Horizontal scrolling vs vertical scrolling

[kobi]

Hello ther. I just wanted your opinions on the pros and cons of horizontal and vertical scrolling. which do you think works best or do you find most comfortable, practical etc. Perhaps you think there is no difference between the two either way your opinions would be much appreciated al the same. thanks

[NazNomad]

If you're talking about webpages, horizontal scrolling is a big no-no.

It's no hardship to make a page fit a browser width.

Vertical scrolling is a given, it can't be avoided, unless you have a puny page, lol.

[ChuckFickens]

As above

People don't expect they will need to scroll anything horizontally, they do expect to scroll vertically.

[Buenchico]

Horizontal scrolling can have advantages where the content is not solely text-based. (e.g. a timeline on a history website).

However, where a block of text is to be read, it makes far more sense to employ vertical scrolling - otherwise it would be necessary to continually scroll backwards and forwards (horizontally) to read each line of that text.

Chris

[NazNomad]

We're all assuming it's a web-based question, and not merely an amateur dramatics backdrop artist looking for inspiration, lol

[kobi]

Yes guys i mean a real serious web page for a proper website. surely its just as easy to prevent vertical scrolling by limiting the height of content to just allow for horizontal scrolling in the same way you would with the width. What Buenchico is saying about text is a serious consideration but what about using text columns?

[NazNomad]

(I will assume) that most people scroll vertically using their mousewheel ... it's a laziness thing. Moving your hand left-to-right to view a webpage is far too strenuous for the majority of internet users.

[NazNomad]

I'll add another assumption.

Most web users will be similar to me in as much as a horizontal scroll bar on a website is easily fixed by clicking the little red X in the top-right corner of the screen, seriously.

If you want hits, keep it vertical.

[kobi]

@NazNomad:

"Moving your hand left-to-right to view a webpage is far too strenuous for the majority of internet users"

lol. i can vouch for that. good point about the mousewheel

[wildwood]

"i mean a real serious web page for a proper website"

A serious webpage should not be wider than 1024, or preferably 960. Not everyone has a 24" monitor.

[rojash]

Yep, I'd go with the majority here. When I finish a day of slaving over a hot keyboard, I usually unwind using StumbleUpon. My first action on hitting a horizontally scrolling web site, is to click the thumbs-down, and be instantly transported to a more user-friendly site.