This article was published 11 years ago, therefore the contents of this post may be out of date.

So far the year 2012 has brought upon some amazing changes in web design. Web development has become a much smoother subject to jump into learning, not to mention the countless open source libraries useful in streamlining the process. And yet it’s seems that the  global development and design community is far from throwing in the towel.

Today’s I want to introduce 10 Web Design Trends to Look Forward to in 2013  and these trends encompass web and graphics design techniques which will likely play a big role moving into 2013. You have probably seen a few of these represented throughout many of your own or favourite websites already.

1. Responsive Layouts

responsive-web-design

With the population of mobile devices users skyrocketed. Users are now fond to visit their favourite sites through their mobile.

On the other hand, varying screen sizes of these devices, gave the web designers gave a hard time in designing websites, so a solution came out. Thanks to the help of CSS Frameworks, such as Twitter Bootstrap, 1140 Grid System and other grids came to the rescue. Websites can now adapt to different devices, whether it on desktop, tablet, or a smartphone. This is now will be part of standards in be followed in web designing.

2. Retina Optimised Websites

retina-js-images

Along with responsive support for website layouts we’ve seen a dramatic rise in people building websites for retina devices.
Apple first engineered this idea when developing the iPhone 4 and has since then been applied this type of screen display onto their other devices, including the iPad and some of the newest MacBook Pros.

As this will means the pixel-perfect web designers that want to support retina devices will need to create two sets of images.
First image you will need to sample your image at double the resolution, then save a “standard” version at half the size then the larger image will be scaled down to the standard resolution and will look very crisp on retina screens.

3. Infinite Scrolling

pinterest

Infinite scroll loading has been around for a few years but this technique hadn’t really hit mainstream until the surge of Pinterest and I’m sure it will continue into 2013 as many well known website has adopt this technique.

But however this technique won’t work on every layout, but for the right websites this can look and behave phenomenally.

4. Mobile Navigation Toggle

treehouse-blog

When speaking of responsive design one of the most difficult questions is how to build a solid navigation. You want to give your readers direct access to all your important links, without flooding the page making it unreadable. It is also a good idea to keep your responsive navigation hidden away until it’s needed.

One prime example of the design trend of mobile navigation toggle menu is the Treehouse Blog

5. Large Background Photos

large-background-photo

Photographers or fans of photography will definitely enjoy this design trend. As photography in the background is an excellent way to capture your visitor’s attention and it can look great when done properly.

When you blend this trend into your layout, the design technique can give your website a major edge in marketing. At the end of last year, many web designers predicted that HTML5 and CSS3 would be widely adopted in 2012.

6. Sliding Web Page Panels

alder-cass-sliding-web-page-panel

Dynamic websites used to be very popular when Flash and ActionScript were all the rage. Now, dynamic effects have moved into the realm of JavaScript/jQuery and even CSS3. This has in turn affected the way designers build websites. Sliding panels is just one technique that been around for a while but you love to see more and more in 2013.

7. Single-Page Web Design

hum-creative-co-one-page

Single page design is a big topic and covered under many different categories. And obviously there have been single-page websites since the creation of the Internet. But over the recent years we have seen this trend evolve to sport a more natural user experience and it’s a easier way to keep your website updated.

8. Minimalist Landing Pages

landing-page-gif

For anybody who has spent some time researching markets will understand that selling on the Internet is just plain smart.   You have access to a large consumer base from anywhere in the world. Additionally you can sell products that are not even physical, such as videos or creative resources.

Creating a landing page online is all about capturing new leads for your product or service. New trends are following the idea of minimalism: keep everything simple and focus on your core product.

9. Usage of APIs and Open Source

github-api-open-source

Open source software has been around for decades and has been changing the web since its inception. But over the course the last year (2012) many of us have noticed more open source software pertaining to webpage widgets, layouts, and dynamic effects.

Open APIs and resources like Github allow designers to not only prototype layouts, but also animations and effects on the page. How ever I’m not expecting the amount of open source projects to slow down anytime soon.

10. Creative Typography

typo-dress-responsively

We are no longer limited to use Arial, Georgia, Verdana, and other standard typefaces. As there is a great deal of fonts to choose from due to widely available typography variations. And designers tend to prefer stylish typography designs to nice images instead of the text when optimizing the look and feel of the websites.

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10 Web Design Trends to Look Forward to in 2013

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