Best Website Design

• It's also a distinct look that differs from a proliferation of white or photo backgrounds and hero headers among many website designs. Taproot Foundation. #00a9d8 #0d9edf #259b9a. Taproot Foundation uses one of the best, most colorful website color schemes out there.
• The Best Website Design Trends of 2021. Artificial intelligence in web design encompasses chatbots, machine learning and automated personalization. Since 66% of customers expect brands to understand their needs and expectations, AI is a web design.

1. Best Website Design Sites
2. Best Website Design Company
3. Best Website Designs 2020
4. Best Website Design Awards

Oct 13, 2021 The best modern web designs Selected for you in a clean list. We've crawled the web and looked at the best modern web designs of 2021. After visiting countless websites and making some hard decisions we listed the best 48 modern websites. 5 Best Website Designs of 2021. Public Domain by Virgil Abloh. Public Domain by Virgil Abloh is basically a replica of his computer screen, providing fans with a behind-the-scenes look through. Image credit Igor Vensko. Minimalism and white space. Minimalism is a classic design trend still popular among today's best website designs of 2020. Its elegant, beautiful, and easy-to-understand appearance makes this technique highly usable, yielding a delightful user experience.

The best web design software makes it simple and easy to build a website, either by offering a coding platform, or a drag-and-drop interface.

It used to be the case that the only option was to code a website directing, using HTML & CSS and even JavaScript. However, these days drag-and-drop editors have become much more commonplace, making it a breeze for anyone to customize or even build their own website.

Whichever option you prefer, all of them make it easier to build in the elements you require on your website, and can work with additional tools such as form builders, image hosting, and even content delivery networks.

In this guide we have focused on the best web design tools currently available. When weighing up which to include, we have focused on ease of use, supported web languages, cost, and how easy the tools make it to upload the finished project once you are done.

We've also featured the best website builder.

Reasons to buy

Wix is more of a website builder than a coding platform, but it is one of the most popular online website creators, offering a range of plans and products. The free version has Wix branding, limited storage space and bandwidth, but move up to the most popular plan (unlimited) and there's no Wix ads.

An excellent collection of 500 plus templates gets the design process off to a quick start. The drag-and-drop editor gives you all kinds of tools and features to explore – an image editor, video backgrounds, animations, social buttons, an integrated site blog – and just about everything can be tweaked, tuned and restyled. Furthermore, as of recently, Wix introduced Wix Turbo, which increases the speed and performance of websites substantially.

All the core editing functions are really smartly designed, and operate more like a native app than your average website builder. Wix does have some weaknesses, with tech support seeming a little sluggish and limited in some respects. But there's no denying that the superb editor and range of top-notch templates make it easy for web building novices to create something impressive.

Read our full Wix review.

Reasons to buy

Adobe Dreamweaver is a long-established app that allows you to code your website design directly, without having to know too much about programming. The software works through a mix of visual editing and HTML editing, which means it shouldn't have too steep a learning curve for most users.

Additionally, while coding your own website design requires you to put in more effort than simply using an existing ready made template, at least you have the chance to ensure you get the look you actually want, rather than trying to work around someone else's design specifications.

A particularly good feature of Dreamweaver is that it allows you to produce a responsive design, which means your website can be optimized to display on desktops as well as mobile devices, without limiting the user experience.

However, if you are a more advanced user you may be pleased to note that Dreamweaver provides multi-monitor support for Windows. It also supports the Chromium Embedded Framework (CEF) to work with HTML5 elements and CSS grids. Additionally, there's also support for Git to allow you to edit source code directly from within Dreamweaver.

Dreamweaver is available as part of Adobe's mid-range packaged app subscription service, Creative Cloud, which also includes Photoshop.

Read our full Adobe Dreamweaver review.

Reasons to buy

WordPress is an alternative way to set up and design your website, being rather different to the other offerings we've highlighted here because it's actually a content management system (CMS). The power here is that it is a simple matter to set up a website in minutes. Indeed, many web hosting packages include a one-click install of WordPress from their Control Panel, but even without that, WordPress is relatively easy to install.

Once installed, the backend for administration and management is very user-friendly. You can use the existing WordPress design templates for your website, but more likely you will want to download and install an existing free or premium WordPress template – all of which can be done with just a few clicks.

Even if you would prefer to work with your own design, you can often do so using drag-and-drop functions, usually from a downloaded design with an in-built framework. This can allow you to create a professional-looking website without having to learn programming or coding at all.

Better still, there are so many free add-ons available to download and install, often requiring nothing more than a few clicks. This makes the whole process of customizing your website very simple, and it does not require any professional skills.

Overall, WordPress is a very easy CMS to use, and can provide a very quick way to get any form of website online fast. The huge variety of template designs and additional community supported features mean that getting something which is near the mark of what you want isn't hard at all. Just ensure that in the settings you select to turn off comments so as to avoid spam.

Read our full WordPress review.

Reasons to buy

Weebly is another online CMS, this time targeted at people with little or no coding experience, by providing easy to use drag and drop tools for creating a website. Weebly also provides the ability for users to create online stores using existing templates to work with their simply website-building framework.

The number of themes available for Weebly is somewhat limited, but the designs are clean and professional-looking, plus there are options to personalize accordingly. Additionally, the themes are responsive, which means they are optimized to work with mobile devices, plus they have in built SEO, analytics, and even a feature for posting ads directly to Facebook.

There's a free tier available for basic use, and allows you to get used to the service. However, to use your own domain and get rid of ads, you'll need the Professional plan.

Read our full Weebly review.

Webflow is a cloud-based service which has been created specifically to allow people with no coding knowledge to get started with web design.

Aside from being truly cross-platform, as it's web-based, Webflow emphasizes the concept of 'smart codelessness'. In the first instance this means a crisp drag and drop interface allowing you to drop elements such as text and images seamlessly onto a page using one of the freely available templates.

Unlike many WYSIWYG editors, the code produced is very clean and well-written even if you choose the 'I have no coding experience' option during setup. Webflow's automation tool will create the necessary HTML/CSS code for you. You can make granular changes to individual elements using the panels on the right.

Webflow offers a free demonstration of its features via the website, and you can also subscribe for a free Starter package which allows you to create up to two projects.

Read our full Webflow review.

Reasons to buy

Bluefish is among the smallest web design tools available today. The tiny installer takes only a few moments to setup. While the interface is text-only, it's clearly designed with novices in mind as it employs clear-cut toolbars, user customizable menus and syntax highlighting.

While the main focus is on HTML, Bluefish supports a huge range of other languages including PHP, Java, JavaScript, SQL, XML and CSS. Unlike visual WYSIWYG web design tools, the text interface makes for much cleaner code.

Bluefish has an excellent search function, allowing you to find text across multiple projects. The tool also has no trouble juggling hundreds of documents at the same time. Although Bluefish supports working with remote files, the varied and useful dialogs and wizards don't currently support direct upload of web pages via FTP.

Despite the best efforts of the developers, Bluefish may take some time to get used to. The tool is available free of charge, however, so you have nothing to lose by giving it a try.

Reasons to buy

Visual Studio Code (or VScode) has become popular among developers – the ones who aren't put off by the fact that it's a Microsoft product, anyway. It offers a variety of packages and free extensions that can be downloaded from its marketplace to add additional features – and the code editor itself can be customized.

While a lot of people may be intimated by the idea of coding if they have no programming experience, at some point in the web design process it can be important to be able to edit code directly. This is particularly helpful if you want to customize code for existing software add-ons in order to get the features you want for your website. Visual Studio Code can help make the process less painful by providing a dedicated platform for coding.

Visual Studio Code sports its own terminal and debugger, supports linting, and has integration with all manner of source control tools. It especially offers good support for Javascript and Python, making it potentially useful not just for coding the frontend of a website but also potentially some backend functions as well.

Read our full Virtual Studio Code review.

Other web design tools you might find useful

If you're involved in web design, the chances are you'll also need some graphic design skills and assets. Here we'll look at a couple of other resources and assets you'll properly need to help with your website design process:

1. Graphics program

You don't need anything too expensive or fancy unless you're chasing a career in graphic design or illustration. However, you'll probably find yourself wanting to create simple logos, headings, text features, as well as manipulate photos, all as part of your website design.

There are a lot of different packages out there, from GIMP which is a completely free software platform, to older software such as Jasc's Paint Shop Pro which remains a competent program that can be bought on the cheap at Amazon.

Alternatively, check out these other features for the latest in best, and sometimes free, software you might want to use:

• The best free photo editor

2. Stock photos

On top of creating your own graphics, there's also a good chance you'll want to use stock photos to really give your website a professional look.

Stock photos are available on almost any subject matter, and on top of that there are also an increasing number of stock video websites, in case you want to add video media.

Even better is that there are a number of free stock image and video websites, but be advised that these tend to be much more limited than paid-for stock image sites.

Here you can check out some of our features on these, to help you choose the best ones:

You might also want to look at our many web hosting guides:

• Best WordPress hosting providers

In 2021, a government website will need to be mobile-friendly, easy to navigate, and ADA-accessible.

Aside from that, what should it look like?

To help you understand the best government website designs in 2020, we gathered examples of government websites sorted by the high-level goals they serve.

Because a great government website design can help you:

• Streamline service delivery for residents.
• Improve public perception through better branding.
• Boost community engagement as efficiently as possible.
• Meet the unique needs of your agency.

Government Website Designs That Streamline Service Delivery

Residents visit government websites to get things done. Go for a service-oriented site if you want to:

• Limit in-person walk-ins.
• Reduce inbound phone calls.
• Meet modern expectations for online experiences.

Interested in adding services to your website? Explore govService >>

City of Kansas City

The City of Kansas City, Missouri, wanted to put their website visitors front and center. To do that, their website prioritizes city services while positioning the city as modern and forward-thinking.

Behind the Website Design

• The uncluttered website design quickly connects visitors to popular services (pay a fine, for example).
• A dedicated search form, called Resource Lookup, lets residents enter their address for personalized service information.
• The easy-to-find 311 tab in the corner of the page helps residents report problems and more.

Insight

Prioritizing services turns a website into a 24/7 tool for residents and visitors. It's also a time-saving tool for staff who receive fewer emails and phone calls for basic information and services.

City of San Jose

The City of San Jose, California, wanted a website that was both as innovative as the community and as customer-oriented as the city leaders and staff that serves them.

Behind the Design

• Top requested services are clear and easy to find.
• A dedicated service finder helps visitors explore by type and location.
• Still can't find it? Visitors can keystroke the service that's on their mind in a dedicated search bar.

Insight

Everyone navigates a website differently. That's why it's important to have user testing as part of your website design process — to make sure the website is intuitive to all.

Township of Abington

In Abington Township, Pennsylvania, the team wanted to cater to the user experience by focusing on the presentation of services and information.

Behind the Design

• A hamburger menu (top left corner) provides constant, mobile-friendly access to top services.
• An address lookup connects residents to relevant location-centric information (utiliites, waste pickup day, etc.)
• Internal pages for city departments also include quick access to department services.

Insight

A hamburger menu condenses the traditional top navigation and can make navigating on a mobile device much easier.

City of Amarillo

In Amarillo, Texas, the team wanted to turn their website into a digital extension of the service the city provides and make it a place where residents can get things done quickly and easily.

Behind the Design

• A contemporary homepage design puts services front and center.
• The gradient on the homepage image serves as a spotlight on services.
• 'Find a Service' button on the homepage expands for quick navigation into services.

Best Website Design Sites

Insight

Require too many clicks and residents can get lost, frustrated, and give up. By bringing services quickly to people's fingertips, like Amarillo does, you can give users a better experience and reduce phone calls and emails.

Government Website Designs for Better Public Perception

Not just a consideration for big companies, a professional brand goes a long way in improving the perception of municipal departments and organizations. Concerted branding, always a website consideration, helps you:

• Improve economic development.
• Attract more job applications from top talent.

Pflugerville Police Department

The website for the Pflugerville Police Department in Texas highlights their professional, approachable, and transparent approach to law enforcement.

Behind the Design

• A welcoming homepage positions the department as positive and professional.
• Photography shows police staff that are smiling and active in the community.
• By adding a silent 'p' to words beginning with an 'f', just like the name of their city, they instantly lighten the mood.

Insight

Gather qualitative feedback to understand people's attitudes toward your city or department. Even a small focus group, if well-directed, can give you actionable data to drive a difference-making design.

El Segundo Economic Development

In El Segundo, Calif., the Economic Development organization wants to encourage business growth.

Behind the Design

• Tagline ‘Where Big Ideas Take Off' reinforced by strong images.
• Navigation prioritizes a user perspective (Why El Segundo?) to connect visitors with proof.

Insight

Stock photos are nearly always a second-choice to great original photography. Nearly always. The hero image on this website is stock, but stands out and serves its purpose dutifully.

City of San Jose

The City of San Jose Economic Development in California wanted to attract economic development by highlighting San Jose as a desirable place to start a business.

Behind the Design

• San Jose differentiators (talent, lifestyle, transit) are clear and reinforced by design and images.
• A bold design positions San Jose as innovative, diverse, and ever evolving.
• By focusing only on the major tasks that users want to complete, the designers were able to keep the experience clean, clear, and approachable.

Insight

San Jose is proud of its diversity. By offering their website in a variety of languages (see top navigation), they make their website as welcoming as the city itself.

Brazoria County Clerk

With their website, Brazoria County Clerk wanted an above and beyond website to highlight the above and beyond service they deliver to the community.

Behind the Design

• Lets visitors search for information and services through a modern design that's professional, stately, and confident.
• Stability and trustworthiness communicated via the serif typeface.
• Images of historical documents throughout provide a unique sense of history.

Insight

Everything in a website design speaks — typography, images, colors. All these elements should combine to reinforce your brand.

Government Website Designs for Stronger Community Engagement

When you connect websites to digital communications, you can strengthen connections between government and the citizens you serve. Follow the lead of these websites if you want to:

• Improve results of your programs.
• Drive relevant traffic to your website.
• Increase the amount of residents opting in to your messages.

El Segundo Hospitality & Tourism

With their website, El Segundo Hospitality & Tourism positions the friendly community as a great place to spend time — from day trippers to young professionals to families.

Behind the Design

• The website design highlights key destinations & attractions.
• A govDelivery website overlay captures email subscribers who actively want updates on events.
• El Segundo sends emails to subscribers to give them reasons to return again and again.

Insight

Don't let your audience slip away! Give them a chance to opt-in to your communications. A homepage overlay quickly builds your audience for a newsletter.

Town of Silverthorne

Nestled among mountains, the Town of Silverthorne, Colo., is a popular destination to live, work, and play. Their website offers an engaging destination for visitors and residents alike.

Behind the Design

• From public office announcements to social media links, the website actively offers residents engagement opportunities.
• The design features easily updated content carousels, which keep the experience fresh and engaging.
• The website overlay, powered by govDelivery, captures subscribers interested in updates from their town.

• The best free photo editor

2. Stock photos

On top of creating your own graphics, there's also a good chance you'll want to use stock photos to really give your website a professional look.

Stock photos are available on almost any subject matter, and on top of that there are also an increasing number of stock video websites, in case you want to add video media.

Even better is that there are a number of free stock image and video websites, but be advised that these tend to be much more limited than paid-for stock image sites.

Here you can check out some of our features on these, to help you choose the best ones:

You might also want to look at our many web hosting guides:

• Best WordPress hosting providers

In 2021, a government website will need to be mobile-friendly, easy to navigate, and ADA-accessible.

Aside from that, what should it look like?

To help you understand the best government website designs in 2020, we gathered examples of government websites sorted by the high-level goals they serve.

Because a great government website design can help you:

• Streamline service delivery for residents.
• Improve public perception through better branding.
• Boost community engagement as efficiently as possible.
• Meet the unique needs of your agency.

Government Website Designs That Streamline Service Delivery

Residents visit government websites to get things done. Go for a service-oriented site if you want to:

• Limit in-person walk-ins.
• Reduce inbound phone calls.
• Meet modern expectations for online experiences.

Interested in adding services to your website? Explore govService >>

City of Kansas City

The City of Kansas City, Missouri, wanted to put their website visitors front and center. To do that, their website prioritizes city services while positioning the city as modern and forward-thinking.

Behind the Website Design

• The uncluttered website design quickly connects visitors to popular services (pay a fine, for example).
• A dedicated search form, called Resource Lookup, lets residents enter their address for personalized service information.
• The easy-to-find 311 tab in the corner of the page helps residents report problems and more.

Insight

Prioritizing services turns a website into a 24/7 tool for residents and visitors. It's also a time-saving tool for staff who receive fewer emails and phone calls for basic information and services.

City of San Jose

The City of San Jose, California, wanted a website that was both as innovative as the community and as customer-oriented as the city leaders and staff that serves them.

Behind the Design

• Top requested services are clear and easy to find.
• A dedicated service finder helps visitors explore by type and location.
• Still can't find it? Visitors can keystroke the service that's on their mind in a dedicated search bar.

Insight

Everyone navigates a website differently. That's why it's important to have user testing as part of your website design process — to make sure the website is intuitive to all.

Township of Abington

In Abington Township, Pennsylvania, the team wanted to cater to the user experience by focusing on the presentation of services and information.

Behind the Design

• A hamburger menu (top left corner) provides constant, mobile-friendly access to top services.
• An address lookup connects residents to relevant location-centric information (utiliites, waste pickup day, etc.)
• Internal pages for city departments also include quick access to department services.

Insight

A hamburger menu condenses the traditional top navigation and can make navigating on a mobile device much easier.

City of Amarillo

In Amarillo, Texas, the team wanted to turn their website into a digital extension of the service the city provides and make it a place where residents can get things done quickly and easily.

Behind the Design

• A contemporary homepage design puts services front and center.
• The gradient on the homepage image serves as a spotlight on services.
• 'Find a Service' button on the homepage expands for quick navigation into services.

Best Website Design Sites

Insight

Require too many clicks and residents can get lost, frustrated, and give up. By bringing services quickly to people's fingertips, like Amarillo does, you can give users a better experience and reduce phone calls and emails.

Government Website Designs for Better Public Perception

Not just a consideration for big companies, a professional brand goes a long way in improving the perception of municipal departments and organizations. Concerted branding, always a website consideration, helps you:

• Improve economic development.
• Attract more job applications from top talent.

Pflugerville Police Department

The website for the Pflugerville Police Department in Texas highlights their professional, approachable, and transparent approach to law enforcement.

Behind the Design

• A welcoming homepage positions the department as positive and professional.
• Photography shows police staff that are smiling and active in the community.
• By adding a silent 'p' to words beginning with an 'f', just like the name of their city, they instantly lighten the mood.

Insight

Gather qualitative feedback to understand people's attitudes toward your city or department. Even a small focus group, if well-directed, can give you actionable data to drive a difference-making design.

El Segundo Economic Development

In El Segundo, Calif., the Economic Development organization wants to encourage business growth.

Behind the Design

• Tagline ‘Where Big Ideas Take Off' reinforced by strong images.
• Navigation prioritizes a user perspective (Why El Segundo?) to connect visitors with proof.

Insight

Stock photos are nearly always a second-choice to great original photography. Nearly always. The hero image on this website is stock, but stands out and serves its purpose dutifully.

City of San Jose

The City of San Jose Economic Development in California wanted to attract economic development by highlighting San Jose as a desirable place to start a business.

Behind the Design

• San Jose differentiators (talent, lifestyle, transit) are clear and reinforced by design and images.
• A bold design positions San Jose as innovative, diverse, and ever evolving.
• By focusing only on the major tasks that users want to complete, the designers were able to keep the experience clean, clear, and approachable.

Insight

San Jose is proud of its diversity. By offering their website in a variety of languages (see top navigation), they make their website as welcoming as the city itself.

Brazoria County Clerk

With their website, Brazoria County Clerk wanted an above and beyond website to highlight the above and beyond service they deliver to the community.

Behind the Design

• Lets visitors search for information and services through a modern design that's professional, stately, and confident.
• Stability and trustworthiness communicated via the serif typeface.
• Images of historical documents throughout provide a unique sense of history.

Insight

Everything in a website design speaks — typography, images, colors. All these elements should combine to reinforce your brand.

Government Website Designs for Stronger Community Engagement

When you connect websites to digital communications, you can strengthen connections between government and the citizens you serve. Follow the lead of these websites if you want to:

• Improve results of your programs.
• Drive relevant traffic to your website.
• Increase the amount of residents opting in to your messages.

El Segundo Hospitality & Tourism

With their website, El Segundo Hospitality & Tourism positions the friendly community as a great place to spend time — from day trippers to young professionals to families.

Behind the Design

• The website design highlights key destinations & attractions.
• A govDelivery website overlay captures email subscribers who actively want updates on events.
• El Segundo sends emails to subscribers to give them reasons to return again and again.

Insight

Don't let your audience slip away! Give them a chance to opt-in to your communications. A homepage overlay quickly builds your audience for a newsletter.

Town of Silverthorne

Nestled among mountains, the Town of Silverthorne, Colo., is a popular destination to live, work, and play. Their website offers an engaging destination for visitors and residents alike.

Behind the Design

• From public office announcements to social media links, the website actively offers residents engagement opportunities.
• The design features easily updated content carousels, which keep the experience fresh and engaging.
• The website overlay, powered by govDelivery, captures subscribers interested in updates from their town.

Insight

The homepage content on this website changes constantly. It highlights all the exciting opportunities in the city, while giving residents and visitors reason to check back.

City of Merced

With their website, the City of Merced, Arizona, empowers their community by offering many opportunities to stay informed, take action, and make a difference.

Behind the Design

• Civic engagement opportunities — whether public meetings, commissions, and more — have high visibility.
• The website overlay, powered by govDelivery, immediately captures email subscribers.
• The website & email directly integrates with govMeetings, their agenda management solution.

Insight

Email subscription overlays can appear right away or when a visitor is leaving the page. Test it to see what works best for your community.

Government Website Designs That Meet Unique Goals

Sometimes you need a website or microsite to serve a unique goal. From custom websites for emergency response to municipal airports to zoos, here are some standout examples.

Dallas Love Field Airport

Dallas Love Field Airport, a municipal airport in Dallas, Texas, wants their guests to feel they can move through their website as easily as their airport.

Behind the Design

• The main navigation moves down with the user as they scrolls for easy access.
• Check Flight Status box contrasts against image, drawing attention to a popular function.
• Most requested services display as large icons in same color as other calls to action on the same page.
• TSA Security and Parking information displays on home page so users can plan ahead.

Insight

Airports can be frustrating. Dallas Love Field Airport removes that fear by making airport navigation as easy as possible for visitors. They take what is most important to their users and put it first.

San Diego LAFCO

The San Diego Local Agency Formation Commission illuminate the relationship between government services and the community's needs.

Behind the Design

• Orange Announcement box breaks into the main image, encouraging reader to scroll down and keep reading
• The News items area facilitates user navigation by pairing news items with imagery in bold colors. As a user hovers on a story, the boxes pop out.
• The upcoming meetings section draws a connection between the schedule and videos of past meetings, which the user can play without leaving the main page.

Take Me There

Insight

By alternating sections of bold and clean backgrounds, LAFCO's website doesn't overwhelm the user. It uses small techniques that facilitate readability and navigation.

Montgomery Zoo

Printworks 2 0 2 – all purpose desktop publishing company. The website for Montgomery Zoo in Montgomery, Alabama, is designed to attract visitors, reduce phone calls, and showcase news.

Behind the Design

• Home page feature vibrant spotlight for important information.
• Strong focus on content, which is easy to read against high contrast backgrounds.
• Secondary navigation provides quick links and information, such as a weather forecast.

Insight

Montgomery Zoo makes navigation accessible, even at the bottom of the page, with a sticky menu bar.

Hawaii County, Hawaii

Best Website Design Company

Kilauea Volcano has been continuously erupting for decades. In 2018, an eruption wiped out more than 700 homes on the Big Island. With their specialty site, Hawaii County provides timely information to residents, media, and other stakeholders.

Behind the Design

Best Website Designs 2020

• A wire frame streamlines information and prioritizes content.
• Excludes heavy animations and anything that bogs down site speed.
• Focuses on user's needs and experience.
• Different size fonts create an hierarchy that is easy to skim.

Insight

By keeping the site simple, clean, and easy to navigate, users will not be distracted in their search for important information.

Is Your Website Meeting Its Goals?

Best Website Design Awards

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