Mastodawn

Kristoffer Lawson Jan 14, 2024

I really, really hate websites that open links into new windows. Especially if they're links within the site itself (e.g. the #superso, super.so, website opens support guides into new windows).

This breaks the mental navigation model and overrides what the user may want to do, for no benefit whatsoever. It's just really poor #UX.

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Tero Ykspetäjä Jan 14, 2024

@Setok For certain values of user, sure (and I’m among them). But an (to me anyways) astonishingly large portion of users get confused because they “lost” the site they were on when they opened the help site. Or in many other ways cannot handle “overriding” where they were by clicking a link to elsewhere on the site.

So I’m with you that I absolutely *like* it more when I’m in control of the windows and tabs, but saying opening them is objectively bad UX is much more complicated an issue.

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Kristoffer Lawson

@tero a lot of depends on how well the site is designed, so they can easily get back to the main activity. I agree that there could be a debate about certain functions (though honestly I haven't seen data to support that, especially on mobile). In the case of #SuperSo, even the bloody sign in link opens a new window. So even common flows are broken up by new windows.