A Foresight Into the Web Designs and Development Trends of 2013
Posted By Andrew Jhonson on February 6, 2013
The future lies in the hands of the present. Predictions are tough to make, but the competitive nature of the Web that lures in users to ask for more, leads to more developments. These advancements are fast-paced and lead to improvements and expansions. What lies ahead can’t be stated, but can be foresighted.
There’s a lot going-on in the world of web design and development. New trends are being incorporated in the older ones, a niche gets created and thus forms an innovation, which is used for the betterment.
2013 is predicted as a year of design shifts, evolution of device usage and adjustments in the consumption pattern of the Web. The year has a lot in store for designers and developers combined, but the year can also have the potential to be an exciting one. The RWD finds its footholds, a standard evolution introduces more scope for the layout and type, and tools distort themselves free of print.
A lot’s happening and stated below is an insight into the must know trends that must be kept in mind for 2013.
The Next Big Thing- Responsive Web Design
Responsive Web design, though majorily implemented in 2012, is going to bombard the Web in 2013. Iain Lobb, Flash games developer, is of the opinion that RWD will go mainstream in 2013. He continues to add, “If you’re designing a website and not thinking about the user experience on mobile and tablets, you’re going to disappoint a lot of users.” Tom Muller, a designer, is of the apprehension that big brands that are joining the race will lead on to big agencies “increasingly using responsive design as a major selling point, persuading clients to future-proof digital marketing communications.” There won’t be any retrofitting of RWD into existing products and, “Instead, RWD will be a key element for a company’s mobile strategy, baked in from the start.”
Design Compatible on Multi-device
Laura Kalbag, a designer, is of the assumption that 2013 will witness “the abandoning of device-specific web design”. She goes on to say that with the introduction of new devices with varied functional view-ports, “pixel precision and Apple-specific breakpoints will die out, the idea of control will be relinquished, and web design will be more about system design than static mock-ups.”
Flash Shifts Gears
Muller admits that he had gone to the extent of stating last year that Flash was here to stay, especially in the entertainment sector for creating good quality online content. But, the exponential rise in the number of tablets and the changing standards has pushed Flash to the side, favoring the faster loading HTML- only sites. Lobb, on the other hand contradicts the notion and says that the days for Flash are still not over. He includes that, “It still has strongholds: specialist video players, banner-ads, Facebook modules, and games. In web games, some predict HTML5 will take over, but on the desktop I see little evidence for that. Until Internet Explorer adds WebGL support, Flash will remain the go-to technology for web 3D.”
Bent-on Modular Design
The year 2013 will witness more people taking advantage of the design process building blocks. Muller, is of the opinion that with the help of responsive Web design, grid-based modular GUI design is far more stronger than ever and more structured page layouts are in the pipeline. Paul Mist, a designer/developer foresights that such changes will speed up the workflow and will boost the web designing aspect, but all this will be achieved at the cost of the people losing touch with core technologies.
A Better Page Layout
Technology has seen an outburst in the recent years, but the focus will shift towards design. Meyer, puts his money on CSS and points that it will be “finally getting strong layout mechanisms” with the help of Flexible Box Layout and Grid Layout. Lake, further takes the trend to a new level saying that there can be an inception of ‘nano design’.
The above stated web design and development trends can be expected to take a surge in 2013 and rule the Web. To cater to a varied audience, responsive design is in and will topple all other previous notions.
One Response
You laid out the trends quite nicely in this article. We’re definitely seeing the needs for responsive, modular, and multi-platform sites. We’ll see where 2013 web dev takes us! Cheers.