As the new year gets firmly underway, lots of blogs are popping up to predict the top web design trends of 2020.
We’ve rounded up some of the UI trends that have caught our eye, as well as some well-known design tricks that continue to be popular year after year.
Microinteractions and animations.
Microinteractions aren’t new, but these small-yet-mighty animations are becoming an increasingly popular way to engage your audience and guide customers around your website.
Motion graphics are an interesting way to confirm actions, highlight important areas of your site (like buttons and call to actions), and overall facilitate an enjoyable user experience.
Animation injects life into otherwise static sites and adds an element of gamification to the user’s experience, as well as enhancing storytelling.
Organic and fluid shapes.
Some brands are stepping away from the hard, sharp edges of geometric style and opting for more natural, fluid shapes and patterns.
Organic shapes are common alongside hand-drawn illustrations and are especially prevalent with IT and technology startups, as well as healthcare and wellbeing companies.
Bringing a sense of “welcome” and friendliness to a brand, this type of design helps businesses appear more approachable.
Neumorphism.
Also known as Soft UI, neumorphic design combines the principles of modern, flat UI and skeuomorphic design that mimics real-world items.
With this trend, buttons and other elements of your website appear to be pushing themselves through your display. We think it creates a clean, plastic feel to the UI.
However, due to the low-contrast ratio between the neomorphic elements and their background, there have been some concerns raised about its impact on accessibility.
Flat and minimal design.
Flat design and minimalist aesthetics aren’t budging from our screens anytime soon. And, for good reason too.
White, open space with clean text is the perfect way to create a clutter-free website that’s functional yet beautiful.
Material design.
Material design has firmly placed itself at the heart of web and app design in recent years.
Just take a look at Twitter and Google for their curved edges and subtle drop shadows; a far cry away from the sharp edges and right angles of more traditional websites.
Geometric.
Despite the influx of organic and fluid shapes in web design, geometric style still has its place on the internet.
Don’t be afraid to be bold and add freshness to your brand with vibrant, attention-grabbing shapes and patterns.
Breaking the grid.
“The grid” provides consistency, familiarity, balance and order to websites.
However, more and more designers are thinking outside of the box and experimenting with fluid and natural layouts.
Defying the rules opens up a host of creative possibilities and brands can use this trick to create a website with real impact.
Nevertheless, grid design is a brilliant way of designing a site that requires straightforward, uncomplicated navigation. Breaking the grid can sometimes lead to accessibility issues and confuse users, so whether it will work for you, depends on the demographic of who will be visiting your website.