Progressive Progress Bars

Progress bars come in different designs. In mobile apps, the demand for progress bars is even high given the short attention span of users.

One mobile app decided to offer 3 progress indicators rolled into one.

A progress bar, a loading icon and a contextual message, 'Sending link...' appear to offer a consolation to the user. Instead, the user is confused with confusing jargon and rolling gif files.

Quoting John Maeda:

"When speeding-up a process is not an option, giving extra care to a customer makes the experience of waiting more tolerable. I appreciate the free cookies and other samples in line at the Whole Foods store during the Thanksgiving season as the checkout queue snakes across the entire store. Saving time is thus the trade-off between the quantitatively fast versus the qualitatively fast."

The focus of loading indicators should be more on the progress rather than making wait times longer and intolerable.