» Changing the Color Of Your Visited Links

A client recently asked me…

I notice that on our website the colors change from blue to purple after clicked on. My question is When some one enters the site are all the category’s purple and then when clicked on they turn blue. However when some else enters the site are all the colors purple or are some blue some purple? 

I started to answer his question then thought it best to go beyond answering it and to also explain why.

Here is my response to the question…
When a user visits your site (industrypacking.com) the links are programmed to be blue. Once a user clicks to a page… all the links to that page will turn purple. The change in color signifies that the page has been visited and helps the user better navigate the website…

• By helping them get back to a page that has the information they found useful
• By helping them from visiting the same page twice if they’re still searching
• By helping them know which pages or content they have not viewed yet

Jacob Nielson Says…
http://www.useit.com/alertbox/20040503.html

People get lost and move in circles when websites use the same link color for visited and new destinations. To reduce navigational confusion, select different colors for the two types of links. 

So Why These Colors
Blue and purple for links and visited links are the default internet colors for starters. Since the dawn of the WWW links have always been blue and purple making it the most prime website usability function.

According to another Nielson article (Guidelines for Visualizing Links)…

• The color for unvisited links should be more vivid, bright, and saturated than the color for visited links.
• The two colors should be variants or shades of the same color, so that they’re clearly related.
• Shades of blue provide the strongest signal for links, but other colors work also.
• When using color to signal information, you should provide redundant cues for color-blind users.
• Never show text in your chosen link colors unless it’s a link.