Website Design – What Are the Current Trends?

There are a number of new trends in web design in 2016, some are design focused while others tend to be more functional.

Let’s take a quick look at those things both designers and clients will be discussing this year.

Flat Design

One of the key trends for 2016 will be the continuation of flat design.  What is flat design? The easiest way to explain it is to give an example:  You could have noticed that Google has recently rebranded its logo slightly.  The new Google branding is based completely around flat design.

Basically flat design is created a simple as possible, yet can still give the feeling of three dimensions using drop shadows, or different colours or gradients.

The major benefit of flat website design is because it is simple, it has smaller file sizes, so pages or websites built in flat design will load much faster.  And in the eyes of the major search engines, fast is good.  We will see a growing number for brands moving sites to flat design.

Responsive Design

While not confined to 2016, responsive web design will continue to play a huge factor this year. Having a responsive website (which Google says is advantageous in their eyes at least) will be one of the major things on most marketers lists this year, if they don't already have one.

In essence, a responsive design will automatically morph the look and feel and layout of a website dependent on the browser or device they are using to access the website. So a website could look much different on a mobile device than say a desktop computer, but will have relevant functionality and calls to action.

As visitors use various ways to access the Internet, companies will need to have their websites working much harder. This will accommodate the various ways people want to interact with businesses online.

The best way for that right now is using responsive design.

User Navigation

One thing that will still be looked at in 2016 and will be a hot topic is that of navigation.  UX - or the User experience - is one of the key factors designers look at to showcase a site that works. Having the right UX and navigation in place will work well.  That said, with responsive web design and different devices, designers will need to look at different navigation methods depending on the way users interact with the web.

There is a push to create simpler and better methods of navigation which can include voice activated navigation.

Summary

2016 will be the year that quicker, faster and flexible design will come into its own, and as the push to get things faster, easier and quicker to navigate, so web design and web designers have to find newer, clever ways to deliver.