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Posted on 02/04/2008 at 02:52:20 PM by Zach Wilson

You know when you do something that feels right and then feel like everyone else should listen to you and follow your lead? We have people ask for the "open in new window" or target="_blank" feature for adding hyperlinks in our WYSIWYG. We tell them, we don't like that functionality because it's bad practice, poor for usability and confuses users. Jakob Nielsen comes to the rescue:

Opening new browser windows is highly confusing for most users. Although many users can cope with extra windows that they've opened themselves, few understand why the Back button suddenly stops working in a new window that the computer initiated. Opening new windows was #2 on my list of top-10 Web design mistakes of 1999; that this design approach continues to hurt users exemplifies both the longevity of usability guidelines and the limited improvement in user skills.

Thanks Jakob, I feel much more vindicated in my advice now!

Posted In Design, Usability

9 Comments

Posted Feb 04, 2008 4:59 PM by Fred

Perhaps tabbing in IE7 will alter the perception that 4 windows is somehow better than 1. Also, for web standards folk, using onclick=\'window.open(this.href); return false\' validates as XHTML.

Posted Feb 05, 2008 12:47 PM by Dave S.

I\'m thinking that you were just ahead of your time. However, now that you have evidence you can say: \'I told you so.\' Must be nice!

Posted Feb 05, 2008 4:58 PM by Dave C

What about if you warn the user with a \\\'New Window\\\' icon or text next to the link? For example, if you are linking off-site to a different organization\\\'s conference information or registration page?

Posted Feb 05, 2008 6:09 PM by Zachary Wilson

Dave C., according to this, the usability issue was in the absence of a history when accessing the back button. The warning still wouldn\'t protect users from that extra time/confusion moving their mouse to the back button realizing nothing is in the history.

Posted Feb 06, 2008 4:26 PM by Maddie Grant

Wait. What? I can\'t stand it when I click on a link (say in a blog post) and it opens in the same window (thereby obliterating what I was just in the middle of reading). You\'re saying you prefer that?

Posted Feb 09, 2008 8:30 AM by Ellen

Is there anything since 1999 that continues to support this? Web users of 2008 are nearly a decade out from those Jakob refers to in your quote. I\\\'m with Maddie here -- maybe once upon a time it was confusing, but then, did Facebook exist in 1999? YouTube? del.icio.us? Users who were 10 years old then are in college now. Given the fact that you\\\'re getting requests for the target_blank tells me it\\\'s probably time to revisit this practice.

Posted Feb 09, 2008 1:36 PM by Fred

It's not web standards compliant, which means its not recommended by the W3C. If your personal preference is to open links in new windows, use shift+click.

Posted Mar 04, 2008 7:03 AM by Mike Mason

Isn't 2007 getting a little late for someone to be flustered by a new browser window?

Posted Apr 20, 2008 5:00 PM by Zachary Wilson

It's very nice Dave S., I must say.