Hick's Law
Make the next decision understandable. Removing useful choices is only one possible way to do that.
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UX principles / The reasoning
Better questions.
More useful interfaces.
Understand a principle, see a proposed application, and check the boundary before turning it into a rule.
19principles explained
Evidence and interpretation
“Law” is a common name, not a promise of universal results. Research findings, perceptual principles, heuristics and engineering rules carry different kinds of evidence.
Understand the distinctions19 principles
Explanation · application · evidenceFitts's Law and target distance
Give controls enough room to hit and put related actions within a sensible reach.
Jakob's Law
Use familiar interaction patterns so people can spend their attention on the task.
Proximity
Spacing should tell the same story as the content: related things belong together.
Miller's Law and working memory
Keep needed information available instead of making people hold it in memory.
Doherty Threshold and responsiveness
Respond promptly and show what is happening. A single timing number cannot describe every interaction.
Von Restorff effect
A meaningful difference can help something stand out in memory. Make the difference worth noticing.
Serial position effect
Order can affect recall. Choose an order that also makes the task easier to complete.
Peak-end rule
How an experience ends can influence how it is remembered. Make completion useful and honest.
Zeigarnik effect and unfinished tasks
Help people resume real work. Do not assume unfinished tasks create a reliable memory or engagement advantage.
Prägnanz
Make the structure easy to perceive without removing the information that makes it useful.
Similarity
Use a shared visual treatment when elements share a role or meaning.
Uniform connectedness
A continuous visual unit and a set of items inside a box are different grouping cues.
Common region
A shared boundary can show which items belong to the same group.
Tesler's Law
When a task is complicated, decide who should handle each part and how mistakes can be corrected.
Postel's Law and input boundaries
Help people enter valid information while keeping the system's accepted meanings explicit.
Parkinson's Law
Define the useful task and remove avoidable work. Do not manufacture urgency.
Occam's Razor
Prefer a simpler adequate solution. Adequate still includes accessibility, clarity and recovery.
Pareto principle
Find where effort has the greatest measured effect. Treat 80/20 as a prompt to investigate, not a fact about your product.
No matches
Give the question more room.
Try a different design concern or remove a filter.
Keep the context
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