But not all of these trends stay trendy. The trick to a good web design is not only understanding what works now, but what will work ten years into the future.
Take 2023, for instance. Throughout last year, numerous trends saw their five minutes of fame in the web design industry, but not everyone knew which the right tracks were to follow, and which were destined to lead to a dead-end.
So, what were the trends and why are they doomed to fail? We’ve listed a few of the most notable ones below.
Luxury Means Complexity
We don’t know how many times we have to say this: a complicated website is a bad website. Despite what we assumed was a universal sentiment, there were plenty of new websites in 2023 leaning towards complicated, intricate designs over simple and minimalistic – perhaps as a way to stand out from the crowd and generate new interest.
But with the attention span of the average internet user in mind, over-designed websites are always going to be a detriment to a business rather than a strength.
Flash Intros for the Win
Another popular movement last year was ‘flash intros’. These are supposed to be ‘exciting ways’ to introduce movement to a website, designed to enhance its impact and create a more compelling experience.
A flash screen can indeed be very effective, but only if it is optimised to load quickly and not slow down the website as a whole. Sadly, many of the flash intros integrated last year were not compatible with mobile devices, and therefore caused pages to load more slowly. That’s going to be a big no-no over the next few years when speed and convenience become even more key than they were before.
Content and More Content
One of the big myths of the SEO industry is that more content equals higher rankings. It’s true that regular content can be great for bumping your website up the Google rankings, but an oversaturation of content can actually have the opposite effect, leading to keyword cannibalization and unengaged readers.
Over the next few years, quality content is going to be far more important than quantity of content, so make sure yours remains informative, entertaining, and above all, good.
Brutalism is Best
We mentioned before that many businesses are attempting to stand out from the crowd with status-quo-defying, over-designed websites. While brutalism isn’t quite in the same boat, it is a trend that is likely to age poorly.
Introduced as a reaction to the standardisation of the internet, this movement works to engage the reader with stark, nonconformist and asymmetrical visuals. While it can still be kept minimal, brutalism can give the appearance of complexity, which can easily switch a reader off rather than draw them in.
Animation Excitation
Animations are great, we’ll be the first people to say it. But a concerning trend that we’ve noticed recently involves businesses integrating animations into their website without context, meaning, or accuracy. In this instance, it’s important to remember a basic business rule: don’t just follow the crowd because you think it’s the right thing to do.
There needs to be a reason for everything, whether that’s to improve the UI, help with navigation, or simply provide a better – but still relevant – aesthetic. You also need to pay for it! While it might sound obvious, plenty of businesses are instilling cheap, generic animations simply to keep up with this trend. But these animations are doomed to become meaningless and even more generic in the next few years.
Gamification Always, Everywhere
As an add-on to that last point, another trend that has been doing the rounds is ‘gamified web design’. This includes gamifying web content to be more interactive and immersive for the user. Game elements, in this case, include competitions, rewards, and leader boards.
While this can be a good way to immerse users, it cannot be done on a whim. If you’re angling toward a gamified website, that aesthetic must make sense in the context of your company, and cater toward your target audience. Remember, you want to engage, not to frustrate.
The Rule of Thumb
Lastly, we want to mention a big trend that has been growing in recent years, where businesses put a higher emphasis on the mobile phone format over the desktop format. More people than ever are More people than ever are interacting with websites on their phones, and it can be a good idea to design a site around mobile navigation – making certain toolbars and UX elements as accessible to the thumb as possible.
But this shouldn’t be at the expense of the desktop design. Nearly 65% of people still browse the internet predominantly on their desktop or laptop, and this is a huge portion of your audience who will interact — at least initially — with that format. To avoid owning a secular website that is fizzling out, you need to make sure to take every user into account and optimise your website for devices big and small.
