What are dark patterns? The types of deceptive design

In short

In a dark pattern the interface works for the company that built it and against the user. The user wants to do one thing; the screen pulls them another way. Often they don't notice, or only when it's too late.

Bad design and a dark pattern aren't the same. Bad design makes things hard for the user by accident. A dark pattern is built to push the user towards a particular decision, and that decision is usually to their disadvantage.

• The two types I see most often are pre-ticked boxes and fees that appear in the last step.
• In the EU, the Digital Services Act prohibits online platforms from designing interfaces that deceive or manipulate users.
• In the short term it brings revenue. Later it comes back as lost trust and complaints.

Where the term comes from

Harry Brignull started a website called darkpatterns.org in 2010. In the site's own words, the aim was to expose manipulative designs and inform the public.

Today the site lives at deceptive.design. The name changed too: instead of “dark patterns” it now says “deceptive patterns”. According to the site, the team at the World Wide Web Foundation's Tech Policy Design Lab suggested the change.

The reason the site gives is that the word “dark” carries negative associations and can feed harmful stereotypes. On this page I use both names. In teams I work with, I still hear “dark pattern” most often.

The definition on the home page is short: deceptive patterns trick people into doing things they didn't mean to do. The site also notes that its analyses are not legal advice.

Types of dark patterns

deceptive.design lists 18 types today. Below are the 12 I come across most often in audits, with the site's names.

Sneaking

Important information is hidden or pushed to the end, and the user thinks they are agreeing to something else.

Forced action

To get what you want, you have to accept something you don't want.

Hard to cancel

Signing up or subscribing is easy; cancelling is very hard.

Preselection

An option is picked for you in advance, and the decision is nudged in that direction.

Obstruction

An obstacle is deliberately put in the way of a task or a piece of information.

Hidden subscription

The user is signed up for recurring payments without it being stated clearly or their agreement being asked for.

Hidden costs

It starts with a low price. Once the user has put in effort, unexpected fees appear at the payment step.

Trick wording

A confusing sentence gets the user to do something they don't want. I see it most often in checkboxes with a double negative.

Visual interference

The user expects information to be clear and predictable. Instead it is hidden or disguised as something else.

Fake social proof

Made-up reviews, testimonials or activity messages make a product look more popular or trustworthy than it is.

Fake urgency

A made-up deadline pushes the user to finish an action right away.

Confirmshaming

The user is emotionally manipulated into doing something they otherwise wouldn't. I see it most often as decline text that makes the user feel guilty.

Six types aren't in the list: fake scarcity, disguised ads, nagging, comparison prevention, addictive design and virtual currency confusion. The full list is in the sources.

Why they are so common

Dark patterns often don't come from a designer's bad intent. Most teams measure a screen by a single number, and the trap lifts that number in the short term. A pre-ticked box looks good in the first week's add-on sales report.

The problem: the cost shows up on a different dashboard. Returns land in support's report, people who can't cancel write on a complaints site. Sales sees the gain; another team carries the loss.

Then there's the copying effect. The team sees a trap on another site and takes it for an “industry standard”. But a trap being common doesn't make it right.

The line between persuading and deceiving

Not every nudge is a dark pattern. Highlighting the recommended plan or making something easier that the user wants anyway is legitimate design work. I draw the line with the questions below and look at the answers together.

• Does the user see all the information before the moment of decision?
• Is the other option as easy to find and choose as the highlighted one?
• Would the user, remembering the screen a week later, think they were deceived?

If you can answer “yes” to the first two and “no” to the last, you are very likely persuading. Otherwise, look at the screen again.

What the rules say: EU and US

European Union. The Digital Services Act, Regulation (EU) 2022/2065 of October 19, 2022, has an article on interface design. Article 25 says providers of online platforms shall not design, organise or operate their interfaces in a way that deceives or manipulates users, or that otherwise materially distorts or impairs their ability to make free and informed decisions.

The article doesn't apply to practices already covered by the Unfair Commercial Practices Directive (2005/29/EC) or the GDPR. It also says the Commission may issue guidelines on specific practices, including giving more prominence to certain choices, repeatedly asking for a choice that has already been made, and making it harder to end a service than to sign up.

United States. When the FTC presented its report on dark patterns in September 2022, it named tactics such as disguising ads as independent content, making it difficult to cancel subscriptions, burying key terms or junk fees, and tricking consumers into sharing their data.

What this means for design: a cancellation path hidden behind a login, three retention offers and a phone call isn't just bad UX. Regulators on both sides of the Atlantic describe exactly this pattern.

Note: This section is not legal advice. Which rules apply to your product depends on where and to whom you sell; confirm it with a lawyer, using the text of the law.

Were you fooled? A game with five screens

Describing a dark pattern is easy; spotting one on screen is harder. Look at the five made-up excerpts below and make your choice for each. As soon as you choose, the answer and explanation open.

Were you fooled?

Look at each screen and decide: does it deceive the user, or is it clean?

1. Screen 1 of 5 · Payment step

   Order summary

   Wireless headphones$34.90

   Shipping$0

   Ticked box: Add shipping protection (+$2.99)

   Total$37.89

   Continue to payment

   Answer: dark pattern, preselection. The box for the paid protection was ticked for you. Whoever doesn’t notice pays $2.99 they didn’t want.

2. Screen 2 of 5 · Subscription settings

   Cancel Premium

   Your subscription renews on December 14. If you cancel, you keep using it until then and won’t be charged again.

   Cancel nowKeep subscription

   Answer: clean. What happens is stated clearly, both options have the same weight, and cancelling takes one step.

3. Screen 3 of 5 · Ticket purchase

   Step 1 of 4 · Choose tickets

   Concert ticket, general admission$45

   Step 4 of 4 · Payment

   Ticket$45

   Service fee$8.50

   Processing fee$2.50

   Total$56

   Answer: dark pattern, hidden costs. In step one the ticket costs $45; the two fees only appear in the last step. Because the user has put in effort by then, it’s hard to turn back.

4. Screen 4 of 5 · Sign-up

   Create account

   Your email address

   Empty box: Send me offers by email. You can turn this off at any time in settings.

   Create account

   Answer: clean. The consent box is empty; the user ticks it if they want. The text also says how to withdraw consent later.

5. Screen 5 of 5 · Pop-up

   10% off your first order

   Sign up for the newsletter and we’ll email you your code.

   Your email address

   Send my code

   No thanks, I like paying full price

   Answer: dark pattern, confirmshaming. The option to decline was turned into a sentence that puts the user down. A plain “No thanks” would have been enough.

The screens are made up and show no real product. The type names come from the list on deceptive.design. You can change your answer; the counter updates with each choice.

The trap in the fifth screen is the easiest to see, because it gives itself away in one sentence. The one in the first is sneakier. The box is ticked and the total rises by only $2.99; that difference is easy to miss.

If you took one of the clean screens for a dark pattern, that's a good sign too. Your eye is used to looking for traps. Still, look at what the two clean screens have in common: the information comes first, and the choice stays with the user.

In real products traps don't stand alone like this. On a payment page, a pre-ticked box and a fake countdown can sit side by side. In the audit I write each as its own finding, because each fix lands with a different team.

How to spot them in your own product

Seeing the trap in your own product is harder than in others'. Because you see the screen every day, your eye gets used to it. I recommend this short round to teams.

1. Create a new account and try to pick the cheapest path, not the most expensive plan. How many steps did it take, and how often did “Are you sure?” appear?
2. Add a product to the cart and note the first price you see. Compare it with the total at the payment step.
3. For every ticked box on sign-up and payment screens, write down what it commits you to.
4. Try to cancel the subscription. Does it work on the device you signed up on, in the same amount of time?
5. Read every “No” and “Decline” text out loud. Would you say it to a customer's face?

Have someone on the team who has never used the product do this round. Note the results along the flow, and you'll see right away which steps the traps cluster in.

How to fix them

The core of every fix is one question: would a user describing this screen to a friend say they were deceived? If so, change the screen. Below are the fixes I use for the most common types.

Remove preselection

Every box that costs something or asks for consent is empty. If the add-on is really useful, describe it clearly and let the user choose it. How to label checkboxes is on the form design page.

Show the total price on the first screen

If there's a mandatory fee, it sits next to the first price. From what I see in audits, users mind the surprise more than the fee. A fee that appears in the last step destroys, in one go, the trust built up until then.

Make the way out as easy as the way in

If a subscription opens in two steps, cancelling ends in two steps too. Write on the cancellation screen what happens: how long access lasts, whether there'll be another charge. You can make an offer to stay, but once and skippable.

Give options equal weight

“Accept” and “Decline” are the same size and have the same contrast. If one is a filled button and the other a faint link, the user is pushed in one direction. Remember that faint text also hurts accessibility. You can measure it easily with the contrast checker.

Write the decline text neutrally

“No thanks” or “Not now” is enough. Every sentence that blames the user also dirties the brand's voice.

Keep numbers honest

If it says “Only 2 left”, there really have to be 2 in stock. If a countdown starts over when the page reloads, it's a lie.

Give the team the rule in writing

Fixing one screen isn't enough, because the next campaign brings the same trap back. I recommend teams keep a short “What we don't do” list next to their design principles. If there is a design system, the list lives in its documentation, right by the checkbox and button components.

The list is short and concrete. For example: paid boxes are empty, the total price is on the first screen, cancelling takes as many steps as signing up, the decline text is neutral. The list is read once at every design review.

It helps if product and marketing sign the list together. If someone suggests a pre-ticked box in a meeting, the discussion leaves personal opinion and goes back to a decision the team already made.

Track the right metric

After a fix, don't look only at the conversion rate. Returns, cancellation rate, support requests and repeat purchases belong on the same dashboard.

When you remove a dark pattern, the first sale may drop a little. But if the other numbers improve, what you lost wasn't going to last anyway. I recommend tracking this comparison for at least one billing period, because with subscriptions the effect only shows on renewal day.

The way to make these checks one by one in a flow is heuristic evaluation. In that round I rely most on Jakob Nielsen's heuristic “User control and freedom”. It asks for a clearly marked “emergency exit” to leave an unwanted action without a long process.

My note

In audits, nobody usually built the dark pattern on purpose. A marketing goal meets the sentence “The competition does it too”. What comes out is a trap that belongs to no one.

I always tell teams the same thing: if you measure conversion, measure cancellation and return rates too. A pre-ticked box seems to lift revenue. If returns and support requests rise in the same month, what you book as a gain is really a debt.

The person who speaks for the user in the meeting is often the designer. Saying “no” to a dark pattern is sometimes the hardest sentence in that meeting. A legal text such as Article 25 of the Digital Services Act is something concrete you can point to.

If you want these traps looked for in your product, the UX Audit covers them too. I describe how an audit runs in the UX audit guide.