1. Autoplaying Horror
Videos, ads, or background music that automatically starts playing the moment a page loads - sometimes multiple at once.
Nothing makes users leap out of their chairs faster than unexpected audio (especially when they’re quietly browsing at work). Autoplay is a UX and performance nightmare: it eats bandwidth, slows page loads, and disrespects user consent (the fun we have trying to get it working cross-browser to get around this). Accessibility-wise, it’s a nightmare - screen readers get confused, and users who rely on assistive tech lose control of the experience… and don’t get me started on trying to find the culprit on a site so I can pause it!
2. Pop-up Poltergeist
Pop-ups stacking like cursed spirits - cookie banners, newsletter modals, chatbots, discount offers, the list goes on.
It’s like being trapped in a haunted house where every door slams before you can move forward. From a front-end perspective, it’s chaos: overlapping z-index battles, scrolling lock issues, accessibility traps for keyboard users, and performance drag from endless tracking scripts. Worst of all, users can’t even reach your content - the very thing they came for. A good rule of thumb: if you’re scaring users into converting, they’ll vanish instead.
3. The Cumulative Layout Shift Creature
Elements on the page that jump around as it loads - buttons sliding away just as you try to click them, text shifting down when an image finally appears, or ads pushing content all over the place.
It’s the web equivalent of a haunted house with moving floors. Not only does it make for a dreadful user experience, but it can tank your Core Web Vitals score and send your SEO straight to the underworld. From a front-end perspective, it’s usually caused by missing image dimensions/aspect ratios, slow-loading fonts, or poorly implemented third-party scripts. It’s one of those invisible horrors you don’t notice until your users start screaming.
4. The Phantom Image Stalker
Images that materialise on hover and relentlessly follow your cursor around the screen - a particularly insidious trend among design agency portfolios.
These spectral images plague interactive elements, blocking the very content you're trying to read. Want to read a case study description? “BOO!” 👻 Too bad, there's an eerie floating mockup obscuring half the text. The only exorcism? Moving your cursor completely off the page and carefully positioning it back, hoping you don't accidentally summon another image apparition. From a design perspective, it's the ultimate example of style suffocating substance. Yes, it’s trendy, but it's actively spooking users who just want to read your content without having to navigate your website like they’re tiptoeing through a haunted house. If your interactive elements are forcing users into an elaborate dance routine just to access basic information, you've created a beautiful barrier, not an experience.
5. The Checkout Phantom Zone
Endless upsell prompts and "Don't miss out!" desperation that turns a simple transaction into a marathon of clicking and second-guessing.
One particular high street supermarket’s online checkout is the perfect case study in transformation horror. What should be a three-click confirmation becomes a labyrinth of meal deals, reward card prompts, delivery slot upsells and substitute preferences. Each screen with the same ‘Confirm Payment’ call to action button look terrifyingly similar to the last, leaving you genuinely uncertain whether you've actually completed your payment. It's the retail equivalent of a funhouse mirror maze: disorienting, exhausting and designed to make you question your own sanity.
From a design standpoint, this aggressive pattern creates false finishes that erode trust. When users can't confidently be sure that they’ve actually finalised a purchase you've failed at the most critical moment. Dark patterns might boost short-term conversions, but they summon the vengeful spirits of cart abandonment and brand distrust.
6. The Infinite Text Length of Doom
Unrestricted line lengths that stretch across enormous screens, forcing your eyes on an exhausting horizontal marathon with every paragraph.
It's genuinely baffling how many modern websites summon this typographic demon despite centuries of print design wisdom screaming at them from the grave. Optimal line length for readability sits between 50-75 characters. This isn't dark magic, it's basic stuff. Yet here we are in 2025, still encountering walls of text that span the full width of a 27-inch display like some nightmarish ancient tome. We're talking 200+ character lines that turn reading into an ocular assault course. By the time you finish one line and scan back across the abyss to find the start of the next, you've lost your place, your comprehension and quite possibly your will to live. From a design perspective, it's a cemetery of bad decisions. Responsive design isn't just about making content fit smaller screens, it's about exorcising these possessed paragraphs at every viewport size. A simple max-width on text containers is Typography 101 - the kind of trick even a junior designer should have in their spell book. Yet this typographic abomination continues to rise from the grave on many a professionally designed site. If your users need to physically swivel their heads like Regan MacNeil from the Exorcist just to read a single line, then unfortunately you’ve given your content a death sentence (pun intended).
7. The Consentless Cookie Curse
Cookies appearing before consent - or worse, after a firm “reject all.” You click “no thanks,” but the site’s already been feasting on your data behind the scenes.
It’s the kind of dark magic that drains user trust faster than a vampire drains blood. From a compliance point of view, it’s a nightmare - violating GDPR, ePrivacy, and basic principles of informed consent. The ghostly hand of third-party scripts often lurks behind it, dropping trackers long before the user has a chance to decide. It’s bad for privacy, bad for integrity, and bad for reputation - because nothing says “we respect your choices” like ignoring them entirely. The worst part is, most users won’t even know that websites are doing this. Sometimes the sites don’t even know they’re doing this!
8. The Chatbot of False Hope
That overly eager chatbot that materialises the moment you arrive: “Hi there! Need any help today?” - only to spiral you into a scripted loop of generic, button-based responses. You try to ask a real question, but it just cheerfully replies, “Sorry, I didn’t get that!” before offering you the same three useless options again.
It’s the uncanny valley of customer service: not quite human, not quite helpful, and definitely not what users want. From a UX standpoint, it’s pure frustration - a barrier dressed up as assistance. Instead of solving problems, it adds one more click-heavy obstacle between visitors and what they came for. When people finally type “talk to a human,” it’s a digital cry for mercy. Unless a chatbot is genuinely intelligent and trained to resolve issues (or escalate gracefully), it’s better left in the crypt where it belongs.
9. The Mobile Menace
That moment when you open a website on your phone and realise it hasn’t been designed for anything smaller than a cinema screen. Text bursts off the edges, buttons hide under side scrolls, and you need surgeon-level precision just to tap a link. Suddenly, your fingers feel enormous, your patience vanishes, and you’re ready to exorcise the tab entirely.
In a world where mobile traffic dominates, an unresponsive site isn’t just inconvenient - it’s catastrophic. Poor mobile design kills conversions, sends bounce rates soaring, and makes users question whether the brand has kept up with the century. Your phone is a computer, but it shouldn’t feel like one from 1998. A well-built responsive layout respects the user’s context; a bad one makes them feel like a frustrated giant trapped in a dollhouse.
10. The Accessibility Afterlife
A website that looks great - until you try to navigate it without a mouse, rely on a screen reader, or bump up the text size. Suddenly, buttons vanish, menus shift, and contrast fades into the darkness.
These aren’t just usability quirks; they’re violations waiting to happen. With the European Accessibility Act coming into force, ignoring inclusive design isn’t just bad UX - it’s risky business. Designing for accessibility protects both your users and your business and keeps your site from turning into a haunted house of frustration.
