Eras of Website Design

A deep dive into the evolution of web design

Why this Exists?

The World Wide Web (WWW) is playing an important role in the development of society in the 21st century. The mass proliferation of internet usage by both consumers and businesses alike has led to an increased importance in having a presence online, and with the wide variety of tools and professional services available at this point in time it’s arguably not hard to build one. The WWW wasn’t always this accessible, and like many other technologies seen throughout human history has gone through various iterations and accepted standards. The protocol itself started out as an experiment in CERN by Tim Berners-Lee as a method of cross-referencing the text of research papers from across the world (Longman). However, interest from corporations and governments quickly led to widespread implementation and usage worldwide. As the WWW went through its own phases of iteration to reach the standard we know today, so did web design in its own way adapt with each of these iterations to match with the tools and knowledge available. These adaptations can be classified and viewed as their own eras of design: the early web, the user web, the standardized web, and the modern web.

Timeline

1993-2002 The Early Web

The early web era encompasses web designs from the WWW’s inception at CERN to the early 2000’s, specifically from around 1993-2002. During this time websites were largely owned by technology and media companies, with many technology companies such as Microsoft and Yahoo competing heavily against each other to see who could establish early web standards (Francis and Mills)...

2003-2012 The User Web

The user web era follows the crash of the dot-com bubble and the rise of the internet’s first social networks such as Myspace, Facebook, and Reddit (Emery). This era mainly spans from 2003-2012, where following the dot-com crash governments started to pay more attention to the WWW, leading to increased accessibility and digital safety regulations...

2012-2017 The Standardized Web

The standardized web era can be viewed as the “industrial revolution” of both web development and design, spanning from 2012-2017 and bringing web design to follow most of the same standards and practices we see today. With the popularity of Apple’s smartphones on the market and their ability to browse the web using safari...

2018-Present The Modern Web

The modern web era classifies everything from 2018 to present day. Most web design protocols and standards have been solidified at this point, and while there are of course more and more advancements in web-based technologies no new heavily altering features have been introduced in web browsers...

Looking to the Future

Each era of web design showcases a different approach to design philosophy, evolving from the limited corporate designs in the 1990’s to the more user-centered dynamic designs of modern day. The modern web is considered to currently be at a tipping point, with the increased capabilities of artificial intelligence and cryptography being two of the main drivers toward a new era of the web. By looking back on design history, we can see the differences between each era and how the design philosophy of the next era of the web might be formed.