# Rage clicks and dead clicks, explained

> Rage clicks and dead clicks signal that something on your site is broken or confusing. What they mean, why they happen and which to fix first.

Source: https://cuttl.io/blog/rage-clicks-and-dead-clicks/ · Last updated: 2026-10-15

Rage clicks and dead clicks signal that something on your site is broken or confusing. What they mean, why they happen and which to fix first.

## Two signs of a frustrated visitor

- A rage click is when someone clicks or taps the same spot several times in quick succession. It usually means they expected something to happen and it didn’t.
- A dead click is a click on something that does nothing at all, often an image, a heading or an icon that looks like it should be a link.

Neither shows up in ordinary analytics. Visitors rarely write in to complain. They just leave.

## Why they happen

- A button is broken, or only broken on certain browsers or phones.
- The page is slow to respond, so people click again.
- Something looks clickable but isn’t, like a product photo or a styled heading.
- An invisible layer, such as a cookie notice or a sticky footer, sits on top of the button.

Frustration and issues in Journey Insights. See how Cuttl handles rage and dead clicks.

## How to fix them

- Watch the moment it happens. A recording that opens right at the rage click usually shows the cause in seconds.
- Check who it affects. If it’s only on phones or one browser, you’ve found a bug, not a design question.
- Fix the most common ones first. Rank them by how many visitors hit them, not by how annoying they look.
- Confirm the fix worked. The rage clicks should stop once the problem is gone.

## Not every repeated click is a problem

Some repeated clicks are harmless: people double-click out of habit, flick through a photo carousel or select text. Look for patterns across many visitors on the same element before treating something as broken.

## Rage and dead clicks in Cuttl

Cuttl detects rage, dead and error clicks automatically, down to the element, and groups them into issues ranked by severity: how serious each problem is and how many sessions it affects. Each issue links to the recordings that show it. When the problem stops happening, Cuttl checks the clean sessions and marks the issue fixed, and reopens it if it ever comes back. The use cases page shows how this fits with other common problems, such as a main button people miss.

## Common questions

### How is a rage click detected?

By looking for several fast clicks in the same small area that get no response from the page. Fast clicks that do get one, like paging through a carousel or selecting a sentence, don’t count.

### Are dead clicks always bad?

Not always, but a dead click on the same element by many visitors usually means people expect it to do something. Making it a link, or making it look less clickable, often helps.

### What is an error click?

A click that is followed by a JavaScript error on the page. It often points to a bug that stops a button or form from working.

### What is a dead click? How to find and fix them

### What is form analytics? Find the field where visitors give up

### What is a holdout group, and why keep one after you ship a test?