Product friction in user experience design is a well-discussed topic, and product developers often see it as a barrier to a smooth user experience. But in fact, not all friction is bad.
When used strategically, product friction can have a positive impact. For example, slight delays or added steps can encourage users to spend more time considering important decisions or ensure that actions taken are intentional, reducing mistakes and regrets.
On the other hand, unnecessary friction can drive users away, decrease retention and harm the overall experience. By understanding the different types of friction — both the good and the bad — you can make informed decisions about when to use it to your advantage and when to eliminate it.
3 Types of Product Friction
- Interaction: This includes all physical aspects of your user interface design.
- Cognitive: This is triggered by product navigation.
- Emotional: This is when users experience feelings of frustration, hesitation or anxiety when using a product.
What Is Product Friction?
Product friction can be anything that slows down or prevents users from achieving their goals.
Friction points in a product can be intentional or unintentional. Asking users to confirm a high-stakes action like making a purchase or deleting an account adds a necessary pause and is an example of intentional friction.
Unintentional friction, however, usually stems from poor design choices, outdated systems, overly complicated processes or technical issues. Things like long loading times, unnecessary form fields or complex navigation will frustrate your users and can make them abandon your product altogether. In fact, user frustration sabotaged one in three visits in 2023.
What’s more, studies show that 70 percent of online shoppers abandon their cart before making a purchase, often due to friction points like lengthy, complicated checkout processes, website errors and crashes.
Types of Product Friction
Interaction
Interaction-based friction is related to the physical and technical aspects of interacting with a product. This includes every element in your UI design, including navigation, layout, buttons, links, forms and so on. It can also result from poor technical performance, such as slow or unresponsive pages.
Designers strive to create intuitive interfaces where users can get to where they need to with just a few clicks. This means reducing unnecessary steps, improving accessibility, using clear text for buttons and links, improving the visual hierarchy and optimizing performance and loading speed.
Cognitive
Cognitive friction manifests when users have to think too hard to understand or navigate your product. This can stem from poor design choices, complex products with steep learning curves or failure to meet users’ expectations.
The most common example of cognitive friction I see is founders laying out a massive list of features or making their design too complex. Not only does this complicate testing and increase the chances of releasing a buggy app, but it also results in a cluttered design that can overwhelm visitors and discourage them from ever using your product.
Emotional
Emotional friction occurs when users experience frustration, anxiety or hesitation that prevents them from accomplishing their goals. This is the hardest form of friction to spot and address due to its subjective nature.
For example, users might be hesitant to input their personal information if they’re unsure about how a site will use and protect their data. It’s useful to include a disclaimer about your privacy policies not just from a legal standpoint, but also to assure and build trust with your users.
To uncover emotional friction, you need to know your users really well. One-to-one interviews, group discussions and feedback forms are all helpful tools for identifying emotional friction.
6 Ways Product Friction Is a Good Thing
Intentional friction at the right time and place can lead to better engagement, higher conversion rates and happier users. Let’s explore how you can use friction to create a positive user experience.
To Enhance Security
Security is one area where friction can be a good thing. Take two-factor authentication for example. By introducing an extra step in the login process that requires visitors to verify themselves, you add a layer of security that gives your users peace of mind.
Another example is password requirements with a combination of letters, numbers and special characters that a lot of sites nowadays impose. This might require some extra effort, but it helps secure user accounts and prevent breaches.
To Encourage Intentional Decision Making
Friction can also help users make more deliberate decisions. Confirmation prompts before critical actions, like “Are you sure you want to delete this?” or “Review your order before finalizing your purchase,” add a moment of delay that encourages users to think twice, reducing the likelihood of mistakes and regret.
A lot of e-commerce platforms also offer a multi-step checkout process broken down into easy-to-follow steps, like entering contact details, choosing a delivery option and payment method and reviewing the order.
While a single-click purchase might be quicker, the friction in a multi-step process gives users enough time to verify their information at each step. This is particularly useful when it comes to high-consideration purchases, like insurance, technology, home appliances or year-long subscriptions.
To Evoke Feelings of Accomplishment
When you use it strategically, friction can evoke a sense of accomplishment. In task management apps, the simple act of manually checking off completed tasks can provide a moment of instant gratification.
A lot of products also use gamification elements, such as earning badges or reaching milestones before you can progress and unlock new features or levels. This can help keep users engaged and motivated.
To Guide Users Through Your Product
A great onboarding experience for Software-as-a-Service products can be the deciding factor between a one-time visit and a purchase; 63 percent of customers consider it before committing.
You might have heard time and time again that the onboarding process should be easy to complete with as few steps as possible so users can start using the product right away. But this can actually be a bad thing.
For example, the team at Equals found that while more users created accounts, the retention was far worse with a low-friction onboarding. The numbers looked like this: 30 percent fewer users stuck around after eight weeks.
In products with a steep learning curve, friction in the onboarding process can help users gradually get familiar with the different features and better demonstrate the value of each one.
To Personalize the User Experience
Nowadays, customers look for personalized experiences. A lot of products have a longer sign-up process and onboarding surveys to get to know their users better. While this introduces some amount of friction, getting this information can help companies tailor their recommendations and the overall experience.
For example, Netflix and Spotify use brief onboarding questions to get to know users’ favorite genres and artists so they can use this data to personalize each feed and recommendation.
Hubspot has also introduced a few extra questions during sign-up where customers can provide more information about their role, their company and what their day-to-day looks like. Hubspot can then use this information to recommend relevant features, tutorials and plans.
To Turn Frustration Into a Positive Experience
Let’s be honest, sometimes unwanted friction creeps its way before you can catch it. If you’re clever about it, you can use it to your advantage.
Loading screens can often be a source of frustration. You can turn them into a fun and branded experience, however, by incorporating witty messages, images and even games. For example, Slack shows team quotes or tips while the app loads (as an admin, you can also customize these), which makes the waiting feel more engaging and therefore shorter.
The same goes for 404 pages. You can use images, jokes that are on brand and offer an alternative page. Ahrefs does this brilliantly by turning 404 pages into an opportunity to educate and turn the user’s attention to their free SEO tools.
Use product friction to your advantage by securing, guiding and personalizing the user journey, turning obstacles into opportunities for better engagement, retention and satisfaction.
