2020 was not an easy year. Between gallons of hand sanitizer being distributed every day, to awkward Zoom meetings and days spent in sweatpants, we’re all feeling a bit overwhelmed by the start of another year. As we all try to move forward past all the crazy that came with 2020, it’s time to put some of your design skills to use! As many people started spending more and more time at home and online, it’s completely changed our digital world forever! From virtual fashion shows in VR to create virtual experiences for the end-user, a lot will change in the coming year. To make sure you don’t fall behind this year, I have put together some of the best trends that you won’t want to miss in 2021 for web design. Use these trends to ensure your website make an even bigger impact!
Smart Video
Videos have become such an engaging must-have for websites. Plus, it can be used as a fantastic online marketing tool. A smart video is about having purpose and meaning behind the video. This means that you need to have a high-quality video that is eye-catching and an excellent visual representation of what you do or the service you’re providing. It’s no longer enough to have a video on your website, but it needs to have a clear purpose.
Immersive Digital Experiences
With the sudden change of life with COVID-19, many things have been moved online that previously used to be in person. This means that more of our experiences will be over a screen. Immersive digital experiences will not only set your website apart from the rest but provide your audience with a valuable resource. Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality are the future of our digital world, and it’s important to start making those shifts in 2021 with your web design where possible. While you don’t necessarily need to have 3D VR walkthroughs for your business, having immersive elements on your website is a must!
Multimedia Experiences
Most of the world has fast internet speeds and web experiences from their phone to their laptops. This means that providing your customer with multimedia experiences is a must to enrich the user experience. Bringing together visuals, text, audio, and video to make a unique user experience will help with successful design in 2021. Using different media formats in a thoughtful way that can maximize the accessibility of the content but not overwhelm people is key. An example of this would be by providing closed captioning or transcripts for any pre-recorded media.
Designs Based on Preference
Web design has made even further progress toward more personalized experiences for the end-user. This can be anything from having a light or dark mode option to choose from changing the site’s navigation and custom-tailored options to fit a user’s desires best. New designs that focus on user-centered design and preference is what the future of web design will hold.
Mobile-Friendly Designs
While there are still a fair number of people who consume part or all of their content from a computer, most people are now consuming the majority of their content online from a tablet or phone. These people are frequently on the go and not always sitting in front of a computer when they’re ready to consume content. This means that your designs need to be adapted and blend seamlessly with mobile-friendly devices. While it’s still important that your website looks great on desktop devices, it’s even more important that it looks good on mobile.
White Space
Colorless design or white space can make for a clean layout and make any elements on the page with color pop. The sleek yet straightforward white backgrounds ensure that the elements with color get more attention than usual. You can even play around with color by using a hover effect that transforms black and white imagery into color.
Full Height Homepage Hero
With this trend, you want to make sure that your homepage hero section is full-height to focus your users’ attention and help deliver messages in a distraction-free way. This is an opportunity for storytelling on your website and keeping things simple. Remember to choose an image that will work well, whether it’s viewed on a computer or mobile.
Web design has changed a lot in even just the past year. Trying to figure out what trends to keep up with and work toward each year can be a bit overwhelming. Having these design trends at the forefront of your design projects will ensure that your pages emerge into the web’s future proudly! While these do not cover everything about web design in 2021, these are the highlights that you want to pay attention to in the coming year.
