Why show waiting
Miller (1968) first set out psychological response-time limits, and Card et al. (1991) split them into 0.1 s (instant), 1 s (flow) and 10 s (attention). Past one second users wonder if a tap registered; past ten they leave. Nah (2004) found feedback extends tolerable waits. Indicators do not cut time but give confidence the system is working.
Choosing spinners or bars
Per Sherwin (2014), use indeterminate spinners for short unknown waits of about 2–10 seconds and determinate bars showing percent or time left beyond ten seconds. Myers (1985) found strong preference for percent-done bars. Use step indicators for multi-step flows, and skeleton screens for short page loads.
Designs that shorten perceived time
Harrison et al. (2007) found bars that start slowly and accelerate feel shorter; bars stuck at 99% are worst. Send long jobs to the background and notify on completion, since interruptions raise errors and anxiety (Bailey & Konstan, 2006). Signal completion with a brief microinteraction, and reduce waits fundamentally through Core Web Vitals work.
FAQ
- When to use a spinner?
- For short waits of unknown length, roughly 2–10 seconds; under one second, show nothing to avoid flicker.
- Can a bar differ from reality?
- You may shape the speed curve, but never show completion early or make a stalled job look active.
Sources reviewed: 2026-10-27
References
- Myers, B. A. (1985). The importance of percent-done progress indicators for computer-human interfaces. In Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (pp. 11–17). ACM. Classic study showing users prefer percent-done indicators.
- Harrison, C., Amento, B., Kuznetsov, S., & Bell, R. (2007). Rethinking the progress bar. In Proceedings of the 20th Annual ACM Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology (pp. 115–118). ACM. Progress behaviour changes perceived duration.
- Nah, F. F.-H. (2004). A study on tolerable waiting time: How long are web users willing to wait? Behaviour & Information Technology, 23(3), 153–163. Feedback extends tolerable waiting time.
- Miller, R. B. (1968). Response time in man-computer conversational transactions. In Proceedings of the December 9–11, 1968, Fall Joint Computer Conference, Part I (pp. 267–277). ACM. First account of response-time thresholds.
- Card, S. K., Robertson, G. G., & Mackinlay, J. D. (1991). The information visualizer, an information workspace. In Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (pp. 181–186). ACM. Proposes 0.1 s, 1 s and 10 s time scales.
- Sherwin, K. (2014, October 26). Progress indicators make a slow system less insufferable. Nielsen Norman Group. Practical guidance on spinners versus bars by wait length.
- Bailey, B. P., & Konstan, J. A. (2006). On the need for attention-aware systems: Measuring effects of interruption on task completion time, error rate, and affective state. Computers in Human Behavior, 22(4), 685–708. Interruptions raise errors and anxiety.