One thing will be certain in five years. Websites can look, sound, and function differently, and keeping up with the ever-changing online environment can be difficult, even for the most talented of web designers. From tiny visual patterns and responsiveness of templates to a thorough overhaul of how we use websites in general. From introducing virtual reality and AI to Augmented Reality that can be seen on cell phones. All is likely to shift and develop in ways that are different from how it is now and how it was years ago.
Because of the potential user interface and the use of emerging technologies such as VR and AR, designers will need to take the time to invest in new technology to develop their skills as a web designer in order to satisfy the needs of both the user and the customer who wants a new site.
Citizens, take a peek at our guide on the upcoming evolution of website design and get ready! The future appears to be promising as we discuss future of web design.
An Overview of Future Web Design Trends
People thought that stuff was smart back in the early 1990s, when the internet was still in its infancy. However, as we look back, those early website designs were unavoidably crude. This was caused not only by a lack of tools available to web designers at the time, but also by extremely poor internet access, poorer quality technology, and computers that simply do not meet today’s expectations.
Over the last five years, the market has been flooded with faster network speeds, feature-rich pages, and resources that combine both form and functionality without compromising technology, and technological advances seem to be coming quickly these days. The introduction of smart phones has recently pushed mobile-first architecture to the forefront of the agenda. This is merely a continuation of the industry’s continued evolution through the years.
Now that you know where web design came from and where it is now, consider where it is going. What will the future of web design look like as emerging technology enter the fray, and how will the course of web creation change for the future of web design?
Chatbot and Artificial Intelligence Technology
The theory of artificial intelligence is widely debated (AI). The question is not only whether we can program a machine that can think for itself, but whether we should.
Aside from Terminator-style issues, AI will determine not just the future of web design; early examples of self-driving online platforms are already in operation. One of the most visible examples is chatbots, which are now used to engage web users through thousands of company websites.
Chatbots can answer basic questions, handle complaints, and free up time for customer service. Since they are modular, they can be used by both small businesses and large organizations. Chatbots are taking over the network, from supermarkets to restaurants and hotel chains, and will soon become the norm in the real world, thanks to the creation of robotic assistants for industries ranging from hospitality to healthcare.
According to a Grand View Research report, the chatbot market would be worth $1.23 billion (£881 million) per year by 2025. Meanwhile, according to an Oracle-commissioned survey, 80 percent of people have used or intend to use an online chatbot by the end of the decade.
Chatbots that use existing instant messaging platforms, such as Facebook Messenger and WhatsApp, are also becoming popular. This is part of a wider trend of combining services provided by various third-party applications on a website, further blurring the lines between platforms and devices.
AI will spread its tentacles into all aspects of web design by 2023. Machine learning algorithms ensure that chatbots become smarter and more efficient with each question they answer. This is particularly critical when it comes to voice search.
A slew of other web design future enhancements that sound like science fiction right now but could easily become reality by 2023 are easy to envision.
If AI and chatbots become sophisticated enough in the next five years, it is entirely reasonable to expect individuals to be able to use autonomous personal shoppers while visiting e-commerce sites.
Furthermore, high-end fashion websites invest in dedicated shopping assistant services run by real people. This is linked to the influencer marketing ecosystem, which has only become viable due to new technologies and online platforms. Even if AI and automation become the standard, people-powered services should still have a place in the new online world.
Technology for Voice Interaction
Individuals are becoming more accustomed to vocalizing requests and getting a spoken response from their smartphones thanks to voice interface services such as Siri and Google Assistant. Amazon’s Alexa and the Echo series of speakers have taken this a step further, fully bypassing websites and firing off answers without the need for the information to be shown on a screen.
Voice interfaces are expected to gain popularity over the next five years as users accept a more practical, conversational approach to engaging with websites. This means the voice must be considered both during the design process and when creating material. Unfortunately, the concepts of voice interfaces are completely unique, which poses a significant challenge to developers.
AI and automation will come to the rescue, and they are already being used to improve the way voice assistants answer questions. The short, focused, keyword-driven strategies of the SEO era will give way to a time when long-tail search terms will be much more successful. To reflect this, content strategies will change, with FAQs attracting visitors more effectively than keyword-heavy posts in the past.
Despite the barriers to adoption, the voice could liberate sites and make them less reliant on organized, rigidly formatted material. Voice is also seen as a threat to traditional search engines like Google, whose company is based on this arms race. Understandably, perfecting and implementing this will take some time, but by 2023, voice should be reshaping the network in the same way that smartphones have over the last ten years.
Improved Website Design
Adaptability is critical now that smartphones are more widely used for web browsing than laptops or desktop PCs. Web design will have progressed far further down this path by 2023, with smarter sites that avoid ‘standard’ templates and tired formats.
Responsive Design is just one branch of this tree. Other trends, such as voice-optimized interfaces, chatbots, and context-specific page adaptations, are expected to grow in popularity.
Sites may already be modified based on variables such as the visitor’s position, the type of device they are using, and the other services they are logging into. As they get smarter and more autonomous, they can become even more flexible. When a customer enters a physical store, for example, a push notification sent to their phone will provide them with an exclusive offer or a link to the company’s website. It blends online marketing with physical storefronts.
Personalization is crucial for millions of consumers, so the one-size-fits-all strategy of the past must be abandoned. Developers would be able to create custom experiences thanks to new technologies, while cookie cutters and inflexible interfaces would be consigned to the dustbin of history. Start-ups like LiftIgniter create apps that automatically adjust to pages, ensuring that no two users have the same experience. This would boost everything from the interface to the material itself, demonstrating the depth of what experts in this area are attempting.
Web Design for Augmented Reality
This is where things start to get interesting. Virtual reality (VR) has become a mainstream concept as a result of devices such as the Oculus Rift and HTC Vive. However, when it comes to the future of web design trends, Virtual Reality is likely to make the most significant changes.
AR has been passed down to consumers in recent years through a number of products, most notably through smartphone apps such as Pokemon GO, also known as ‘mixed reality’ by Microsoft and many other businesses. The future of web design will be reframed in light of the rise of augmented reality (AR), with analysts predicting that this sector will be worth around £116 billion by 2020.
Most of this revenue will come from hardware sales, but users will need software experience to go along with the headsets they buy and the AR-ready smartphones they buy. Wearable technology will allow designers to place interactive, location-based elements above the visitor’s real-world view. When combined with object recognition and facial scanning, the possibilities are limitless.
Users may use AR to walk down a typical high street, look at a store, and receive instant offers from their website. They could walk by a restaurant to see what’s on the menu using the data pulled from the internet by their wearable tracker.
This will force sites to become more flexible and minimalist, or at the very least adaptable enough to show tourists around the world without being obtrusive. This isn’t a new balancing act in and of itself; it’s just that the mechanisms involved have changed. However, in the future of web design, designers and developers will need to get a handle on this technology in preparation for when larger tech-focused sites begin pushing it into their own websites, applications, and platforms – it will be a design element that everyone will require and is definitely on the list of predictions for the future of web design.
What You Won’t See From Web Designers In The Future
Change entails not only introducing new elements into the design mix, but also removing stale components from the existing design. This is especially true in the world of web design, where patterns can emerge quickly and fade just as quickly. In the future of web design, by the time the trends are adopted, what patterns that are currently prevalent would have been pushed to the sidelines?
First and foremost, it is time to say goodbye to parallax scrolling, an impact that has become so ubiquitous that it has ironically faded into the background and no longer engages tourists as it once did. The biggest sin of parallax scrolling is not its superiority, but the fact that it slows down page load times. As mobile phone surfing becomes more popular, sites may want to trim the fat from their templates and make their brands and websites as streamlined as possible. In the future of web design, the end of this pattern cannot come soon enough.
Following that is complicated typography, which has become an industry scourge in recent years. Ramming in as many fonts as possible is a bad idea today, and it will still be a bad idea in 2023 if you want to get a response from visitors. On a mobile device, it causes pages to appear jumbled, inconsistent, and difficult to use. To deviate from this pattern, keep things easy, clean, and uncluttered.
Finally, the demise of needlessly cluttered web design interfaces is unavoidable in the next five years. The impact of voice search will be just as important in stimulating this transition as the success of mobile devices. The easiest way to reduce bounce rates is to provide users with the information they need in the shortest amount of time. Meanwhile, the dodo will join the ranks of sites that cling to excessively complicated formats and pages that are overflowing with content.
Mike O’Raw, KIJO’s Lead Web Designer, has some ideas about the life and death of web design trends.
In the history of architecture, there is a consistent theme. When a trend becomes successful for a long enough period of time, a movement that is diametrically opposed to the former emerges. This can be seen in Dada and Constructivism. In five years, I believe designers will abandon the asymmetrical, minimalist look that we see now and return to more deliberate and ordered layouts.
How Will Web Design Change In The Future – The Future of Web Design
The introduction of the aforementioned emerging technologies would necessitate a radical rethinking of how we approach website design and development. The key point is that a new army of various website interaction tactics is on the march, and the future will be much more complicated than we can imagine. Web design strategies would need to evolve to reflect evolving technical features such as AI and speech, as well as VR and AR.
Unfortunately, those who are unable to compete at the highest levels of web design may be replaced by AI itself as new intelligent methods of automated web design arise. If better-quality automated web design facilities are made available to website designers than are made available to the general public, site designers may feel compelled to pay for access to those in order to remain ahead of the competition. For developers who use WordPress for site design, there are already future-thinking plugins available.
Most importantly, these future-focused frameworks, plugins, applications, and technology will most likely supplement, rather than replace, the conventional interfaces that we currently use; this will cause less havoc, but it is critical that you remain ahead of the curve to avoid falling behind. Sign up for our newsletter to receive the most recent updates on the ever-changing world of web design, or visit our other blogs for more ideas, detail, and inspiration.
