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I'm currently creating a questionnaire. The questionnaire consists of two statements top and bottom. User is required to use the slider to indicate the preferred statement by dragging the handle towards one of the statements.

What would be a better approach for this? or How to improve the slider? I believe this is not a good UX solution for the user.

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    I think it is important here to make the distinction if you are just wanting the user to make a selection between the 2 or if it matters how far they slide it towards one or the other.
    – AsheraH
    Jun 2, 2020 at 9:10
  • What is the reasoning behind having the user pick between statements using different values? Does the slider go from Strongly Agree at the top to Strongly Agree at the bottom? Because that's confusing, but it's the only thing that "makes sense" given the design. Usually, the values are Strongly Agree — Agree — Somewhat Agree — Neutral — Somewhat Disagree — Disagree — Strongly Disagree on a slide, so having those twice on one slider would be overkill. Which have you missed out?
    – Steve O'Connor
    Jun 2, 2020 at 11:27
  • @SteveO'Connor Forgot to mention in the question but you're right. We have 5 total points across the slider. The starting point is neutral and the user is able to slide up or down. Values are Agree—Strongly Agree—Neutral—Agree—Strongly Agree
    – Tharindu
    Jun 3, 2020 at 8:33

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According to the article published in NN/g:

Selecting a precise value using a slider is a difficult task requiring good motor skills, even if the slider is well designed. If picking an exact value is important to the goal of the interface, choose an alternate UI element.

Also, using a slider for a questionnaire is not an established pattern. I would suggest using radio button groups for selecting one value from the options provided or checkboxes if its multi-select.

Links to the articles:

https://www.nngroup.com/articles/gui-slider-controls/

https://www.nngroup.com/articles/steering-law/

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Don't just drop the slider for the sake of it. Although radio buttons are more common, one big benefit to the slider is a simpler, less-cluttered UI. Does a user really need to see a long list of the same options for every question? Why not keep the slider, but fix it's shortcomings. Make it beautiful, not boring.

So what are the downsides of a slider, and how can they be addressed:

Can't easily see all possible values

A user shouldn't need to scroll the whole slider just to see what options can be selected. You already display the "selected value" of the left. Why not list all the values on the left, but make the non-active ones a lot less noticeable (e.g. semi-transparent), maybe even a tick icon on the selected value.

Fiddly

You don't want a slider that changes position for every pixel. Use a slider that supports fixed increments, and keep the number of values to a minimum. 5 values, or 7 at a push (less values = less prone to miss-selection). Play around with the height of the slider until you get something that feels natural - ask some potential users to try it out if possible.

If using the suggestion of listing all items, why not also make them clickable. Click an option, slider adjusts to match. Easy to use, and looks good too. Best of both worlds.

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