Ajax Load Vs Pagination

Ziycon

I had this up on stackoverflow with no bites so posting here to see if anyone has any opinions on it?

Is there a 'right' way to load lists of data/classifieds/articles on a web page, I'm currently loading 8 items via an AJAX request with a view more option at the bottom of these 8 items which once clicked will load the next 8 items and so on until there are no more new items to display.

I was looking around and there is an almost 50/50 split between Ajax loading and pagination listing for data depending on what website you look at. I'm wondering is it easier for a user to use one or the other or is it all the same these days and it's just down to me as the developer to decided?

I know that if I go down the pagination route it removes the overhead of any javascript or jquery needed to be used which is a negligible difference.

Technically it doesn't matter either way to me as I've implemented both options before numerous times.

This is more a question of user experience then a coding issue.

oscarBravo

From a UX point of view: what happens if I click on "view more" four times, clicked on the fortieth listed item and then hit the "back" button - do I still get the forty items listed?

If not, paginate please.

Ziycon

oscarBravo wrote: »

From a UX point of view: what happens if I click on "view more" four times, clicked on the fortieth listed item and then hit the "back" button - do I still get the forty items listed?

If not, paginate please.

You'd just get the first 8 results as it stands, point taken, I've seen this happen before and it is terribly irritating.

Pagination it is, thanks.

Talisman

What you describe is quite similar to infinite scroll with a manual click requirement. Google's recommendation to make infinite scroll search-friendly is to use pagination.

oscarBravo

This is an interesting take on the problem.

Giblet

Ajax history is now a solved problem, and it's really easy to do back button with a correct URL and load ajax content.