Hollance  iPad + iPhone App Development

The client briefs that I receive often contain the requirement that “the app should display our logo when it starts”. In other words, a splash screen. Unless you’re making a game, I think adding a splash screen to your app is a bad idea, and here is why:

Splash screens make your app appear to start up slower. When the user launches an app, he expects to be able to interact with it immediately. If you show a splash screen first, he has to make a context switch from what he expected to see (the actual app) to your logo and back again when the app is done loading and its real interface finally appears.

Instead, if you do what Apple recommends in the HIG—show an empty version of your UI, without any content—then the perceived app startup time is actually shorter and users are happier as a result. Anything you can do to make your users happier is something you should do.

All iPhone and iPad apps contain a launch image, Default.png, that is shown when the app is being loaded by the operating system. Unfortunately the temptation is big to put a logo in this image. Don’t, as that is not what it’s there for.

Here is the launch image of an app I recently completed for a client. Boring, but effective.

Splash screens are about you, not about the user. You probably like your logo very much and I’m sure it is pretty, but here is something you need to realize: the user doesn’t particularly care about you or your logo. You, on the other hand, should care very much about the user.

Most people just want to get on with things and if your app helps them do so, great! But if the app gets in their way, it only takes three taps to uninstall.

If your app is a novelty app designed to promote your brand, then remember that unless the app delivers some kind of value, people won’t be using it for very long and they won’t get much exposure to your message. Focus on the value, not on the brand.

Forego the splash screen and find a better way to integrate your branding in the app’s user interface. Give people a good experience to associate with your brand, rather than shoving it into their faces.

The launch image is rarely shown anymore. Now that almost everyone has OS 4 with multitasking on their iPhone, apps resume where they left off the next time they are opened. This means the load image, i.e. your splash screen, is only shown for a brief instant the very first time the app is used.

The launch image also appears if your app is re-launched after it was truly terminated, which occasionally happens when there is not enough free memory to keep all suspended apps around. Most of the time, however, when the app loads the user sees a snapshot of where he last left off.

Showing your splash screen only now and then makes for a very inconsistent experience. Putting a logo in the launch image might have worked on the slower models when there was no multitasking yet, but no more.

Don’t get too clever! If your app launches really quickly—and it should!—then the load image is only visible for a second or so, especially on the fast iPhone 4. Hardly long enough to make an impression.

To “solve” this problem, some apps use a timer that keeps the splash screen visible for a few seconds more before it fades into the main interface. How silly is that? You are not doing the user any favors by purposely slowing down the launching of the app.

Let me say it again: the app is not about you, your brand or your logo, it is about the user and the goal he wants to accomplish.

If your app is a game, then it makes sense to show a “Loading…” screen but for any other apps, do the right thing and put a blank version of your UI in the default load image.