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I haven't heard many developers/designers talk about the overused practice of using toasts for UI feedback. The post shares a few real-world examples and illus

I haven't heard many developers/designers talk about the overused practice of using toasts for UI feedback. The post shares a few real-world examples and illustrates some of the problems with how they use toasts. What do you think? Are toasts overused? In which cases do you use them in your own apps?

unglaublich 2y ago
Toasts should be used if there is no direct relation to or interaction with a visible UI element: notification, heavily asynchronous processes, out-of-view modifications.
CRConrad 2y ago
[flagged]
- ben_w 2y ago
  A lesson for us all: no matter how obvious a metaphor may seem to us, it isn't obvious to everyone. 90% sure it's called this because toast is what pops up out of a toaster. https://dribbble.com/shots/3072186-Pop-up-toaster-motion-design https://dribbble.com/shots/3072186-Pop-up-toaster-motion-des...
  - CRConrad 2y ago
    Oh? That one never occured to me. Thanks! ETA: If they actually behaved like that, it would help with OP's issue with them-- pop out of "the toaster", where you clicked to initate the action, so you'd be more likely to notice. Seems his complaint was in large part that they appear somewhere else. (So they're not really "toasts": At least my toaster doesn't have a teleportation function, to make the toast appear wherever the toaster designer has more or less randomly decideded it should. It just pops up the bread in the same old boring position where I know to look for it.)
Ukv 2y ago
I'd speculate that their overuse comes from convenience of displaying any message by throwing in a `showToast("Foo!")` opposed to altering each UI component to show the relevant feedback.
- maccard 2y ago
  That cuts both ways IMO. At least with a toast system I know where feedback appear on a per app basis (or website or whatever). Imagine if every screen, view, list entry, checkbox had its own way of displaying feedback. It would be an enormous amount of overhead.
JohnFen 2y ago
> Are toasts overused? I think so, yes. > In which cases do you use them in your own apps? I don't. But I don't write mobile apps (where they make more sense) for distribution, so they don't address any need my applications have.

unglaublich 2y ago

Toasts should be used if there is no direct relation to or interaction with a visible UI element: notification, heavily asynchronous processes, out-of-view modifications.

CRConrad 2y ago

[flagged]

ben_w 2y ago
A lesson for us all: no matter how obvious a metaphor may seem to us, it isn't obvious to everyone. 90% sure it's called this because toast is what pops up out of a toaster. https://dribbble.com/shots/3072186-Pop-up-toaster-motion-design https://dribbble.com/shots/3072186-Pop-up-toaster-motion-des...
- CRConrad 2y ago
  Oh? That one never occured to me. Thanks! ETA: If they actually behaved like that, it would help with OP's issue with them-- pop out of "the toaster", where you clicked to initate the action, so you'd be more likely to notice. Seems his complaint was in large part that they appear somewhere else. (So they're not really "toasts": At least my toaster doesn't have a teleportation function, to make the toast appear wherever the toaster designer has more or less randomly decideded it should. It just pops up the bread in the same old boring position where I know to look for it.)

Ukv 2y ago

I'd speculate that their overuse comes from convenience of displaying any message by throwing in a `showToast("Foo!")` opposed to altering each UI component to show the relevant feedback.

maccard 2y ago
That cuts both ways IMO. At least with a toast system I know where feedback appear on a per app basis (or website or whatever). Imagine if every screen, view, list entry, checkbox had its own way of displaying feedback. It would be an enormous amount of overhead.

JohnFen 2y ago

> Are toasts overused? I think so, yes. > In which cases do you use them in your own apps? I don't. But I don't write mobile apps (where they make more sense) for distribution, so they don't address any need my applications have.