6 Reasons Not To Use Flash On Your Website

UPDATE, I wrote a newer article detailing 5 reasons to use Flash
Although this may come off as a devil’s advocate article, there are reasons you shouldn’t use Adobe Flash on your website. Even though I do have a hat as a Flash Developer, there are things people should know. Here are the reasons I came up with, in no particular order.

Load Time

This always strikes a chord with web usability enthusiasts. The longer it takes for your site to load, the more likely your visitor is discouraged from revisiting your website.

Eats Up a User’s Time

Intricate animations or Flash intros (brrrawrr :/) eat up a user’s time. When users visit websites they usually have a goal: to find information. Having Adobe Flash animations that animate content, navigation, etc. is likely to bother the user who already has a goal in mind.

Time Comsuming to Develop

Flash pieces aren’t simple pictures that are cut and paste with animation filters being applied. It’s based on a timeline and is very time consuming. This places a restriction on organizations with limited budgets.

CPU Heavy

Although you may be running a computer made in the last 3 years, this isn’t the case for everyone. Flash can get CPU heavy and run like molasses on older computers. Again, this discourages users from digging deeper into your site and revisiting your website.

Frivolous

Flash is a very eccentric word, just saying it gets me excited. But having Flash for the sake of having Flash just isn’t a good idea. If what you’re looking for is Flash, you should be able to justify all the points mentioned in this article.

Different Usability

Replicating usability circumstances or interfaces in Flash is a pain. Buttons, scrollbars, textboxes can all look different and confuse users. This can overwhelm older or inexperienced users that aren’t used to “minesweeping” websites for surprise content.

That’s all for now, hope that helps.