Trends in Website Design

We suggest that diversity and changes in the visual design of web pages exhibit trend-like characteristics. We begin with a survey of the fashion and trends literature to clarify these terms and to relate them to the domain of web design. Based on freely available online archival data we assembled a website design trend library that includes 42 trends encompassing the period from the mid-1990s to the year 2010. The trends were classified into three general groups, from oldest to most recent: Faded, PastPeak, and Current. A second study tested hypotheses that stemmed from the premise that web design trends exist. Data from 262 designers and non-designers indicate that designers are more accurate than non-designers in evaluating the up-to-dateness of web design trends, and that people tend to like trends that they perceive as up-to-date. We discuss research and practical implications of these findings for the design process of websites and for interactive systems in general, for the role of designers in this process, and for the education of IS students.