many sites, such as social media and online stores, use Infinite scrolling nowadays, as it’s the more modern design pattern. They do this for two key reasons: it boosts user engagement and is better for mobile devices.
Users don’t have to click buttons to load up the next batch of results: they can scroll, which is an easy action for smartphones.
However, this also highlights one of its downsides: it’s hard to track where a user is (and where they found something). The more they scroll, the less control users have. It’s hard to get back to the top of the page or something they previously saw after scrolling.
So which design pattern should you consider using? To answer that question, we need to think about edge cases. Or, in my case, what would be expected for the application.
Consider edge cases to understand which approach is better
One of the easiest traps to fall into when designing a prototype is only designing for happy paths. That can cause misunderstandings, like what happened with me. I assumed the default case was the screen with only three options.
The difference between these patterns is almost non-existent when there are only three options: it becomes a matter of preference. You need to consider edge cases, like 200 search results, to understand which pattern fits your needs.
What do you want your users to do if they’re greeted with 200 results? Users usually take three actions when greeted with that scenario.
The user scrolls through all the results (or pages), searching for what they need.
The user scrolls through a few results before finding some way to sort results for what they need (i.e., “Sort by most recent, etc.”)
The user checks how many results they have before deciding to use a way to filter out results (like a search bar)
After seeing the results, which actions you want the most users to do should help you decide which pattern to use.
For example, if it’s crucial not to filter out relevant results (i.e., the user is searching for healthcare providers), then the users would rely on sorting patterns, which lends itself well to pagination. On the other hand, if the user doesn’t care about finding a specific product (i.e., browsing search results on Amazon), it lends itself to infinite scrolling.
But you cannot see these differences until you consider the edge cases.
Both pagination and infinite scroll have their uses
I know the common trend nowadays is to move away from pagination in favor of infinite scroll, but both patterns have their use. Pagination is often like tables and spreadsheets: something old but useful to help users in specific situations.
Not to mention that infinite scrolling has some other problems, like the potential to cause users harm.
So if you have to design for a very large-scale set of results, consider which of these use cases fits better. They both have places where they can shine, and you should consider edge cases to figure out which one works best for you.
Kai Wong is a Senior UX Designer and a top Design Writer on Medium. His new book, Data-informed UX Design, explains small changes you can make regarding data to improve your UX Design process.