In addition, the color of title keywords has a moderating effect on the influence of visual complexity of interface design on cognitive load of elderly users. For older users, font color emphasis can significantly reduce cognitive load in interface search tasks. While this study provides valuable insights into how visual complexity and keyword color in mobile news interfaces affect elderly users’ cognitive load, several limitations should be acknowledged to guide future research. First, the sample was limited to 24 urban elderly participants in China with basic app familiarity, potentially restricting generalizability to rural or less tech-savvy seniors; future studies could employ larger, stratified samples across demographics to enhance representativeness. Second, the focus on visual complexity (e.g., layout and item count) and a single moderator (keyword color: red vs. [...] Furthermore, while this study effectively utilized global eye-tracking metrics such as pupil diameter, fixation count, and blink frequency to assess cognitive load, it did not incorporate detailed analyses of scanpaths or saccadic movement patterns. This focus on overall physiological and attentional measures limits the interpretation of spatiotemporal aspects of visual navigation during search tasks. Future research should integrate scanpath-based analyses to more comprehensively examine the temporal dynamics of visual search strategies in elderly users, potentially revealing nuanced differences in how older adults process complex interfaces. Additionally, while ethical approval was obtained, cultural variations in color perception (e.g., red’s significance in China) warrant cross-cultural comparisons. Future directions include comparing elderly with younger groups to delineate age-specific effects, testing additional moderators like blue fonts (as suggested in prior readability research), and developing adaptive interfaces using AI to dynamically adjust complexity based on user cognitive profiles, ultimately informing inclusive design for aging populations.