9 basic principles of responsive web design

12
9 basic principles of responsive web design Designing in pixels for Desktop and Mobile is a thing of past. No fixed page size, no millimetres or inches, no physical constraints to fight against. Let's clarify some basic principles of responsive web design here to embrace the fluid web, instead of fighting it. Responsive websites respond to their environment “Day by day, the number of devices, platforms, and browsers that need to work with your site grows. Responsive web design represents a fundamental shift in how we’ll build websites for the decade to come.” - Jeffrey Veen

Transcript of 9 basic principles of responsive web design

Page 1: 9 basic principles of responsive web design

9 basic principles of responsive web design

Designing in pixels for Desktop and Mobile is a thing of past. No fixed page size, no millimetres or inches, no physical constraints to fight against. Let's clarify some basic principles of responsive web design here to embrace the fluid web, instead of fighting it.

Responsive websites respond to their environment

“Day by day, the number of devices, platforms, and browsers that need to work with your site grows. Responsive web design represents a fundamental shift in how we’ll build websites for the decade to come.”

- Jeffrey Veen

Page 2: 9 basic principles of responsive web design

Responsive web design is a great solution

for devices of various screen size

Page 3: 9 basic principles of responsive web design

Responsive vs. Adaptive web design

It might seem the same but it isn't. Both approaches complement each other

Page 4: 9 basic principles of responsive web design

The Flow

As screen sizes become smaller, content starts to take up more vertical space and anything below will be pushed down, it's called the flow

Page 5: 9 basic principles of responsive web design

Relative units

The canvas can be a desktop, mobile screen or anything in between. Pixel density can also vary, so we need units that are flexible and work

everywhere. So making something 50% wide means it will always take half of the screen

Page 6: 9 basic principles of responsive web design

Breakpoints

Breakpoints allow the layout to change at predefined points, i.e. having 3 columns on a desktop, but only 1 column on a mobile device. Most CSS

properties can be changed from one breakpoint to another.

Page 7: 9 basic principles of responsive web design

Max and Min values

Sometimes it's great that content takes up whole width of a screen, like on a mobile device, but having the same content stretching to the whole width of your TV screen often makes less sense. This is why Min/Max values help.

Page 8: 9 basic principles of responsive web design

Nested objects

Having a lot of elements depending on each other would be difficult to control, therefore wrapping elements in a container keeps it way more

understandable, clean and tidy. This is where static units like pixels help. They are useful for content that you don't want to scale, like logos & buttons.

Page 9: 9 basic principles of responsive web design

Mobile or Desktop first

Technically there isn't much difference if a project is started from a smaller screen to a bigger (mobile first) or vice versa (desktop first). Yet it adds extra

limitations and helps you make decisions if you start with mobile first.

Page 10: 9 basic principles of responsive web design

Webfonts vs System fonts

Although webfonts look stunning, remember that each will be downloaded & will take longer to load the page. System fonts on the other hand are

lightning fast, but if the user doesn't have it locally, it will fall back to a default font.

Page 11: 9 basic principles of responsive web design

Bitmap images vs Vectors

Does your icon have lot of details and some fancy effects applied? If yes, use a bitmap. If not, consider using a vector image. For bitmaps use a jpg, png or

a gif, for vectors the best choice would be a SVG or an icon font.

Page 12: 9 basic principles of responsive web design

Write to us at:

[email protected]

www.capitalnumbers.com

or