Heuristic evaluation of YouTube website

This paper presents a heuristic evaluation of the YouTube website. The evaluation methodology used is heuristic evaluation, and the ten heuristics recommended by Nielsen have been used for evaluation. The paper discusses the principles that have been followed and violated and provides recommendations for improving the usability aspect of the YouTube website.

Heuristic evaluation of YouTube website
ABSTRACT
The concept of usability is extremely important when
designing an interactive system. It not only improves the
human computer interaction, it also makes the process
engaging which is required for such system.an usability
evaluation has been conducted on the YouTube website.
While some of the principle of the heuristic evaluation,
some of the principle has been violated as well which has
been discussed in details in this report. Additionally some
recommendations have been provided in this report for
improving some of the features which have not followed
the evaluation principles.
Author Keywords
Interface evaluation; think-aloud; usability evaluation;
further education;
ACM Classification Keywords
H.5.2. Information interfaces and presentation: User
Interfaces – Evaluation/methodology, Interaction styles,
Screen design, User-centered design;
1. INTRODUCTION
Right from its inception in the year 2006, YouTube has
remained the web success story. It is an interactive website
that allows to access videos uploaded by others and also
allows to upload videos as well. Basically it is an open
video sharing platform. The platform has wide range of
videos available including various genre such as tech,
music, movie, comedy and numerous other categories as
well. Along with that the service is free as well including
subscription to any favorite channel that is part of the
platform.
2. BACKGROUND
Before YouTube came into market, there were already
numerous application available in the market. However
they were either not so intuitive and feature packed, or
lacked clarity of application. This was well recognized and
a video platform was created to offer a simple,
comprehensive and feature packed video streaming service
for the internet users. Although YouTube over the years has
become immensely popular, it is not perfect either in terms
of usability and hence in this paper various issues related to
the usability has been explored to provide a comprehensive
review and recommendation for improving the usability
aspect of the YouTube website.
3. LITERATURE REVIEW
The definition of usability is not so easy to define as it
involves various important concepts that are related to each
other. Hence various aspect need to be taken while defining
usability. According to ISO 9421-11, the standard
definition of usability is as follows:
‘Usability is effectiveness, efficiency, and satisfaction with
which specified users achieve specified goals in particular
environments’. There are various contradictory views about
usability among the authors of various HCI literature
(Reijonen et al. 2015). According Bocken and Short (2016)
to usability is web context means ‘how well and how easily
a user, without formal training, can interact with an
information system of a website’.
While there might be various methods for website
evaluation, it is important to be specific while selecting the
methodology for evaluation and each have their own
benefits and drawbacks (Laukkanen 2015). Hence it is
important to analyze the context of evaluation while
selecting any methodology for the evaluation purpose
(Porterfield 2015).
No matter what methodology is chosen, user feedback is
equally important for each of the selected method (Raisch
2016). While methodology helps in executing the
evaluation process in an effective and organized way, if the
user feedback is not considered, it does not provide the
overview of the system from user point of view which is
important thing to consider to effectively execute the
evaluation of the usability of the interactive system (Warren
2017).
4. EVALUATION METHODOLOGY
4.1. Selection of usability evaluation method
The usability evaluation method (UEM) that has been
selected in this context is heuristic evaluation. The reason
behind selecting this evaluation methodology is that UEM
is very popular, common, simple yet an effective evaluation
method (Chan 2014). It allows experts to critically analyze
the user interface and verify the agreement with simple and
general heuristics or principles (Dan 2015). These
principles include features such as clarity, consistency or
fluidity of navigation. Apart from that it is also cost
effective and less complex which ensures in proper
evaluation of the usability of the YouTube website. Due to
these various benefits of the methods this evaluation
method has been selected.
4.2. Evaluation design
The design of the evaluation is based on the following
aspects:
 First the list of the ten heuristics as recommended
by Neilsen has been identified and listed for
evaluation.
 Then each of the principles have been compared
with regards to the features and characteristics for
initial investigation.

 Questionnaires have been designed and provided
to participants. 8 participants were invited from
computer and information background and they
were asked to provide to their response against
those questionnaires.
 The response of the participants is then compared
with the initial investigation.
5. EVALUATION RESULT
In this section the application and the result of the
evaluation methodology has been documented.
Principle 1: Visibility of System Status
When evaluated against this principle, YouTube performs
well as the visibility of the system is well designed. Users
are informed with the activities executed on the system.
This is evident as information is provided about loading and
duration of the video being watched. Hence users are well
aware about the system and information are clearly
communicated through visual descriptions which increase
the visibility of the system, thus complying with the
principle. Hence YouTube performs well as it is evaluated
against this feature.
Principle 2: Match between System and the Real World
This principle is not well followed. If we analyse the video
players which is well known to the users out there, it will be
clear that there are various difference in terms of features
and there are several additional features that are not part of
traditional video player and this often creates confusion
among users which are not very well versed with the
YouTube website. Hence this principle has been violated.
Principle 3: User Control and Freedom
This is principle has not been followed properly but also
been integrated appropriately. Here the conventional video
commands are supported through which the website allows
the users to take full control over the system. Users have the
freedom to in interact with the way they want to interact
with the system and even provides the privileges for
customizing it as well. Hence when evaluated against these
principle, YouTube performs well.
Principle 4: Consistency and Standards
When this principle is applied, it is seen that YouTube
performs significantly poor here. This is illustrated through
two examples:
 Navigation history is not retained when users logs
in to the system. This makes the interaction
inconsistent. For instance when logged into the
system, users are not able to access the videos,
quick lists that were accessed previously.
 Users are able to comment on videos, but these
comments are often chats between the users which
are not presented through linear and dated logic.
Hence it is not easy to understand the context.
These two example that are illustrated above shows that
YouTube does not perform well when it is evaluated
against this principle. Hence it clearly lacks consistency and
standards.
Principle 5: Error Prevention
When a video is uploaded, it is not shown what type of
errors might occur if proper procedure is not followed. The
error only shows if there is some mistake. Hence this
principle has been violated when reviewed against this
principle.
Principle 6: Recognition Rather Than Recall
When user need to upload video or create content or need to
comment on videos, users need to have account on the
platform which is by default a google account. When users
are looking to create an account, there should be option of
sign up, but there is only option sign in which might not be
recognized by many users at first instance. Hence this
principle has not been followed properly.
Principle 7: Flexibility and Efficiency of Use
This is where YouTube performs better. Sometime a user
might not want to view a complete video if it is long. Hence
users might want to save it, when they are not watching it.
YouTube provides “watch later” option which is convenient
from user point of view. Hence this principle has been
properly followed.
Principle 8: Aesthetic and Minimalist Design
This guideline has been followed as well. If the evaluation
was performed several years back this might not be the
result for sure. Things has changed a lot for YouTube,
especially in terms of design and aesthetics. YouTube now
has more minimalistic design and opted for material view
as well which has been liked a lot by the users. According
to majority of the YouTube viewers, the new design looks
simpler, yet visually appealing which makes the design
follow this principle of Aesthetic and Minimalist Design.
Principle 9: Help Users Recognize, Diagnose, and
Recover From Errors
When a video is uploaded on YouTube, it need to be
followed some standard guidelines as recommended by the
YouTube authority. If the title of the video that needs to be
uploaded has some special characteristics or has some
special words that are rejected on YouTube as per the
community guidelines, then it is rejected. However
YouTube also provides detailed guidelines and steps to
recognize as well as resolve the issues with step by step
guidelines. Hence this principle has been properly followed
as well.
Principle 10: Help and Documentation
YouTube has listed help section for providing some quick
and essential help guide. When the help section is clicked, it
first list some of the popular help that has been accessed by

users previously. Some of these guidelines are “Clear your
watch history, Contact the YouTube Creator Support team ,
Clear your search history , Monetization is disabled for my
channel , How to earn money from your videos”. Then it
provides a link “Browse All Articles” for exploring other
options as well. Then it also provides options such as “Need
more help?”, “Send feedback” for sending feedback to
assists in detailed trouble shooting.
Fig: new minimalistic design of YouTube

Fig: watch later option of YouTube
Fig: sign in option at the top corner of YouTube
RECOMMENDATION
In the evaluation it is seen that some of the principles have
been followed and properly executed, some improvement
are needed in some aspects. Although it is feature packed,
some of the features like featured videos which is not part

of the traditional video players might confuse new users.
Hence proper documentation is needed in this context.
Consistency and standard should also be improved through
allowing linear and dated logic for the comments provide.
Navigation history should also be retained when user sign
in to the network.
REFERENCES
Bocken, N.M.P. and Short, S.W., 2016. The theory of
heuristic evaluation: a comprehensive discussion. McGraw-
Hill, Inc.
Chan, C., 2014, January. The importance of proper
assessment tool for interactive system management.
Dan, A., the scope and status of heuristic evaluation as
evaluation and planning tool, 2015. Method and apparatus
for leading effective evaluation program.
Laukkanen, T., 2015. The definition and scope of heuristic
evaluation for interactive system. A modern theory of
project management, 42, pp.35-46.
Porterfield, T.E., 2015. Evaluation of interactive system: an
empirical investigation of scope and success. International
Journal of informtion security management, 40(6), pp.435-
455.
Raisch, W., 2016. Towards a sufficiency-driven interactive
system assessment: evaluation, 18, pp.41-61.
Reijonen, H., Hirvonen, S., Nagy, G., Laukkanen, T. and
Gabrielsson, M., 2015. The bias of effective evaluation
method in interactive system evaluation. A modern
approach, 51, pp.35-46.
Warren. N, 2017, January. The importance of evaluation
quality for successful review of interactive system and
implementation: an intuitive guide.
Appendix:
Risk assessment:

Domain Impact of risk
1. Random sequence generation
(selection bias) Low
2. Allocation concealment
(selection bias) High
3. Blinding of participants and personnel
(performance bias) Low
4. Blinding of outcome assessment
(detection bias) Not clear
5. Incomplete outcome data
(attrition bias) High
6. Selective outcome reporting?
(reporting bias)
Low
7. Other bias Low

Data collection form
Review title
Usability evaluation review of YouTube
Study ID
N23145
General Information
Date form completed 11/01/2019
Report title Heuristic evaluation of YouTube website
Instruction to the participants:
 Review each of the features with reference to 10 principles of heuristic evaluation
 Rating should be given after completing the review
 Whether to 1 or 5 stars it completely depends on the participants
 5 stars implies no improvement is needed as the principle of the evaluation has been followed properly. Any rating
less than 5 star means improvement is required to comply with the principle
principles evaluated Rating (1-5) Description
Visibility of system status

Match between system and the real world
User control and freedom
Consistency and standards
Error prevention
Recognition rather than recall
Flexibility and efficiency of use

Aesthetic and minimalist design
Help users recognize, diagnose, and recover
from errors
Help and documentation
Results
principles evaluated Rating (1-5) Description
Visibility of system status 5(4)
4(3)
3 (1)
4 people has rated 5 star as they think
principle has been followed and 4 and 3
star rating has been provided by 3 and 1
people respectively
Match between system and the real world
5(3)
4(4)
3 (1)
3 people has rated 5 star as they think
principle has been followed and 4 and 3
star rating has been provided by 4 and 3
people respectively

User control and freedom 5(3)
4(2)
3 (3)
3 people has rated 5 star as they think
principle has been followed and 4 and 3
star rating has been provided by 2 and 3
people respectively
Consistency and standards 5(4)
4(3)
3 (1)
4 people has rated 5 star as they think
principle has been followed and 4 and 3
star rating has been provided by 3 and 1
people respectively
Error prevention 5(4)
4(3)
3 (1)
4 people has rated 5 star as they think
principle has been followed and 4 and 3
star rating has been provided by 3 and 1
people respectively
Recognition rather than recall 5(4)
4(1)
3 (3)
4 people has rated 5 star as they think
principle has been followed and 4 and 3
star rating has been provided by 1 and 3
people respectively
Flexibility and efficiency of use 5(4)
4(3)
3 (1)
4 people has rated 5 star as they think
principle has been followed and 4 and 3
star rating has been provided by 3 and 1
people respectively
Aesthetic and minimalist design 5(4)
4(3)
3 (1)
4 people has rated 5 star as they think
principle has been followed and 4 and 3
star rating has been provided by 3 and 1
people respectively

Help users recognize, diagnose, and recover
from errors
5(4)
4(1)
3 (3)
4 people has rated 5 star as they think
principle has been followed and 4 and 3
star rating has been provided by 1 and 3
people respectively
Help and documentation 5(4)
4(3)
3 (1)
4 people has rated 5 star as they think
principle has been followed and 4 and 3
star rating has been provided by 3 and 1
people respectively