Remember those “mini vertical scrollbars” that were big in websites many years ago, but faded away as an outdated design trend?
They are back and back big because their important role in function won over design. And with today’s technologies, good developers can easily customize vertical scrollbars to look great on your site.
Inline vertical scrollbars can be seen on our own TakeYourBusinessPlaces.com site, as well as Yahoo and Facebook, although Facebook’s skinny vertical scrollbars aren’t exactly user-friendly because they are too skinny and your mouse easily slips off of them.
Here are good examples of well-functioning mini vertical scrollbars:
Our TakeYourBusinessPlaces.com site on the left, AppleBees in the middle, and Kiel Mortgage on the right, all of them using custom inline scrollbars to feature dozens of high fives and testimonials and other social media information. The primary benefit for the user is the inline scrollbar lets users easily control the amount of content they see, and quickly scroll through dozens or hundreds of pieces of information, without having to move their mouse very much. The primary benefit for the business’s website, is the mini scrollbar can be designed to take up a relatively small amount of space, yet contain what appears to be endless information.
