As we approach 2016, our team reflects on the newest trends that recently sparked in website design and analyzes which ones will continue to grow and become a trend to follow next year.

Today we have selected the 4 top web design trends.

=1= Less text, more images and more videos:

We all know that Internet users prefer to watch instead of read. YouTube is continuing to grow in popularity and remains strong as the #2 website in terms of traffic right after his sister company Google.

Text is becoming more succint on new websites especially on the homepage. That can create some challenges for organic SEO since content is the #1 factor for great ranking.  Long well developed content is best kept for sub pages not the homepage.

Using powerful and high resolution images is now possible since most users have high speed Internet access. There are also new code that helps download images and graphics quickly and modern browsers releasing new versions that also helps the fast display of high res image.

So again one of the trends that continues to evolve is Less Text – More Graphics.

=2= Dynamic story telling:

We discussed the topic of Dynamic Story Telling last week (see post >>). It combines movement/animation to tell the story of your company or highlight your products/services. It guides the visitors through a thought process from A to Z to convey a specific and clear message. This can be used to highlight the benefit of using your company, explain what your products are better than others, the story behind a non-profit organization, and so forth. There are endless ways to use dynamic story telling and, if done well, it can really boost your site’s popularity. We see this website trend going very strong into 2016.

=3= Flat design:

For many years, Internet users, site owners and designers have enjoyed drop shadows, embossing, gradients, and textures in designs. One of the fastest growing trends in 2016 is going to be to simplify the design back to the basics with more streamlined and sharp objects and web elements. This is called Flat Design by most while Google calls it Material Design (see post >>).

We also see more use of bright and solid colors without texture and block text sections outlined by thin borders while keeping the background color a pure white. It has been shown to be easier to read a page when using flat design since everything (text and visual) is streamlined to the basics.

=4= More customization of mobile device layout:

We have also discussed this subject before (see post >>). When mobile devices took over the consumer and business worlds, programmers got to work to create new coding techniques to enable layout modifications of web pages based on the device used by the web visitors. This is known as Responsive Design. Lately the concept has been taken to the next level but truly understanding what parts of each page needs to be seen on a mobile device.

Making it look good on mobile devices is not good enough anymore. The trend for 2016 is to eliminate, move, adjust and replace specific elements when someone uses a smartphone or tablet. It is still the same website but the code is detecting the device used and makes the changes automatically and accordingly. This applies to not just text, but also images, movement, forms and more.

This web design trends is going to be important in 2016 to set your site apart from the competition and truly give a better appeal to mobile device users.

Now we invite you to watch our 15 minute-video in which we review the top 4 website design trends for 2016. Click Play and enjoy!