Signs it is time to revisit navigation design

The gap between knowing this and actually doing it is where most teams lose ground. A few signals that navigation design is due some attention.

The measurable part of design is whether people can find what they came for and act on it without hesitating. Budget a little time for it every quarter and it never becomes a project of its own.

The signals

• Nobody can say when it was last reviewed
• The answer depends on who you ask
• Seven or fewer top-level items keeps a menu scannable
• Label links by what people want, not by your org chart

The practical version

A visible current-page state prevents visitors getting lost. The teams that handle this well are rarely the ones with the biggest budgets. If it only works because one person remembers to do something, it does not work yet.

The short version

Design decisions are the ones clients feel most confident arguing about, which makes it worth separating taste from evidence early. Three things worth confirming about navigation design before you move on:

• Someone can say what the current setup is without going to look
• A visible current-page state prevents visitors getting lost — and you know whether that is true here
• There is a way to tell whether the last change to this helped

If you want a second opinion on how yours is set up, ask.