I was inspired to write this post because I just finished browsing some YouTube videos. Many of the channels use autoplay (the video starts automatically.)
I always advise people to be careful with autoplay on YouTube and with music on their sites because both can be annoying.
Not everyone’s watching from the comfort of home.
Right or wrong, many people surf the Internet at work, and having autoplay on your site is a great way to lose a visitor.
When I had a 9 to 5, there were many times I would go to a site (shame on me, I know) and the music would start automatically. I’d have to quickly close the browser or lunge for my speaker controls to turn the volume down.
(C’mon, you know this has happened to you at least once! 😉 )
When using autoplay, it’s important to consider that many people are not watching your videos or viewing your site in private.
If you have a YouTube channel, I would highly recommend turning off Autoplay. (It’s located under “Videos and Playlists” in your channel options.)
Trust me, I did an unofficial Twitter survey and the results were overwhelmingly in favor of NO AUTOPLAY. In fact, everyone that responded said they hated it.
Musical Etiquette
I was on a blog once and the author kept referring me to other sites, and the sites opened in the same window. So every time I went back to his site, the music started again. Ugh!
I thought I was going to slit my wrist! 🙁 I had to hunt for the volume controls because they inconveniently placed it at the bottom of the page.
I’ve never understood that logic. Forcing people to listen to your tunes is not going to make them enjoy your music or site more. If anything, it may aggravate them and cause them to leave. Just because you are grooving to your tunes, don’t assume everyone else will.
In most cases, you should give people a choice between whether to listen to music or not. However, if you must use autoplay, only load the song on the first page view, and make it easy to turn the audio off. Don’t hide the volume controls!
Music can be a great addition to a website, I just think it should be used sparingly and appropriately.
What do you think of sites that play music and/or have autoplay media?
yeah it’s true ’bout that…
I totally agree with you Lisa, and with all those who share these view. One point I’d like to add is this. In some countries bandwidth is not cheap, and auto-playing stuff at my cost is like spamming faxes in the old days, where spammers used up the recipient’s fax paper without permission. I too want to read first and then choose whether I want to use my bandwidth watching a video or listening to an audio.
Great blog Lisa! Thanks for all you’re sharing with us.
God, a page full of anti-autoplay Nazi’s! I think this is funny because on my music website, I’m annoyed that it will not auto-play due to some type of site bug (yes, MySpace). What annoys me more than most of you are annoyed by a concept like autoplay, are people who cannot click a button every once in awhile. If you don’t like whatever is playing turn it off! Its not like I’m asking you to get up from your computer and go outside and hand mix a batch of concrete; not that any of you would know what that entails, but you get the idea! Hope the page is not offended by my attempt at some light-hearted devil’s advocacy! p.s. I hate Twitter, even the name is stupid!
I have a client when demanded me put it on his web site, I refused to do it over and over until I finally told him if he wanted to build his own site and insert it he could. he used the line I am the customer blah blah blah. I hated to do it but I did, how else do you explain to them it is a web courtesy to not do this?
If it’s a business site, and the client won’t listen to me about not putting a auto-playing video on their site. I tell them straight out. Be prepared to not have as many customers as you might have and you could lose traffic and money over it. That usually works…if they are rational. LOL
Business site indeed and I finally told him I’d refund his money and he could find a different unethical web designer and am now awaiting a reply…………
Nice to see that you stick to what you believe in. 🙂
I’m totally with you that you should avoid autoplay for most websites and in most places. For years as a web designer, I tried to steer my clients away from it … regularly using the at-work example: Nobody wants to be surfing at work and get caught with a loud video playing over their speakers.
However, I think there are some very cool applications for when to use autoplay. We’ve got a client at Dovie who is putting QR codes on his products in stores. Someone with an iPhone that has a QR code reader app can scan the code, be sent to a website that has an embedded video about that product start autoplaying right away. At the end of the video, we send them to an information page right in their safari mobile browser. Its like getting a personal video intro to a product right in the store. Very cool.
This could also apply if you’re sending out an email newsletter with a link to watch a video. If they’ve already clicked the link in the email to watch the video, why not save them a click when they get to the video page?
It’s cases like these I think autoplay can be a powerful tool in the arsenal. But, yes, it should be used sparingly. 🙂
What if it’s for a party website? Does that qualify as a good asset to the site for having music on autoplay, or is it still annoying?
I have music on autoplay on my party website, partizzle.com. It’s on the top right of all my main pages, and fairly easy to get to to pause/turn off. But after reading this, I don’t know what to think of it anymore. =P
What do you think? I’d love your honest feedback. Do it work for my site, or should I take off the autoplay?
Thanks,
Al
I think music is more fitting for music-related or party sites but you should still give people the options to play the music instead of auto-starting. Just my opinion.
Awesome website, awesome information!
Learn how to make your own website
I assign some blame to YouTube, which seems to have autoplay as the default. Professionals cannot use this as an excuse, but people using YouTube for fun may not even KNOW that there is another option, or they don’t know how to change their settings.
Any website that has music or audio embedded into the site gets ignored by me.
I might let you slide if there is a clearly visible off/on button to the media file.
If there isn’t I go to some other site for information.
And like Deni mentioned, most of the time I have my own music playing and I dont want it interrupted.
Be careful.
I’ve done that on a few sites in the past…I am guilty! ;-P
But now that I have been building sites for awhile and now have clients and no matter how many times I tell my friends/clients that auto playing media is BAD, they still want it. I’ve tried telling them that they will lose traffic, and all the other things you said in your blog post…they never listen. Makes me want to slam my forehead on my desk.
I find pages that load video or music automatically to be extremely irritating. Not so much because of “getting caught at work”, as I work from home, but more so because… 1) I have my own music playing and I don’t want your stuff blasting over it… and 2) I have (and so do many others) a crummy internet service which limits my daily download allowance… meaning if I have to download all your music and videos every time I go to your website, I’m probably going to quit going there. I need my download space for what I need to do, not for your music… which by the way not everyone likes what you like… While it may be small amounts, it’s annoying having to waste a limited commodity on something you’re not interested in. I have a “download status meter” so if I see I’m getting close to the limit, and I find a site that starts downloading music and/or video… I’m gonna immediately close your site. Give me the OPTION to load your video or music… Don’t just throw it at me.
My tiny problem is that if I just listened to a video or a song that was low volume I turn my speakers up and when the song is over I forget to turn them down so next song is blowing my hair back at 4000W and my ass is turning inwards grabbing for my heart and my lungs!!!! I just hate it!
I am a little late to the party… but this has to be my number one pet peeve. I don’t offer second chances with a “noise” site as I shut it down straight away.
Another thing i hate on others blogs are those pop up sign up forms that cover the whole screen. why would i want to sign up to a site that i have no idea what the content is?
I tried xing out one day and it wouldnt let me. Not a good business form in my opinion.
I agree with you auto play music or anything else that auto plays is not good.
Yes Holly! Ugh!! So annoying.
I agree with your post and if I ever put music or video on my site I will make sure to have autoplay off. Thanks Lisa
“The ads that float down in front of the content you’re trying to read is almost as annoying,” is certainly true Amy, but the one’s that float down in back aren’t much better.
Are you listening, Netflix?
I’ve concurred with just about every comment on this post – NO music or video unless we choose to play it.
I’ve noticed some adverts doing the same thing on some pages. If I wanted to play them I would. The ads that float down in front of the content you’re trying to read is almost as annoying. Don’t businesses know that if you’re annoying you’re driving people AWAY?!?
*Smacking myself in the forehead*
I hadn’t even considered that on the youtube channel. What was I thinking? Its funny too, I was clicking through my own channel, looking for your blog to learn a few new tricks…. Im up early, 3:30 am, and my vid started blasting through the house!!! ( I dove for the speakers)
I’m so embarrassed to say I had the autoplay enabled. And I have read web design for dummies…. I should have known better. Haa lesson learned, and an excellent though / blog entry
Thanks again
I HATE music on sites I’m checking out.
On some systems, it slows down page loading time.
It’s from Shakespeare, Tracy. In the battle at the end of Henry IV, Part 1, Sir John Falstaff, a lazy, drunken knight chickens out in battle. “The better part of valor is discretion,” he says. It’s ironic, because, although he’s a crooked, lazy, good-for-nothing, he’s also very clever.
You totally read my mind with this post Lisa. I have been on too many websites lately that automatically start either a video or music as soon as the page loads…and I find it completely annoying. I do have to say though that thankfully most of the sites I’d seen had easy and obvious ways to stop it. I also agree about the privacy issue. I honestly don’t even want everyone in the room with me at home to keep asking me what I am doing because of autoplay on a website. Everybody wants some privacy sometimes… I do admit though that I have occasionally surfed at work in the past:p Webmasters should remember that “…discretion is the better part of valor.” I wish I could credit that quote properly. Thanks for the great post Lisa. I will remember to make this consideration when I create my website.
It must be something that is being taught somewhere because only recently have I noticed it more and more. Or maybe it is just the untaught who think this is a great new feature to incorporate. I think its dumb and potentially causes you to lose readers. Maybe an extremely popular and niche site like ESPN can get away with it, but I don’t like it there either.
I get annoyed by the fact when music or video’s auto play basically for the same reason you said Lisa, for if you are browsing and your speakers may be up and now you hear this loud music or video or your somewhere where you *cough* shouldn’t be viewing certain sites, and then you hear the music on these sites, and then you could get some innocent person in trouble, because they didn’t know about the autoplay.
That’s my take on music/videos and autoplay.
i have read this website and now i found out that it was very useful to post a comment !
Autoplaying music is why I’ve never stayed on a MySpace page for more than 3 seconds.
I hate it when I got a site and it just starts talking to me. You know, when people basically autoplay a video on their WEBSITE.
If I wanted to hear what you have to say about whatever your site is about, I’d read your content, then CHOOSE to listen/watch what you have to say. It’s an instant turn-off.
Amen Joe. Couldn’t agree more.
I don’t mind auto play music or videos as long as they:
1) Do not slow the load time on the page
2) Have the pause button in plain sight
I think I’ve just come to expect that automatic things may be lurking on the next page I open.
Besides Youtube doesn’t think it’s such a bad idea and look at the traffic they get.
Yeah Jordy, but YouTube doesn’t do that on their homepage. Notice their video banner ads don’t autoplay. You have to opt to play them. They probably know how people hate them. Yes, they give their users the option to autoplay on their individual channels which is not quite the same as having autoplay on the YouTube homepage. YouTube is so popular and has such a large share of the home video market they can get away with having autoplay on their individual channels. The smaller players like us don’t often get that kind of forgiveness online.
Agreed. I often work in my living room lazyboy in the evening. Last night I went to a site on purple martins and it opened with a bunch of birds chirping. Everyone turned in my direction and one person chided, “What’s that?” They knew, just wanted me to feel uncomfortable.
And in a similar but different vein–though equally annoying– there are a number of sites that have their YouTube videos fixed so you cannot pause or use other controls even though you do have to start them. I find this especially troublesome with tutorial type presentations when I need to make some notes or look up terms.
When making decisions like these it is important to think in terms of the viewer rather than what we think clever or “a neat effect.”
I hate getting on a site where there are comments and someone has lieft a video with autoplay, and you have to hunt the darn thing to be able to turn it off. That drives me nuts, and quite frankly, turns me off.
I have intentionally NOT looked at what they had to offer becaise of it.
So true, Lisa!
This is one of the reasons I mute the sound on my computer and only turn it on when there is something I want to listen to. I can’t stand being barraged with others’ music or videos. Very annoying!
Yeah I don’t like this. Even when I used to run an internet radio station I would never switch the radio player on the site to autoplay.
Off-topic but I was at work once and was surfing the internet during my lunch break when I clicked on a link in a forum and as the page loaded a sound file started playing and what bellowed out of the speakers was “ATTENTION! THIS USER IS WATCHING G*Y P*RN! ATTENTION! THIS USER IS WATCHING G*Y P*RN!”
Thank god I was the only person in the office, but I still could not turn the speakers off and close the link quick enough!
Even though this is widely written about, there are still lots of websites out there with this annoying feature. Let’s hope this post will put that to rest once and for all. 🙂
Autoplay YouTube channels do annoy me sometimes, it just depends on what type of content they are showing. On the other hand, its ok if websites use music as long as it isn’t distracting and it fits the theme of the website and it is a short clip, of around 30-45 seconds that only plays on the home page.
Great blog post, this should change peoples minds about allowing autoplay on their YouTube channels, however I think most ‘celebrity partners’ do it so they can generate more video views.
Autoplay is bad especially if you are watching a channel that isn’t like music videos. Also, adding music to any site should be a no-no unless it is a site about your music.
Stop giving all these helpful hints. The competition is much easier when people just flounder and drive traffic away 🙂
Your work has changed my life, Lisa. I’m having a ball learning all this stuff. I’m still happy even though my site is down right now. Trying to get blogger to release the domain name so I can authorize Website Palace to put it up. I’ve already rebuilt my WordPress blog with Thesis on my local host, thanks to you. Everything is ready to go live once I get the domain transfer authorized. You are excellent!
LOL! Glad you’re learning and progressing. 🙂 Keep up the great work.
Hi Lisa,
I have definitely been in situations where sudden blaring music has sent me scrambling for the exit button. 🙂 I was in a library one day surfing the web when I landed on a site with autoplay – it was so embarrassing! Everyone stopped what they were doing to give me the stink eye! I prefer to have an opportunity to decide whether or not I want to watch the video or listening to music. I don’t like it when sites take away my options.
I think that if you have a music site or something music related it is ok to have music on your site. Otherwise it is just cheesy. I ALWAYS turn it off. Just as I always click Skip to Site …
Right, in certain instances music can be a great asset to a site/video. I think it just gets abused by too many sites.
Lisa
You know YouTube started that the last time they updated their interface, now personal I think its not that wise to force an start video down your viewers throats right off the back.
Given them the option to pick and choose is the best place to start anything.
“TrafficColeman “Signing Off”
Very great post Lisa Irby. I think you beat me to it on this topic because I was in the process of writing something similar to this topic.
I also think that auto-plays are annoying especially for audios on a website. Some webmasters use tunes that they enjoy but they don’t consider is this music suitable for my site or will my visitors appreciate this music. For the YouTube videos I don’t like it as well. If someone is watching a video and that person wants to use auto play, he/she can also turn it on if that’s their choice.
Thanks for the post Lisa 🙂
Ah, one of the no-no’s of web site developement – autoplaying multimedia content.
For Firefox, I use Flashblock that requires me to click on the flash object before playing any video. My work blocks YouTube altogether, so I can’t even view the content if I wanted to.
Autoplay music is the worst, mainly because it may be harder to find the play controls for the music (if any) on the website.
I’d rather determine when I want to view/listen to multimedia content on a website.
Background music, videos auto playing get rich schemes, all cheesy stuff you expect to see on a cheesy website. Any credible information that may have been on the site would not be viewed by me