When talking about web design trends, one thing that readily comes to mind is the suggestion that they are, by nature, temporary. It’s true that such trends come and go in the world of web design. A web design trend could make a big splash—like the hit counters button did—and be everywhere one day, then be consigned to the dustbin a short while later.
It’s hardly surprising that no one uses the hit counters button anymore. Not only has it proven to be ineffective at tracking the number of your visitors accurately, but it has also become a source of shame for websites when it shows a pathetic number of people visiting them.
Then again, while the hit counters button has long faded away, many web design trends are still in wide use today years after they have first made an impact. From the looks of things, these trends are going to last forever, and that any web designer worth his or her salt would do well to incorporate these timeless trends in their work.
More whitespace
Take a look at some of the more newly-designed websites now, and you will see that many of them use plenty of empty or white space.
A relatively recent web design trend, the use of more whitespace gives other elements of a website’s design more breathing room, and people seem to like it. After all, there is no need for them to see everything about the business crammed in one page. Plenty of whitespace should give them breathing room as well, as they would be more interested in exploring the website in the future than getting everything in one go.
Simplicity and intuitiveness
It is but normal for web designers to do their best to come up with elaborate and incredibly gorgeous work. Simplicity, however, will always win people over better. For one, a simple design typically makes a website easier to explore. For another, a website that carries a simple design looks better, since there would be fewer distracting design elements and business information.
Beautiful web design is good, but making site navigation better with simpler web design is more important. Getting people to spend some time on your site and eventually becoming leads, then conversions, is the primary goal after all.
You also need to keep in mind that the people who visit your site have varying skills and comfort levels when it comes to exploring it. If you put in bells and whistles in your design that only more Internet-savvy users will find easy to understand, you risk alienating visitors who have no idea what any of those fancy buttons and icons mean. You need to be more intuitive when it comes to designing your website so that everyone can use it comfortably. All important sections of the website must have clear labels, the processes should be more streamlined, and the interface should be well-organized.
Text that’s easy on the eyes
It’s understandable that web designers love to play with fonts, especially when a lot of new font designs are being churned out every year. Still, nothing should trump readability when it comes to font use. A web designer can use the coolest and trendiest fonts out there, and the page will look impressive, but what will impress people more is the idea that they can actually read with ease the written content on your page.
To ensure the legibility of your content, the fonts you use should be of a type and size that’s easy on the eyes. It’s also important that the font be readable on both desktop and mobile. You can also improve readability by employing bulleted or numbered lists to break up your content.
Incredible photography
Highly-readable text is good, but fantastic images—striking photographs to be specific—are even better when it comes to drawing the attention of visitors. As the cliché goes, a picture paints a thousand words, and people will be more likely to spend more time exploring the site and taking in the beautiful images. The pictures could be of the products and services offered by the website, and visitors will still appreciate them because of the exquisite photography. Web design trends come and go, but big, high-quality photographs are here to stay.
Responsiveness
Compared to the other trends mentioned above, responsive web design is practically a newborn baby. However, with the way things are going, responsiveness is the one web design trend that will last forever and beyond, or for as long as mobile devices exist. Smartphones and tablets, after all, aren’t likely to be going anywhere anytime soon.
There’s also the fact that there are now more mobile users than desktop users, and the gap just keeps on increasing with each passing day. With the number of mobile users growing by leaps and bounds, it’s safe to say that responsive design is only going to get bigger and more important in the foreseeable future.
That future already began with Google’s roll-out this year of the Mobile-First Index. With Google basing its rankings and search listings on the mobile versions of websites, responsive sites are now in a better position to get ranked better. Pretty soon, all webmasters will go for responsive web design, and it will be a web design trend that has the potential to be the longest-lasting of them all as long as Google keeps the Mobile-First Index in place.
Speed
Everyone loves a site that loads fast, especially your visitors. Your website loading speed affect the UX significantly. This is why you need to make sure that your site is literary on toes in terms of speed. Website speed is one of the major factors of ranking high in Google search results as Google prefers to show a fast loading website to their users. Thus, keep improving your website speed is not just a trend, it is a compulsory task all the time.
Conclusion
If you take a look at the history of web design, you will see that so many web design trends have already joined the hit counters button in oblivion. A number of the ones that have surfaced this year may also be gone by next year. The ones listed above, however, have the potential to be of use to generations of future web designers. These web design trends had worked well when they were first introduced and will continue to work well long after the people who started them are gone.
