True or False? People Click “Read More” Links

Imagine you’re creating a design that lists articles and their descriptions on a website—maybe it’s news on a homepage or a list of blog posts. Each listing has an image for the article, the article’s title, a short description, and a “Read More” link. You recall hearing that generic links like “Read More” can be annoying for screen readers if implemented poorly. Since you’re planning to link the headline and the image anyway, can’t you just skip adding a “Read More” link to the design?

Now imagine you’re at a design review meeting and one of your coworkers suggests adding “Read More” links so people know where to click. They share their rationale: “Some people don’t realize they can click on images or headlines.” Another coworker says the whole image, headline, and blurb lockup should be a single link with a hover state indicator, so it doesn’t matter. What should you do?

If you’re overthinking “Read More” links, we’re here to help. We asked 74 participants to pick an article to read from a list and tracked where they clicked to put this debate to rest.