• by Mark Walsh  @markfwal, September 26, 2012

A new eye-tracking study suggests the leaderboard banner is the most likely to command users’ attention regardless of device.

The research by Tobii Technology in Sweden and Mediative in Canada found leaderboard ads on the iPad outperformed other units, with people fixated on them 44% longer than the next best ad type. The leaderboard also held users’ attention 22.5% longer on the iPad than on the PC, but the unit was viewed twice as fast on the PC as on the iPad.

For both devices, the leaderboard proved the most effective at grabbing people’s attention compared to other display formats such as skyscraper and big box ads.