The Eternal Spinner

Narrated

Your trip planner is looking real. Users can sign up, log in, upload photos, and everything is saved to a database. It looks professional. You’re proud of it.

Then someone clicks “Generate my trip.” A spinner appears. That spinner is supposed to disappear when the AI finishes building the itinerary. Simple, right?

Except it doesn’t disappear. Not for five seconds. Not for ten. Thirty seconds go by. The user stares at a spinning circle. They don’t know if it’s working or broken. They don’t know if it’s ten percent done or ninety percent done. They just see… spin. Spin. Spin.

So they do what every human being does when something feels frozen. They refresh the page. And the request starts over. Another thirty seconds. Another refresh. Eventually they close the tab. They don’t come back.

This is the eternal spinner. And it’s one of the most common reasons users abandon real applications.

Here’s the thing — the AI was actually working. It was building a beautiful 14-day itinerary, day by day, restaurant by restaurant. It just needed time. But your app was designed like a drive-through window. You place your order, and you sit there with the engine running until someone hands you a bag through the window. If the order takes too long, you drive away.

Real apps don’t work like drive-throughs. They work like restaurants. You place your order, you get a table number, you sit down, and someone brings your food when it’s ready. You can see the kitchen. You can check on your order. You’re never just staring at a wall.

That’s what this lesson is about. Stop making users wait in the dark. Give them a ticket, show them progress, and deliver the result when it’s done.