How Character Stickers in Articles Affect Time on Page and Readability
- What Role Do Small Characters Play in Written Content?
- Catching the Eye Isn’t the Same as Keeping Readers Reading
- Readability Improves Not Because of Characters, but Because Meaning Aligns
- Is Time Spent Really a Good Signal?
- Use Them Differently Depending on the Purpose of the Article
- Using DecoBlocks to Manage Characters and Article Structure Together
- Frequently Asked Questions
- Related WordPress Plugins
Minji was reading a long article when a small character at the end of a sentence made her pause. It was only a smiling face, but it prompted her to read the explanation that followed.
So, if you add character stickers or emojis to a WordPress post, will readers stay longer—and will they find the article easier to read?
What Role Do Small Characters Play in Written Content?
Character stickers and emojis in WordPress content convey emotion and tone. Sometimes they act as signals saying, “Pay attention here” or “This is something you may relate to.”
But words and characters are not read in the same way. Readers build meaning by following the words of a sentence, while a character presents a scene or emotion first.
A 2021 eye-tracking study found that emojis placed at the end of a sentence played a role in how readers understood its meaning. Emojis that fit the context were also less likely to be viewed again than emojis that did not fit.
A 2020 study of messaging-app users also found a distinction between emojis and stickers. Emojis were used mainly to modify the emotion and tone of written messages, while stickers tended to function as self-contained messages.
That makes a sticker less like a comma in a sentence and more like a brief scene.
A scene cannot replace meaning.
Catching the Eye Isn’t the Same as Keeping Readers Reading
Blog owners often add characters when a long article starts to feel dry. The expectation is that a cute expression appearing midway through will make readers feel less bored and less likely to close the page.
But pausing to look at something once is not the same as continuing to read the entire article. A character may attract attention, but if the next sentence is difficult or the image is ambiguous, readers may stop rather than continue.
Attention is only the beginning.
A 2025 eye-tracking study compared sentences containing emojis with sentences containing dashes. Several reading-time measures were longer for sentences with emojis.
That result alone does not show that emojis increase time on page. The study measured the process of reading an individual sentence, not the amount of time people spent on a webpage.
There are at least two possible reasons readers looked longer:
- They understood the sentence more fully.
- They needed more time to interpret the image.
A 2018 study on sticker misunderstandings points to a similar issue. It found that the complexity of a sticker’s appearance and its position within a message could lead different people to interpret it differently.
In other words, the fact that a character captures the eye does not prove that it has improved the article.
Looking longer does not necessarily mean reading better.
Readability Improves Not Because of Characters, but Because Meaning Aligns
Characters help reading when the image and the sentence convey the same meaning. For example, placing a worried expression after an instruction that is easy to get wrong can quickly signal that the reader needs to take care.
By contrast, if a character laughing loudly suddenly appears after a calm explanation, readers must decide whether it is decoration, a joke, or an important signal. At that point, the character becomes an extra task rather than a helpful cue.
When the meaning is out of sync, decoration becomes an obstacle.
In the 2021 study, emojis that fit the context were viewed for less time and were less likely to be viewed again than emojis that did not fit. When the meaning aligns, readers have less trouble figuring it out.
Placement matters, too. One study found that emojis at the end of a sentence were viewed longer than emojis at the beginning, and that total sentence-reading time was also longer.
That does not mean you should always place an emoji at the end of a sentence. An image at the end can make readers reconsider or summarize what came before, so depending on the context, it may either support reading or slow it down.
Emojis and stickers also work best in different places.
- Emojis: signals that convey emotion, emphasis, or a softer tone
- Stickers: signals that mark the beginning or end of a conversation, express personality or laughter, or depict a particular scene
In informational writing, use characters only when a small visual cue is genuinely needed. If a character replaces the core explanation, the meaning may disappear along with the image.
The words must remain to the end.
Is Time Spent Really a Good Signal?
The most dangerous misconception is treating time spent looking as evidence of interest. If readers reread a passage because they could not understand the character’s meaning, time on page may rise while readability gets worse.
The 2025 study likewise found that emojis made reading times longer than dashes. But it did not distinguish between extra time caused by better understanding and extra time caused by additional processing demands.
Emojis that did not fit the context made the problem worse. They produced greater processing demands, reflected in longer total reading times, a higher likelihood of rereading, and more time spent looking at the item.
It is also risky to assume that a character can stand in for the writing. If you replace an explanation titled “Installation instructions” with a single character pointing a finger, readers will not know what to do or in what order.
It is equally unsafe to assume that everyone will interpret a character in the same way. The 2018 study explained that people can interpret a sticker’s scene and emotion differently, creating misunderstandings.
Accessibility also matters. Web accessibility guidance notes that an emoji’s default name may not match the author’s intent, and recommends providing a written alternative when the meaning is important.
There are clear pain points in the editing process, too. Writers often check only whether an image looks good in the body of the article, overlooking whether it covers text on a phone screen or how a screen reader will announce it.
And unless you compare versions of a sentence with and without the character side by side, it is difficult to tell whether readers understood the text better or simply spent more time on it. Manually adjusting an image’s size and position also becomes tedious as the number of articles grows.
To reduce the burden of adjusting character size and placement by hand in every article, it helps to establish a consistent workflow for decoration within the editor. DecoBlocks lets you add effects such as speech bubbles, boxes, highlights, and separators without writing CSS directly. Characters from an installed sticker pack can be inserted with the Insert Sticker block or a shortcode in the Classic Editor.
Even so, you still need to check whether the character covers the content on mobile and whether the key message remains clear without the image. Decoration should not replace the meaning of the article; it should be treated as a way to separate and emphasize sentences that are already doing the explanatory work.
A polished layout is not enough.
Use Them Differently Depending on the Purpose of the Article
Informational and personal writing do not need to follow the same design rules. Start with what the reader came to do.
- Informational articles and tutorials: Use characters sparingly, mainly to flag a point of caution or mark a shift in emotion.
- Search-driven articles: Use them as small cues that support the explanation, not as decoration between every subheading.
- Relatable and review-style articles: Add warmth with one or two characters that match the mood.
- Action instructions: Make sure the steps and method remain clear from the words alone, even without the character.
Before inserting a character, check three things: whether the image conveys the same meaning as the surrounding sentences, whether it covers any content on a mobile screen, and whether the key information remains clear without it.
If a character could be interpreted in several ways, it is safer to include an explanatory sentence. If the character is meant to signal “caution,” spell out what the reader should be cautious about next to it.
Ultimately, characters are less like bait designed to hold readers and more like road signs that show them where to go.
They are not an automatic way to increase time on page in a WordPress post. When they fit the context and do not interrupt the reading flow, they can help readers understand emotion and structure at a glance.
So if your goal is to convey information, write the sentences first. Then remove the characters one by one and check that the meaning still holds. The safest approach is to keep them only where they are truly needed.
Build the sentences first.
Using DecoBlocks to Manage Characters and Article Structure Together
To add characters without letting them replace the explanation, you need an editing workflow that keeps the body text and decoration distinct while managing them together. DecoBlocks lets you insert characters from an installed sticker pack with the Insert Sticker block or a Classic Editor shortcode. You can also use Section Box (Solid) or Highlight (Yellow) to distinguish important information and parts of a sentence. Speech bubbles, custom icon lists, and separators can likewise be used to fit the context of the article.
For long articles, you can create an Auto Table of Contents based on H2 and H3 headings, and choose heading levels and font sizes for each text block. If the text inside a decoration is difficult to see because of the site background or theme colors, you can change the default color options shown in the editor through Color Palette. However, no decoration can determine a character’s meaning automatically, so you still need to check that each placement matches the sentence and its meaning.
Frequently Asked Questions
Q. Will adding lots of character stickers to a WordPress post increase time on page?
A. Not automatically. You need to distinguish between time spent because readers understood the content and time spent interpreting the image. If the character does not fit the context, it may increase the burden of reading instead.
Q. Where should I place characters in my article?
A. Good locations include points of caution, paragraphs that need an emotional connection, and transitions where the tone changes—anywhere a brief visual cue can help. However, the instructions and core meaning must still be clear from the words alone.
Q. Can a tool solve this problem easily? Which tool should I use?
A. Editing tools and accessibility-checking tools can help you review an image’s alternative description, screen size, and placement. Tools can help identify problems, but you must read the article and decide for yourself whether the image and sentence convey the same meaning.
Q. How can I style characters and important sentences together in a WordPress post?
A. DecoBlocks lets you insert characters from an installed sticker pack with the Insert Sticker block or a Classic Editor shortcode.
You can also use Section Box (Solid) and Highlight (Yellow) to distinguish related content or parts of a sentence. For long articles, you can create an Auto Table of Contents based on H2 and H3 headings, but you still need to check that the core meaning remains clear without the characters.
