Published: February 24, 2025
It’s time for the last entry in our series on 2025 trends, and this time we’re downloading the 2025 trends in web design. If you’ve read our blog on graphic design and blog on typography, you might have seen some of these coming. If not, plug in and browse this list to see if what’s trendy in the new year could work for your website.
1. AI Everywhere
Whether you’re a lover or a hater of this new technology, generative AI (or gen AI) is everywhere right now, and it doesn’t show signs of going away any time soon. Because of its ubiquitousness, of course you’re going to see it creeping into web design. Whether that’s AI generated layouts, elements like images or web copy, or chatbots calibrated to help you navigate any issue you might have with an organization, just know that there’s a good chance you’re interacting with something touched by AI. Now we don’t lean on AI in our designs, copy, images, etc., but there are many places that are embracing this new tech wholeheartedly as a way to save money and time.
2. The Human Touch
As in graphic design and typography, the rise of AI is also giving rise to a resurgence of hand-crafted designs as a form of protest. This means you’re going to experience websites with hand-drawn images, text, and design elements along with scrapbook motifs, custom illustrations, and badges proclaiming an AI-free zone. Unique designs made by humans for humans will be competing for attention with unique designs made by computers for the foreseeable future. You don’t have to pick a side, but if your values align with one or the other, these obviously human-created websites might be a way of letting your audience know which side you’re on.
3. Mobile-first Design
More than half of all internet users are going to be visiting your site on mobile. If your website isn’t optimized for those visitors, they’re not going to go through the hassle of trying to navigate it. We used to build websites for desktop and laptop users and try to make something that worked on mobile. Now, though, because the majority of visitors are browsing on their phone, many organizations are actually starting by designing something optimized for mobile and then making sure it works on a bigger screen. If your website isn’t even optimized for mobile, get on board here. It’s past time to join the rest of the world.
4. Movement
If you’re as old as some of us, you might remember the days of nonstandard cursors. You’d go to a website (waiting forever for it to appear because you were on dialup), and your cursor would be a severed hand, a sparkly arrow, a crosshair, or some other random thing that was often just a reflection of the website creator’s vibe. Well, don’t be surprised if you start seeing that again. Apparently this time we’re trying to animate them, giving visitors something else to look at while navigating. Think microinteractions like animations when hovering and clicking.
You know what else is coming back? Parallax scrolling! It seems like we just updated all our websites to remove it, and now it’s rising in popularity again. This time, though, web designers are trying to make it special with animation, color switching, and other visual tricks to make you say, “Whoa.”
5. Text-only Heroes
This one’s not a new addition to this list. For the last several years, big, bold text has been growing in popularity as hero image fodder. If you haven’t given this trend a shot, talk to your graphic design department and see what they can whip up, conceptually, for a new hero image for your website. Or better yet, ask us! And if you’re already on this trend, check out our graphic design trends blog if you haven’t already, and see how you could change it up a little for the new year.
6. Gamification in Design
It seems like everything from self care to weight loss to managing finances is being gamified these days, and we’re here for it! If we can make it more fun for someone to adopt a lifestyle they’re happy with, that feels like a good thing. It’s a no-brainer, then, that gamification is seeping into web design. While you’re out there in the ether, you’re likely to see more polls, calculators, contests, assessments, and quizzes popping up on your favorite websites. Getting their visitors involved in something fun that helps an organization deliver more personalized content has proven to be an effective way of reaching people. And participating gives someone a sense that they’re contributing to something that matters. So why not?
7. Helpful and Clear Data
Clarity is a big deal when many websites are hungry for your data, your attention, and your money. We have to know, as consumers, where our dollars and attention ultimately goes, who benefits, and what happens to it. To that end, some websites are trying to be more clear about that. They’re adopting more clear data visualization, interactive charts and tables, and other methods to let people know what goes on behind the curtain. They’re also answering questions before they’re asked with smarter videos that answer frequently asked questions or freely teach and explain things, making their website a valuable resource for people to explore. And, as in previous years, clarity in ethics, sustainability, and accessibility are always in fashion.
8. Experimental Navigation
When you visit a website, you know how to find your way around because the huge majority of websites have a friendly menu at the top complete with about, contact, and any other relevant headers. Well, believe it or not, some people are beginning to question whether this is the best way to build a website. Some are even getting into experimental navigation methods like horizontal scrolling, navigation methods built into the design, hovering menus that change color or shape as you navigate, etc. It’s a wide open world, and we’re all just seeing if maybe something else works better. And even if it doesn’t, it’s got people talking.
9. Dark Mode
It can be jarring when everything on your phone is set to dark mode, you’re all curled up in your dark little world, and a website blinds you out of nowhere with glaring white backgrounds and bright colors. That’s why you’re going to see a pivot to designs that are dark mode friendly. As more people adopt dark mode, look for darker colors on websites, less flashy colors, and contrasts that are easier on the eyes. Soothing!
That brings us to the end of our series. We’ve seen you through graphic design trends, typography trends, and web design trends for 2025. Hopefully something stood out to you and you’ll be adopting some of these in your work in the future. It will be interesting to see which of these trends are with us in 2026 and which have been tossed aside like last season’s boot-cut jeans.