Reactive Onboarding

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Reactive Onboarding

Reactive onboarding is a method of educating users about your product, by explaining what, and why something happened.

Featured in 8 UX Bites

Similar psychology:

Likely impacts:

Productivity & Efficiency

Attention & Interest

Complexity & Understanding

Last updated: 26/09/2026

How to utilise this in your designs

After a user deletes something, you could use reactive onboarding on their next visit to that screen, with a tooltip explaining how to get it back.

Revolut app UI shows two cards, an info icon, "All crypto" link, a tooltip "Reactivate your card - You can now reactivate a terminated card in-app," and a black "+ Add new" button.

Example from

Revolut

While walking users through a new feature interactively, you could add reactive onboarding that appears only when they make a mistake, explaining what went wrong.

UI shows a collage tutorial with penguin and blue swirl cutouts; arrows highlight instructions: "Learn how to change the order of cutouts," "Keep finger pressed, drag down," and "Your finger must be pressed the whole time." Buttons: Skip (grey) and Next (red).

Example from

When a request could be handled by a more specific tool, try showing a reactive prompt in context, explaining how the user could get a better result next time.

Chat UI with light grey and white speech bubbles on a gradient pink-yellow background, discussing broadcasting features including device or room-specific options like "Office."

Example from

Google

You could treat repeated negative prompts as a sign of struggle, and use them as a reactive onboarding trigger to introduce a planning feature.

Bottom-left dark UI panel with buttons: Add (+), Edit, Chat (highlighted), audio wave, and stop icons; tooltip says "Feeling stuck? Use chat mode to create a plan."

Example from

Lovable

When a user pastes a large block of content, you could react by asking if they'd like help splitting it up, teaching the feature at the moment it matters.

Example from

Gamma

Possible impacts

Reactive onboarding could increase feature usage by introducing tools only when a user's action shows they'd benefit, rather than front-loading every feature.

As seen in:

Revolut Revolut's progressive onboarding

Pinterest Reactive (and interactive) onboarding

By explaining what just happened and how to act differently next time, reactive onboarding might help users become more productive and efficient over time.

As seen in:

Fantastical Stripping out times

Lego Keeping track of your totals

Reactive onboarding could capture more user attention than upfront tours, because it's tied to something that just happened and feels directly relevant.

As seen in:

Gojek How much luggage can you bring?

Pinterest Pinterest's drag and hold menu

Explaining why something happened and what the consequences are may reduce perceived complexity, helping users understand features at the moment they need them.

As seen in:

Pinterest Reactive (and interactive) onboarding

Google Google's reactive onboarding

Written by Peter Ramsey

Consultant to 100+ companies

Published: 06/09/2023

How to utilise this in your designs

After a user deletes something, you could use reactive onboarding on their next visit to that screen, with a tooltip explaining how to get it back.

Example from

Revolut

While walking users through a new feature interactively, you could add reactive onboarding that appears only when they make a mistake, explaining what went wrong.

Example from

When a request could be handled by a more specific tool, try showing a reactive prompt in context, explaining how the user could get a better result next time.

Example from

Google

You could treat repeated negative prompts as a sign of struggle, and use them as a reactive onboarding trigger to introduce a planning feature.

Example from

Lovable

When a user pastes a large block of content, you could react by asking if they'd like help splitting it up, teaching the feature at the moment it matters.

Example from

Gamma

Possible impacts

Reactive onboarding could increase feature usage by introducing tools only when a user's action shows they'd benefit, rather than front-loading every feature.

As seen in:

Revolut Revolut's progressive onboarding

Pinterest Reactive (and interactive) onboarding

By explaining what just happened and how to act differently next time, reactive onboarding might help users become more productive and efficient over time.

As seen in:

Fantastical Stripping out times

Lego Keeping track of your totals

Reactive onboarding could capture more user attention than upfront tours, because it's tied to something that just happened and feels directly relevant.

As seen in:

Gojek How much luggage can you bring?

Pinterest Pinterest's drag and hold menu

Explaining why something happened and what the consequences are may reduce perceived complexity, helping users understand features at the moment they need them.

As seen in:

Pinterest Reactive (and interactive) onboarding

Google Google's reactive onboarding