When UIE did a study on how visitors perceived download time on 10 different sites over a 56 kbps modem, they found that there was no correlation between the actual download time and the perceived speed reported by the users.
Instead they found a strong correlation between perceived download time and whether users successfully completed their task, suggesting that if people can't find what they want on a site, they will regard it as a waste of time.
This suggests that download time might not be as important, as many usability experts claim.
Links:
Henrik Olsen
- October 10, 2002
See also: Research (128) Download time (5)
