Benefits of Animated Scrolling

Compares animated scrolling at four speeds with nonanimated scrolling across three types of documents.

Klein & Bederson (2005)Conferencedoi:10.1145/1056808.1057068

Citation

Klein, C., & Bederson, B. B. (2005). Benefits of Animated Scrolling. CHI '05 Extended Abstracts on Human Factors in Computing Systems, 1965–1968.

Controlled experiment measuring task time, accuracy, and preference.

Animated scrolling improved reading speed by up to 5.3% at 300 ms and symbol-counting speed by up to 24% at 500 ms.
Animated scrolling reduced reading errors by up to 54% and improved satisfaction.

Limitations: Extended abstract; the best duration varied by document type.

Interaction frequency determines motionSupported
Frequently repeated actions, especially keyboard-driven ones, should avoid animation; save motion for infrequent, meaningful changes.
Duration should follow the taskNot tested
An appropriate animation duration depends on the task; there is no universally correct duration for every interaction.

Motion