'Add Another' button in mobile

Question

Context

• I have an issue with a form, let's call it the parent form.
• Inside the parent form, you can 'Add Item'.
• Once you click the 'Add Item' button, it will navigate you to a new screen where you can fill in the information about the item.
• When all info about the item is filled, you can click 'Add' so it will add the info to parent form.
• You can add many items.

Problem Statement

• In web, we usually have the 'Add another' checkbox at the bottom of 'Add Item' page, so there will be a new empty form for you to fill for another item once the previous one is saved.

• My issue is, this function is needed in mobile and I am not sure the checkbox is appropriate. The current solution we have is two buttons, 'Add & Back' and 'Add & Next'.

  • Add & Back: Add this item and navigate me back to parent form
  • Add & Next: Add this item and add a new item

• My concern is that 'Next' does not clearly portray a new 'Add Item' form will show up after you add this current item.

• And the 'Add & Back' does not make sense because when you add the item you are automatically redirected to parent form.

• I tried to propose the 'Save' and 'Save & Add New' but it was rejected due to the word 'save' since it does not save the data but just adding the information back to the parent form.

Kindly advise :) and thank you for taking the time to read this.

Answer 1

I think your new changes it the right approach, but I would be tempted to switch your "default" around to make adding another item the primary option. Then the second button is the one that returns to the previous screen. That way you can just be explicit about the return action rather than trying to force "Add and Add Another" into one button label.

So, for example the 2 buttons would be like this:

Add Item - Adds the item and remains on the current form. Clearing the fields ready for a new entry. I would also display a little notification somewhere that says "Item Successfully Added" (or something along those lines). This is important so the user knows the action actually happened, and that they didn't just clear the from by mistake.

Add Item and Return - Adds the item then returns to the parent form, nice and simple, and clearly explains what it will do. I am not 100% sure on using "Return", with more thought I might opt for a different word, but you get the idea.

Note that if the form was more of a popup dialog type we could use "Add Item and Close", but with the design you have shown that might be a bit misleading.

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In addition, I would consider adding a 3rd button for "Cancel". I assume you can just press the back button in the top-left to do this, but that might not be obvious to all of your users. You don't want them getting stuck on this screen after all!