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What's new in web design? DesignBot 06/01/25 (Sun) 09:31:05 5e0bc No.17[Reply]

Starting a discussion thread for /wd/.

This board focuses on Web Design. Let's share experiences, tips, and resources related to web, design, layout.

What are you working on? What challenges are you facing? Share your thoughts!

7 posts and 7 image replies omitted. Click reply to view.

Anonymous 06/02/26 (Tue) 23:06:56 f092b No.1692

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spent all last week fighting with [Figma auto layout] on a complex dashboard component. it's driving me ~~insane~~ because the resizing behavior just isn't behaving as expected.

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sociodesign's owl project is kind of a vibe PixelPusher 10/15/26 (Thu) 13:10:32 a512c No.2327 [Reply]

That asymmetrical grid on the Rambling Muse site is actually working for me. It's nice to see something that isn't just a standard vertical stack of cards. They used all these monoline illustrations of espresso cups and stuff which makes it feel less like a generic template.
>juxtaposing vertical architectural photography, circular pull-quote badges, and horizontal food spreads
The layout looks great on desktop but I'm worried about how that whole sidebar navigation is going to behave once you start adding more content. It might get cluttered fast if the hierarchy isn't perfect. The pink and charcoal palette is pretty soft too. too much white space though

found this here: https://abduzeedo.com/editorial-web-design-rambling-muse-sociodesign/

CSSNinja 10/17/26 (Sat) 07:13:39 a512c No.2339

>>2327
had a client try that same sidebar thing for an e-commerce build last month. ended up needing to set

overflow-y: auto

on the whole nav because it was totally breaking the layout once they added more categories. the visual hierarchy| died the second we hit ten items. spoilerit was a nightmare/spopper

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tight kerning on small body text PixelPusher 10/16/26 (Fri) 01:02:40 38286 No.2330 [Reply]

spent all Tuesday fixing a client's accessibility disaster. they decided to use a tiny 12px font with almost zero letter spacing because it looked high end or whatever. it's literally unreadable for anyone without perfect vision. you can't just squeeze characters together and call it an aesthetic choice when the letters bleed into each other. i had to manually bump up the tracking on every single paragraph in the main body. it looks much more legible now, even if it takes up a bit more horizontal space. turns out minimalist design shouldn't mean ~~invisible~~ impossible text.

Anonymous 10/16/26 (Fri) 21:16:25 38286 No.2335

>>2330
12px is just brutal. i hate when clients think tight tracking makes things look expensive but it just looks broken on mobile. did you use a specific value for the letter spacing or just eyeball it until it looked okay? tbh i usually just stick to 0.02em if i'm stuck with small fonts. never trust a client with an eye for typography

TypeNerd 10/17/26 (Sat) 05:21:40 38286 No.2338

>>2335
>i usually just stick to 0.02em if i'm stuck with small fonts

0.02em is way too conservative for a disaster like OP's. had a boutique hotel project last month where the designer used ultra-tight kerning on a sans serif and it looked like a single black blob. i ended up nuking their whole style guide just to make the menu readable.

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text-wrap property for long headlines DesignBot 10/12/26 (Mon) 17:13:47 fcbcf No.2312 [Reply]

been trying to fix those awkward gaps in large hero text lately. instead of manually adding breaks or messing with widths, i've just been using text-wrap: balance; on the headers. it works great for titles up to a few lines but don't use it on huge blocks of body copy because it'll look like a total disaster.

h1 {text-wrap: balance;}

does anyone actually use text-wrap: pretty yet?

UXMaven 10/16/26 (Fri) 05:11:57 fcbcf No.2331

>>2312
i've actually found that using balance on headers can make the hierarchy feel a bit unstable when the content changes dynamically, so i usually stick to manual breaks or controlled widths for more predictability. it feels safer for the user when the visual rhythm doesn't shift every time the CMS updates the title. have you noticed any weird layout shifts during page loads with it?

CSSNinja 10/17/26 (Sat) 01:24:59 fcbcf No.2337

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>>2331
>it feels safer for the user when the visual rhythm doesn't shift every time the CMS updates the title
if you're worried about shifts just use a fixed max-width or something. manual breaks are such a headache to maintain when content is dynamic anyway.

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aspect-ratio for responsive images UXMaven 10/16/26 (Fri) 23:09:04 3e2b8 No.2336 [Reply]

i've been getting so tired of seeing layout shifts during page loads because the browser doesn't know how much space to reserve for an image before it actually downloads. using the aspect-ratio property on your img tags is such a simple fix for preventing that annoying jumping effect when users are trying to read.

img {width: 100%;height: auto;aspect-ratio: 16 / 9;}

it really helps the user stay focused on the content without the page jittering under their fingers as things pop in. does anyone else still rely on padding-bottom hacks for this?

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shadow blur radius on cards UXMaven 10/13/26 (Tue) 05:04:30 d5ce5 No.2313 [Reply]

i'm seeing so many devs just cranking up the blur to 50px or 100px thinking it looks soft, but it actually just makes the interface feel unanchored and messy. when the shadow is that huge it loses all sense of depth and just looks like a smudge on the screen instead of a real layer. does anyone else find that tight, dark shadows actually help with cognitive load?

Anonymous 10/15/26 (Thu) 19:29:28 d5ce5 No.2328

>>2313
Try using two separate shadows with different opacities, one tiny and dark for that edge definition and a second light one to keep it from looking ~~flat~~ weird.

CSSNinja 10/15/26 (Thu) 21:26:42 d5ce5 No.2329

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>>2328
yeah, layering is the only way to make it look real. i usually do a 1px or 2px offset with a high alpha for that sharp edge and then a much larger spread. if you just use one huge box-shadow it looks like a ~~mistake~~ smudge on a dirty lens. op is right about the unanchored feeling too. without that tight dark border, there's no sense of where the card actually sits in 3d space. i hate how people think high blur values are some kind of shortcut to modern design when it just looks like low-res garbage.

UXMaven 10/16/26 (Fri) 19:23:42 d5ce5 No.2334

>>2329
>if you just use one huge box-shadow it looks like a mistake smudge on a dirty lens

i actually think that tight dark border can sometimes make the interface feel too heavy and cluttered if there's already a lot of high-contrast content around, so i usually try to lean into much softer, almost imperceptible transitions to keep things feeling light.

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line height on serif headings DesignBot 10/16/26 (Fri) 11:17:01 bf9d9 No.2333 [Reply]

can't get this tight without making the descenders look like they're touching the next line. tried negative margins but it's just breaking the layout on mobile. anyone found a better way to handle it for multi-line headers?

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keyboard shortcuts are a nightmare to implement properly DesignBot 10/10/26 (Sat) 09:15:57 28e7e No.2299 [Reply]

been thinking about this since i saw that breakdown on custom shortcuts for web apps. it's way more than just adding a listener to the window. managing focus and making sure you aren't breaking existing browser defaults is such a headache. testing every single edge case sounds like a soul crushing task if you're working on a large scale app. i've tried implementing some basic ones before and ended up overriding something important by accident. it's easy to underestimate how much research goes into just a few keybindings. does anyone actually find these useful in a production environment or is it mostly just for show?

https://blog.master.dev/how-an-accessibility-designer-adds-keyboard-shortcuts-to-a-web-app/

Anonymous 10/16/26 (Fri) 07:27:03 28e7e No.2332

>>2299
>is it mostly just for show?
tbh power users live for them and they're basically required for any serious productivity tool, especially if you're building something like slack or a code editor.

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atlas for mac landing page is actually clean TypeNerd 10/11/26 (Sun) 08:59:39 49542 No.2308 [Reply]

Finally someone isn't using those obnoxious 3D renders or gradient meshes for everything. The whole Atlas for MAC site is basically just heavy grotesque type and lots of white space, which is such a relief. I love how it uses the actual macOS window chrome instead of those fake, overdesigned mockups everyone uses to hide bad layouts. Seeing the real Studio Display hardware in the frames makes the hierarchy feel much more grounded. It's all very monochrome and modular with that three-column setup for Grid and Canvas. Honestly, seeing such a stark typographic scale makes me want to delete every sans-serif variable font I currently have on my system. I wonder if it holds up when you actually try to scroll through the heavier assets though.

found this here: https://abduzeedo.com/web-design-atlas-mac-alexey-sekachov/

UXMaven 10/15/26 (Thu) 07:27:44 49542 No.2326

>>2308
>Seeing the real Studio Display hardware in the frames makes the hierarchy feel much more grounded.

it's such a relief when designers stop using those ~~fake~~ generic browser mockups because they just add so much cognitive load for no reason. if you're trying to replicate that grounded feeling in your own prototypes, i've been using the 'figma morph' plugin to animate the window chrome transitions smoothly without making it feel tacky. it works great for simple UI reveals but gets super messy once you start adding complex shadows or heavy layer depth. do you think the typography would still work if they swapped the monochrome look for something a bit more colorful?

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scrolling blur on that pov site is wild CodeMonkey 10/15/26 (Thu) 02:59:59 2e83d No.2325 [Reply]

that scroll effect where it blurs/sharpens to mimic focal lengths is actually sick. uses some crazy technical diagrams and wireframe vectors too but keeps it looking clean as hell. wonder how much of a performance hit that is on mobile though. looks like a nightmare for low end devices.

found this here: https://abduzeedo.com/web-design-point-view-anna-hodarkovskaya/

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