Satisfying websites

Satisfying websites do one thing well: they give your hands or eyes something to do, and they give back an immediate, pleasant response. No score, no level, no pressure. Just sand falling, fluid swirling, or a picture slowly coming into focus.

The list is full of toys where cause and effect are perfectly matched. Sandboxels is a sandbox of hundreds of elements that react to each other. WebGL Fluid Simulation lets you drag glowing smoke around the screen. Silk turns a cursor into mirrored ribbons of light. This is Sand pours colored grains into layers. Zoomquilt never stops falling, and Koalas to the Max splits colored circles apart until a photograph of koalas emerges.

There are smaller pleasures too: Bouncing DVD Logo is a screensaver whose only drama is whether it hits the corner, and Cat Bounce is about as simple as bounce physics gets.

If sound is your preference, Rainy Mood and A Soft Murmur sit in this list too. Use "Surprise me from this list" for a random pick.

All links are checked daily, and the badges on each card tell you whether a site works on mobile and how long it will hold you. Heads up: Patatap carries a flashing-images warning.