Choosing the right popup type is one of those small decisions that has a huge impact on your conversions. If you’ve ever felt unsure about which pop-up formats actually work — or worried you’ll annoy your visitors — you’re in the right place.
A lot of people assume all types of popups are intrusive by default. In my experience, that’s not true. The real issue is using the wrong format at the wrong moment. When the timing aligns with intent, a popup stops feeling like an interruption and starts feeling helpful.
In this guide, I’ll walk you through the five popup types that consistently perform well and show you how to choose the best popup type for your goal. By the time you’re done, you’ll know exactly how to use popups without tanking your UX or rankings.
Here’s what you can expect:
The 5 essential popup types every marketer should have in their toolkit
The best popup type for high attention vs. low intrusion
How to match each format to your campaign goal
What to avoid on mobile (so Google doesn’t side-eye your site)
Simple choices that instantly boost conversions
You’ll leave with a clear plan for using pop-up formats that feel natural, helpful, and aligned with how your visitors actually behave.
Here’s Why You Should Give Popups a Chance
A lot of business owners feel nervous about using popups — and honestly, I get it. If you’ve ever landed on a site and been smacked in the face with a giant box before you even read a single sentence, it’s easy to assume all types of popups work that way.
But popups aren’t the enemy. Bad timing is.
Wrong format is.
Cluttered design is.
A popup shown at the right moment, with the right message, can feel like help — not a disruption.
Used intentionally, popups can guide your visitor, highlight something valuable, save a disappearing cart, or capture a lead right when interest peaks. They can support your user experience instead of taking away from it.
When I create popups for my own campaigns, these are the non-negotiables I stick to:
Give people time to breathe. Let them read, scroll, or explore before you ask for anything.
Match the message to the moment. Your popup should feel connected to what they’re already doing on the page.
Make the exit obvious. No tiny, hidden “X.” Respect always leads to better engagement.
Design for mobile first. A popup that looks elegant on desktop but chaotic on a phone is a fast track to a bounce.
Use a clear, confident CTA. Tell people exactly what happens when they click.
Test everything. Timing, triggers, copy, design — small tweaks can unlock surprising wins.
When you approach popups with care instead of urgency, they stop feeling like interruptions and start acting like conversion engines — the kind that actually make your visitors feel supported, not pressured.
11 Types of Popups to Use On Your Site to Boost Your Conversion Rates
1. Lead Magnet Popups
If you’re trying to turn more website visitors into leads, you should consider adding a lead magnet popup to your top-performing posts or non-sales pages.
This is effective for lead-generation and your overall marketing strategy.
You can use a timed popup or set it to be triggered by an action (e.g. when a reader scrolls or lands on a particular section on a post).
Use this popup to offer an enticing, valuable offer – an ebook, worksheet, checklist, etc. – to encourage your visitors to opt in immediately.
2. Coupon Popups
Who doesn’t love saving a bit of cash?
Coupon popups are your go-to strategy to boost sales and hook your visitors simultaneously. This type of promotion popup work wonders on virtually any webpage.
The trick is to catch your visitors at just the right moment—like when they're about to leave your site or after they've spent a certain amount of time browsing a product page or sales page. This is where the magic of timing and action triggers comes into play.
3. Limited-Time Offer Popups
Limited-time offer popups help create a sense of urgency that can push undecided prospects into action.
Perfect for promotions, special sales, a giveaway, or the launch of a new product, these popups grab attention by highlighting the scarcity and time sensitivity of an offer – triggering a sense of FOMO (fear of missing out).
Deploy them when you sense a visitor is deeply engaged, perhaps after they've viewed several products or spent a meaningful amount of time on your site. The appearance of a countdown timer within the popup can amplify the urgency, reminding visitors that "now" is the best time to act.
4. Exit-Intent Popups (Exit Popups)
Think of exit-intent popups as your last line of defense to sway an indecisive prospect’s decision.
It's like gently tapping a customer on the shoulder as they're heading for the door, and offering them a reason to stay a bit longer. These popups are particularly effective because they catch users at a critical moment, right before they exit, offering them something compelling to reconsider their departure.
Exit-intent popups are designed to detect when a visitor is about to leave by tracking their cursor movements. This allows you to present a popup with a special offer, discount, or reminder at the perfect time.
5. Cart Abandonment Popups
Cart abandonment popups serve as a needful nudge for shoppers who are on the fence. When a visitor decides to leave your eCommerce site with items still in their cart, these popups spring into action, providing a compelling reason to complete the purchase.
Timing is everything with these popups. They're most effective when triggered by actions indicating the user is about to leave the checkout page or after a period of inactivity on the cart page.
To implement a cart abandonment popup effectively, your offer should be clear and appealing. It could be a discount code, a reminder of the limited stock for items in their cart, or even a message highlighting the benefits of the product they're interested in.
6. Feedback Popups
Feedback popups are useful for understanding your audience and refining your offerings based on direct user input.
The key to creating effective feedback popups is to ensure they don’t disrupt your website visitors’ scrolling experience. You can opt for a small slide-in popup or chatbox popup to encourage your audience to share their thoughts.
For WordPress websites, you’ll need a plugin to configure the right types of feedback popups. And our top recommendation is UserFeedback.
UserFeedback helps you collect feedback from your site visitors right from your website. It’s easy to install, allows you to ask unlimited questions, and has a growing library of pre-built question templates so you can ask your visitors the right questions.
So, with a survey popup, you can engage with your customers while they’re on your website and gather useful information in real time.
Plus, you can add various types of questions, including multiple-choice, rating, and open-ended questions. With these answers, you can make improvements to your website or amplify the parts that are working faster.
7. Slide-in Popups
Slide-In popups are a subtler alternative to traditional popups, emerging from the side or bottom of the screen to offer information or promotions without fully interrupting the user experience.
This less intrusive approach makes it easier to engage your audience without overwhelming them.
Example of a slide-in popup on the Drip website
These popups are most effective when they appear after a visitor has interacted with your content— e.g. scrolling down a page or spending a significant amount of time on a specific section.
The key is to make the popup feel like a natural extension of their browsing experience. With the right content and a smooth, unobtrusive entrance, slide-in popups can significantly enhance engagement and conversion rates without detracting from the overall user experience.
8. Subscription Popups
Subscription popups serve as an open invitation for visitors to receive email marketing campaigns — updates, news, discounts, and valuable insights — straight to their inbox.
Unlike lead magnet
popup examples, which offer a specific item of value (such as an ebook, webinar, or template) in exchange for contact details, subscription popups aim to enroll visitors in ongoing communication.
These popups are particularly effective on pages where users have shown genuine interest, such as after enjoying an article, exploring your products, or while they're actively engaging with your site.
9. Gamified Popups
Gamified popups bring an element of fun and interaction to the user experience on your site.
By incorporating game mechanics, like spinning a wheel to win a prize or completing a simple quiz for a discount or free offer, these popups transform a regular visit into an engaging and memorable moment.
Make sure the game is quick, easy to understand, and genuinely rewarding. The prize could range from a discount code to free shipping or a small gift with their purchase.
10. Notification Popups
Notification popups are timely alerts or reminders that appear to visitors during their browsing session. These popups can inform users about new blog posts, product launches, upcoming sales, or any important updates relevant to their interests.
The best time to deploy notification popups is when they can add immediate value to the visitor's experience. For example, alerting them to a flash sale while they're browsing related products, or announcing a new feature or content piece that aligns with their demonstrated interests.
Delivering these popups as push notifications is a great way to draw your visitors’ attention without disrupting their browsing experience.
You can use a push notification
plugin like PushEngage to create these types of popups.
This WordPress notification
plugin enables you to drive traffic to your website through web push notifications.
You can use these notifications to send targeted messages to your visitors, alerting them of special offers (e.g. a coupon) they should check out.
11. Click Popups
Click popups only appear when a visitor clicks on a specific link, button, or image on your site. This makes the popup relevant to what the visitor is interested in at that moment, creating a more meaningful interaction.
Configuring a click popup is straightforward. Connect them to something on your site that’s drawn a user’s attention, like a detailed guide, upsell offer, or discount code.
Next Steps: Design Your First Website Popup with Thrive Leads
Thrive Leads is the best WordPress popup builder you can use to generate sales or grow an engaged email list. This plugin has a super simple visual builder you can use to build and customize your opt-in forms.
To help you create stunning, eye-catching popups with ease, Thrive Leads provides a user-friendly visual editor and a library of 450+ attention-grabbing opt-form templates you can use to grab your audience’s attention and get them to convert.
You have a wide range of templates to create different types of popups, including:
- Lightbox popups
- Floating bar popups
- 2-Step Opt-In form
- Slide-in forms
- Opt-in widgets
- Scroll popups
- …and so much more
You’ve already seen a few of these templates in action, because most of the popup example images in this article were created in Thrive Leads!
Additionally, Thrive Leads offers advanced targeting options to help you show relevant, highly targeted offers to your visitors at the right time based on posts, categories, tags and more.
Show popups based on exit-intent, or different trigger options like scroll depth, interaction with specific elements, time on page, and many more.
This advanced targeting is proven to boost conversion rates, while ensuring you still offer a good user experience on your WordPress site.
When people do engage with your popups and contact forms, you'll be able to effortlessly sync the data with your email marketing service thanks to a host of integrations.
This allows you to effortlessly follow your email opt-ins up with high quality email marketing.
With your Thrive Leads subscription, you’ll be able to run A/B tests on your popups and forms, without needing to purchase another plugin. And, with advanced analytics, you'll be able to use the data to spot your best performing popups and se them across your site.
The best part about this plugin? You don’t need to know how to code. You can build high-converting popups in minutes and embed them on your WordPress website.
Types of Website Pop-ups: Start Generating More Conversions Today
And there you have it! This is all the info you need to start creating the right popups for your audience -- and goals.
Popups should play an assisting role in your marketing strategy -- not the main part. If you're struggling to generate your target conversions, you may need to revise your current funnels.
Here are four free tutorials to help you identify and roadblocks and optimize your marketing funnels:
- The 10 Biggest Conversion Killers (and How to Fix Them)
- How to Improve Your Opt-In Form Conversion Rates
- 21 Easy Hacks: How to Increase Conversion Rates
- How to Use Pop-Ups on Your WordPress Website (+ 8 Best Practices)
And if you need a popup plugin to add more oomph to your landing pages and turn more indecisive prospects into customers, Thrive Leads is definitely the way to go.
One more great thing about this tool? You can try Thrive Leads risk-free with a 30-day money-back-guarantee. Less risk, more value for you.
It's over to you now.
