Our users pause before clicking "delete" for 11 seconds on average.

We measured cursor dwell time on destructive action buttons across 220,000 sessions.

Median hover time before clicking delete: 11.2 seconds
Median hover time before clicking save: 0.8 seconds
Users who hovered then navigated away from delete: 19%
Users who hovered delete, clicked, and then undid: 14%

Users were not deleting carelessly. They were agonizing. Eleven seconds of hovering was a decision, not a reflex. And

33% of them either backed out or immediately reversed it. Our confirmation dialog was appearing after the click, which meant we were confirming a decision that had already been made and doubted.

We moved the safety to before the click: a hover tooltip showing what would be deleted and what would be affected, plus a 5-second undo window after. Total deletions dropped 12%, and undo usage dropped 44% because people stopped making the mistake in the first place.

What destructive action are your users agonizing over, and are you helping them before or after the click?