UX Movement – Why Your Form Buttons Should Never Say Submit

When you see a Sub­mit but­ton on a form, what comes to your mind? One could eas­ily rea­son that click­ing the but­ton sub­mits the user’s infor­ma­tion into the sys­tem for pro­cess­ing. A Sub­mit but­ton describes what the sys­tem does well, but it doesn’t describe what the user does at all.

When users fill out a form, they are engag­ing in a task. The action but­ton should affirm what that task is, so that users know exactly what hap­pens when they click that but­ton. A but­ton that describes the user’s task tells users that the form focuses on car­ry­ing out that spe­cific task. The more focused your form is, the more likely you’ll get users to com­plete your form.

via UX Movement – Why Your Form Buttons Should Never Say Submit. While submit describes a generic case of what the user is doing (ie. submitting a form) it doesn’t really help the user know what the button is for.