What is an example of the peak end rule?

The painful procedure: Kahneman found patients rated a longer exam as better when its final minutes were less painful — the end rewrote the memory.

Where do you see the peak end rule in everyday life?

The painful procedure; A theme-park day; The bad meeting; Hotel checkout; A vacation's last day.

End things on a high note — meetings, courses, visits, customer experiences — the finish weighs far more than the middle.

Curated by Paulo de Vries · reviewed 2026-06-01

We don't remember experiences as a whole — we remember the most intense moment and how it ended. Design the peak and the finish, not the average.

The painful procedure
Kahneman found patients rated a longer exam as better when its final minutes were less painful — the end rewrote the memory.
A theme-park day
Hours of queuing fade; the one thrilling ride and a warm goodbye are what the kids talk about for years.
The bad meeting
Sixty tense minutes are forgiven if the last two end on a clear, hopeful note.
Hotel checkout
A smooth, friendly checkout can flip a mediocre stay into a 'we'd come back' memory.
A vacation's last day
End on a high — a great final dinner — and the whole trip is remembered more fondly than it actually was.

End things on a high note — meetings, courses, visits, customer experiences — the finish weighs far more than the middle.
Judging your own past, separate 'how it ended' from 'what it actually was' — a bad ending edits the whole memory unfairly.
Designing anything people experience? Engineer one strong peak and a strong ending rather than a uniformly 'fine' average.

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