Back behavior

If your application uses the drill-down approach to navigation, the content is structured in a hierarchy and users need a way to move back easily through the hierarchy.

When users move back in a BlackBerry application, the movement is hierarchical. This means that moving back takes users to the previous level in the application hierarchy. It does not necessarily take them back through each screen that they viewed previously in an application.

A Back button appears in the far left position in an action bar. The Back button only appears on the second or subsequent levels in an application hierarchy.

The Back button can contain an icon and the title of the screen or tab that users would navigate back to. If the context is clear, you can use the title "Back" instead.

Users can move back in three ways: Tap the Back button Swipe their finger to the right on the content area Touch the Back button and drag their finger to the right to peek at the previous level. If they drag their finger past a threshold, the previous screen in the hierarchy appears.

Best practices

• Do not put a Back button on the first screen in an application. Users can leave an application by swiping up from the bottom of the screen.
• If you combined the tab and drill-down approaches to navigation, make sure that back navigates within one tab only.
• In most cases, use an implicit saving model when users move back to the previous screen. For more information, see Saving.