# Breadcrumbs or Back
> Breadcrumbs show where you are. Back shows where you were. Deep hierarchies need both.

## Situation

Do people jump up levels, or just retrace their steps?

## Decision

### Use Breadcrumbs when

Content lives in a hierarchy three or more levels deep, and people jump up more than one level at a time.

- Three or more levels of nesting
- People arrive mid-hierarchy from search or links
- Jumping up two levels at once
- Folders, categories, docs

### Use Back when

A shallow, linear path where the previous screen is almost always where people want to go.

- One or two levels deep
- Mobile drill-down
- Linear flows, list to detail
- The previous screen’s title makes a useful label

**The numbers:** Two levels deep: a back button is enough. Three or more, or people arrive mid-hierarchy from search or links: add breadcrumbs. Label back with the destination’s name, not just ‘Back’.

## Why

Half our traffic lands on a document from search, so they’ve never seen the folder above it. The breadcrumb tells them where they are and gets them up in one click.

## Edge cases

On mobile, a full breadcrumb trail truncates badly. Show only the parent (‘‹ Projects’) and keep the full path one tap away in the header.

Source: https://productfordesigners.com/cards/breadcrumbs-back
Author: Alex Dovhyi