A Complete Guide to Jakob Nielsen’s 10 Usability Heuristics

With 2024 coming to an end, the 10 usability heuristics developed by Jakob Nielsen have reached their 30th anniversary. Jakob Nielsen’s 10 usability heuristics are not merely opinions; they are grounded in systematic research conducted via factor analysis. According to Jakob himself, the 10 heuristics are “as durable as if they had been engraved on a rune stone.”

These heuristics have stood the test of time, proving their relevance across decades of technological advancement. Whether you’re designing websites, apps, or any interactive digital system, these principles remain fundamental. Let’s dive into the 10 heuristics and their significance in modern design applications.

An Overview of Jakob’s 10 Usability Heuristics

Given below are the 10 usability heuristics defined by Nielsen. These principles are not specific guidelines. Rather, they are broad principles for usability that can serve as guidelines for improving usability in an interface. These principles are useful for anyone building digital products from websites and apps to software or physical interfaces like kiosks.

Who Should Learn About Jakob Nielsen’s Usability Heuristics?

If you are a UX designer, then knowing Nielsen’s usability heuristics is essential. But it’s not just UX designers that ought to have a foundational understanding of how usability works. When the user interface of your product is not user-friendly, meeting business goals is not possible. Therefore, getting a basic understanding of Nielsen’s usability heuristics can improve the productivity of your business if you work in one of the following roles:

• Product Manager
• Software Developer
• Marketing Professional
• Graphic Designer
• Content Creator

Designers, developers, product managers, and anyone building digital experiences can benefit from understanding these principles. Although Nielsen’s usability heuristics aren’t strictly a QA tester’s checklist, they offer a solid foundation for identifying usability flaws before a product launch. In addition, researchers and academics who work in the field of human-computer interaction (HCI) also rely on heuristics to teach foundational principles of usability.

So what exactly are these usability heuristics and how are they applied in real-world applications? Let’s dive deep into each of the heuristics to get a clear understanding of how they can be applied effectively.

Visibility of System Status

A good system should always keep users informed about what’s happening and provide relevant feedback for their actions. This feedback should be given in a timely manner too.

For example, when a user completes an action like clicking a button, you might think there’s nothing more to consider. After all, it’s a simple button click. However, for a system to be user-friendly, users need to be guided on what’s happening as they click the button.

Say you clicked a button to upload a file and the system doesn’t provide any form of feedback. It’s typical for first time users of digital media as well as tech-fluent users to feel lost and confused.

“Did I hit the button, or should I do it again? Has something gone wrong?”

As a user processes many thoughts such as the ones above, he or she might just decide to leave the frustrating interface for a better one.

Match Between System + Real World

The system should speak to users in a language that is familiar to them. Using familiar concepts and conventions is important since no user is interested in struggling to understand a user interface.

For example, universally understood symbols like a trash can for ‘delete’ or a magnifying glass for ‘search’ can be applied. Don’t use technical jargon such as ‘Error 404’ that a normal user cannot understand. Instead, you can replace such a term with a phrase like “We couldn’t find the page you’re looking for.”

In the example above, the user interface on the left uses the term ‘Transmit’ instead of the more familiar ‘Send’ for the button. Although users know the meaning of this term, it is not the universally applied term for sending an email. Therefore, users may find themselves struggling for a few seconds. Since user-friendly interfaces are offered by competitors, users will not hesitate to avoid using your product based on inconveniences such as the one illustrated in this example.

User Control & Freedom

This heuristic is crucial for ensuring a user-friendly experience. Users naturally make errors when interacting with a system, and even without mistakes, they may change their minds and want to undo an action. It's essential to give users the freedom to revise decisions during their journey. This heuristic highlights the importance of providing an “emergency exit” that allows users to escape an unwanted situation easily and without frustration.

To your business, the user interface may be a tool designed to achieve specific results. However, from the user’s perspective, it is a point of interaction where a non-living entity represents your brand. Therefore, humanising your interface to align with human behaviour and thought is essential.

In the example shown above, Gmail provides an "Undo" button immediately after sending an email. This allows users to reverse their action in case they sent the email by mistake or need to make changes. 

By offering the "Undo" functionality, users can recover quickly from sending errors without having to go through more complex processes, such as drafting a follow-up email or recalling the message.

Consistency & Standards

Nielsen’s heuristic about consistency and standards refers to sticking to the same words, situations, or actions to define an element consistently throughout a product’s system. This principle is closely tied to the second heuristic discussed earlier, which highlights the importance of familiarity for users.

While Nielsen’s second heuristic stresses on familiarity, the fourth heuristic emphasises that not only should interfaces be familiar, but they should also maintain consistency. This reduces the learning curve for users.

When interacting with a user interface, people already have certain expectations of how the platform should look and function. If you try to make your website stand out with too many distractions or design elements that feel out of place, users may feel overwhelmed and leave.

For instance, standard UI components like menus, buttons, or modal dialogs should appear in familiar designs and the same standards should be applied to all these components throughout the website or user interface in question.

As you can see from the example given below, Nielsen’s heuristics apply to physical user interfaces too. Whether you drive a sedan, SUV, or luxury car, air conditioning (AC) system symbols are represented by universally recognized icons that are familiar to all users. So, even if an individual switches to a new vehicle, there is no need to relearn the functionality of the AC controls.

Error Prevention

Error prevention is the principle that good systems should prevent mistakes rather than trying to correct them. Users can be guided to avoid errors by designing a system that guides them in performing actions. By preventing errors, there is less of a possibility of users feeling frustrated.

You can gently guide users through their journey by showing suggestions, providing smart defaults, and applying constraints where necessary.

Example 1 - Error Prevention

In example 1, a suggestion is provided in the search bar on the right so that the user’s journey is not interrupted by a mistake. If the user’s mistake is pointed out without any guidance (refer image on the left), it will cause frustration and time wastage.

Example 2 - Error Prevention

By providing real-time suggestions for improving password strength, such as including special characters or a mix of uppercase and lowercase letters, the interface on the right side helps users avoid creating weak passwords, thereby preventing errors before they occur.

Recognition Rather than Recall

According to Nielsen, recognising something is easier than remembering it. So, it is a good practice to always minimise the load on a user’s memory by making actions, elements, and options clearly visible.

The goal is not to make users remember the function of a particular button. Recalling requires more mental effort, which is not user-friendly. Recognition, on the other hand, is more effective because it requires less cognitive effort and makes interacting with a new user interface easier for users.

Clearly, all of Nielsen’s heuristics are interconnected. Getting users to recognise what a user interface does requires a familiar interface that matches their real-world interactions, as per the heuristics discussed earlier.

The example illustrated below shows how good design can help users by making things easier to recognise instead of forcing them to remember. On the left, users have to type their job title into the "Position" field without any help, which can be frustrating if they are unsure of the exact wording. On the right, the system provides autocomplete suggestions based on the user’s partial input as they type, like "Senior UX Designer," making it easy to pick the right option. By showing choices, the design reduces effort and helps users quickly find what they need.

Flexibility & Efficiency of Use

This heuristic implies that systems should provide tailored user experiences for both novice and experienced users. Needs of new users are different compared to those of more experienced users.

New users rely on tips and clear labels with a step-by-step approach whereas more experienced users apply a faster and less guided approach. For example, they can opt for keyboard shortcuts or touchscreen gestures.

Options should be provided for beginners as well as advanced users so that both target groups feel valued. You can provide customisable dashboards where users can personalise their interfaces. Accelerators such as autofill or macros are also helpful to streamline repetitive tasks.

An example of using keyboard shortcuts to improve user efficiency is given below:

Aesthetic & Minimalist Design

Visual appeal through design is one of the key objectives of developing an effective user interface. An aesthetic and minimalist design ensures that relevant information is provided to users.

A minimalist design is needed since cluttered designs can overwhelm users. Utilising plenty of white space to separate content is a best practice that helps highlight key points. In order to produce a user-friendly system, the interface should be cleaned up by getting rid of all the elements that don’t help users complete tasks.

Google's homepage follows Jakob’s heuristic on Aesthetic and Minimalist Design by keeping the interface clean and focused. Since unnecessary elements are not present, the search bar and key buttons are highlighted. So users can easily complete their task without distractions.

Help Users with Errors

Error messages should be written in plain language and explained briefly to show what caused an error and how users can fix it to continue with their user journey. This step is critical since it ensures that a user does not get interrupted too much when a mistake is made.

Make sure that users don’t feel intimidated by error messages with technical jargon such as error codes. What your user interface should do is help users by offering clear guidance on how to recover from the error.

The example below highlights how clear error messages help users fix issues at ease. On the left, the vague message "Please fill out the field" doesn’t explain what’s missing, leaving the user confused. On the right, the message "Your profile needs a name" is clear and actionable, guiding the user to resolve the error in a friendly manner.

Help & Documentation

While a good design is familiar and easy to understand, sometimes, your users will need a little nudge. The best way is to be proactive and offer help when users actually ask for it, like contextual tips or onboarding screens.

Although this help is provided as new users enter the system, users have a tendency to skip educational content. Therefore, offer help centres with search capabilities and inline tips proactively so they can get relevant guidance when the need arises later on.

Final Thoughts

Even after three decades, Jakob Nielsen’s 10 usability heuristics are still relevant and accepted by modern UI/UX experts. They are adaptable to both digital interfaces such as mobile apps and physical interfaces such as kiosks. By following Jakob Nielsen’s heuristics, you can achieve usability even if you are just starting out as a designer.

Without usability, even an exceptional design will be worthless since the entire point of a user interface is to interact with users efficiently. Exploring Jakob’s 10 heuristics makes it clear that producing a good design means to truly serve your audience with a platform that is not only visually appealing but also reliable.

Start applying these heuristics today and see how they transform your projects! For further advice on designing websites that deliver seamless UI/UX experiences, consult our web design and development team at AT Digital now.