Empty state
What a screen shows when there's nothing in it yet, ideally a friendly nudge toward the first action.
What it is
An empty state is the screen people see before any data exists: no projects, no messages, no results. Left unhandled, it's a blank page that looks broken.
A good empty state explains what will appear here and offers one clear action to get started: "No invoices yet. Create your first invoice." An icon or small illustration helps.
There are a few kinds: first-use (nothing created yet), no results (a search or filter matched nothing), and cleared (inbox zero). Each deserves its own message.
How to ask for it
“New users see a blank page with nothing on it. Make it better.”
“Add an empty state to the Projects page for users with no projects: an icon, "No projects yet", one sentence explaining what projects are for, and a "Create project" button. Use a separate empty state for searches with no results.”
"Make it better" doesn't say what to show; "empty state" names the pattern and the prompt specifies its message, action, and the no-results variant.
You've seen this in
- TTrello's new empty board
- GGmail's inbox-zero message
- NNotion's blank page with templates