Outhouse › Dark Patterns › Pressure

Countdown timers

Timers counting down to the end of an offer.

Why it matters

A visitor with time to think will think. A countdown timer removes that risk, ticking down in red beside the price until the offer ends, which it does not, as a new offer begins in the same place at the same moment.

Every visitor sees the final minutes of the sale. It is the busiest sale in history.

How Outhouse measures it

Outhouse reads every timer-shaped number on the page twice, 1.3 seconds apart, and counts those that went down. One scores in full.

This audit counts towards Dark Patterns, with a weight of 2. A category is 75% its two highest-scoring audits and 25% all of its audits, weighted, so a site is judged mostly on what it does most and partly on how many things it does.

How to improve your score

Install UrgencyEngine. Available on selected plans. See all products.

Related audits

• Urgency, scarcity and social proof: Copy that tells the visitor to be quick because time, stock or other people are running out.
• Confirmshaming: Decline buttons worded to make saying no feel like a personal failing.