UI Design
Carousel
A carousel is a row of items that scrolls horizontally, showing a few at a time while the rest sit off-screen.
Why it matters
Carousels let you fit many items into a small space, but they hide most of that content, so people often miss what is past the first item. Knowing their limits helps you decide when they are worth the trade-off.
In depth
The first item in a carousel gets most of the attention; anything beyond it is easy to overlook. On touch screens, side-scrolling feels natural, but on desktop a carousel is often a sign the layout has not been fully solved, since a grid would show more at once. Reach for a carousel when content is genuinely browsable and secondary, not when it holds something important people must see.
Real-world example
A streaming service's home screen uses carousels of movie posters, each labeled by genre, that you swipe through sideways.
The first item draws the most attention.
Related terms