The University of Toledo

Basic Criteria for Evaluation Web Information

 The following are factors that you may want to take into account when evaluating a website.  Please see our "Finding Internet web sites" page for more evaluation criteria.

AUTHORITY

• Who's responsible for content?
• Reputation of author/group?
• Author/group affiliation apparent?
• Email link to author/group?
• Information verifiable?
• What have reviews said?

AUDIENCE

• Purpose made clear immediately?
• Audience identified immediately?
• Content appropriate?
• Reading level appropriate?
• Graphics appropriate
• Organization appropriate?
• Meets needs of intended audience?

SCOPE

• Detailed or Overview?
• Links to other sites?
• Contains original Content?
• Abstracted or full-text?
• Time periods covered?
• Subjects covered
• Scope stated or only implied?

ACCURACY

• Balanced or biased?
• Sources cited?
• Verifiable?
• Done comparison testing?

CURRENCY

• Updated how often?
• Pages dated?
• Source of the information?
• Static or dynamic content?
• Links/pages updated often?
• Lots of "dead links"?
• Is there a copyright date?

FORMAT/APPEARANCE

• Designed well?
• Organization easy to deduce?
• Information where you expect to find it?
• Navigation buttons lead where they should?
• Graphics load quickly?
• Text well written, not wordy?
• Graphics add to site not detract?

FUNCTIONALITY

• Available when you need it?
• Server response time?
• Page load limit?
• Low-bandwidth version available?
• Need extra software/plug-ins?
• Work with graphic and non-graphic browsers?

SEARCHABILITY

• Intuitive search engine?
• Adequate search help, samples?
• What percentage is searchable?
• How long do searches take?

UNIQUENESS

• Commonly available in other formats?
• Difficult to locate?
• Unique to the Net?
• Compliment to other materials?

HELP FOR VISITORS

• Help files available in a consistent place?
• In-context help?
• Written for target audience?
• Use of "techie talk" kept to a minimum?
• Different help files for different visitors?

Adapted from an OHIONET workshop by Gail Junion-Metz of Information Age Consultants, Columbus, Ohio, December 3, 1997.