Are breadcrumbs still a viable way to navigate web sites and web apps?

Question

I'm currently working on the following types of web sites and apps:

1. ecommerce like Amazon
2. Reservation system (think of a hotel receptionist checking rooms availability)
3. Invoice management like Freshbook

On Amazon, I didn't notice any breadcrumbs, just facets from the left panel. However, newegg is using both breadcrumbs and facets.

In a management system like hotel reservations or invoice management, you usually have unique reservation or customer number that you search through your system. Each reservation can then expand to more sections, for instance:

Reservations
    > Reservation #123456
        > Guests
        > Room
        > Airport pickup
        > Payment

In each unique reservation page, I'm using breadcrumbs to show the location of the current page relative to the site. Is that a good method to present that kind of information? Should I use tabs or other techniques?

Answer 1

I find breadcrumbs a very useful feature. I particularly like it on ecommerce sites where I might be in and out of a lot of different category products. Its a wonderful tool that should be used more often and doesn't require a lot of screen real estate to implement.

Answer 2

Breadcrumbs are used in Windows 7 Explorer, in a highly effective manner.

I actually think breadcrumbs are underused in web sites. It's an extremely effective technique for moving around in the website tree, especially if the website is large and complex.