UX Power Up: Fat Finger Friendly

On mobile, tapping the right target at the right time is critical, since users are often engaged in motion with one finger and one eyeball. In this week’s UX Power up, Frank discusses why it’s so important to remember the fat finger rule.

Transcript of video above…

Fat Finger Friendly

Frank Spillers here and it’s time for this week’s UX Power Up.

So today we are talking about a mobile UX law, which is what I call the Fat Finger Friendly rule.

And, the fat finger friendly rule is one of these things that you have to adhere to in mobile, and the correct target is 44 pixels for the fat finger friendly rule.  What that means, is that individual targets – if you have like a little button or a little arrow, whatever the case may be – it needs to adhere to the print on the hand which we refer to as the fat finger.  So fat finger friendly, it means that if you accessing a link or a piece of content, or you are doing something here – maybe you have a little icons, maybe you have little links or buttons here – they have to actually be the size of a 44 pixel, so that the target of the finger can actually hit that when a user is interacting with it.  

So, fat finger friendly rule, always in mobile.  It’s one of the laws, I think, of mobile that dictate how you decide whether a button or a target is going to be accessible to a user.  

Now, one of the things – just quick little tips – is that, as you have your design, one thing you can do is to touch the screen, because you are probably designing on a PC, like I do, or a mac.  And so if you just touch that thing with your finger, just to see what it’s like to interact with, that will maybe give you a little more of a reality check than actually relying on your mouse and kind of waiting until you stick it into a mobile simulator, or test it on a mobile device.

So, thanks for joining me, and remember – always design fat finger friendly for mobile.

See you next time on a UX Power Up.