How and When to Use Inline Design

Finding and Using Hidden Spaces Within Your Interface

When creating experiences, we want to ensure a smooth user experience. The less movement there is the better. Modals, new pages, display toggles are great at creating space within an interface but ON PAGE content is still preferred for the following reasons:

a) It is disorienting to get bounced around (even modals are still a bit jerky).
b) Every second counts. The longer it takes, the closer you are to losing your user.
c) Out of page, out of mind. You lose your user’s train of thought (unless the action is within that modal).

A neat alternative is to use the hidden spaces within your interface.

Look at this example:
We wanted a little blurb about our webinars, a reserve button, and then a selection of dates. Putting this on a modal or a separate page is clearly overkill. Hiding half of the content pre-click, enabled the repurposing of some unused real estate (white space).

If the additional content is quite small (naturally or you can whittle it down), consider adding (variable) elements within your content. It keeps all your content ON PAGE and feels quite natural!

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