7 WordPress Web Design Trends for 2021
Want to keep your WordPress site fresh and stay on top of the industry trends? Take a peek at these seven upcoming WordPress web design trends in 2021. By the end of this article, you’ll know what it takes to create the best web design that’s not only appealing but also profitable for your brand.
Why Should You Follow Web Design Trends?
With so many factors influencing them from time to time, you might notice that trends tend to come as quick as they go. In the web design industry, the audience’s change of taste and the growth of technology heavily affect today’s trends. Additionally, the change in available technology solutions changes how much you can do with a website. That’s why it’s not just important to keep an eye on what visitors demand, but also consider the latest innovations that are spearheading the market.
The latter particularly applies to WordPress sites. As the most popular free CMS on the market, WordPress web design trends evolve with the industry’s own trends and the platform’s latest innovations. With over 54,000 plugins (and counting) and 31,000 themes to work with, WordPress’s pace of change is inevitably rapid. With WordPress, every established practice can be integrated fairly easily. Between those plugins and themes you’ll definitely find mobile-responsive options, the latest AJAX powered search bars and whatever else you might need to improve user convenience and integrate the latest trends.
Knowing is half the battle — stay ahead of the competition by keeping up with the latest WordPress web design trends. Don’t let your guard down and stay satisfied with occasional modifications. The last thing your site needs is for visitors to click away because its design looks stale.
Top 7 WordPress Web Design Trends in 2021
Here are seven WordPress web design trends to keep a close eye on in 2021:
1. Drag-and-Drop Page Builder
With the success of the Gutenberg editor, more and more users turn to drag-and-drop page builders as their preferred method of editing. Implementing the WYSIWYG and block system, this type of editor allows everyone to build their web pages with a few clicks. It’s easy to use, beginner-friendly, and code-free — what’s not to love?
This trend was influenced by the trend of easy-to-use website builders that have broken through in the website creation market in a big way. Thanks to the new competition on the scene, WordPress developers took notice and improved their platform so that truly anyone can create a website.
To fulfill the increasing demand for easy web page editing tools, more and more drag-and-drop page builders rise to the challenge. Gutenberg’s current competitors include Elementor, Divi, and Beaver Builder. As this trend will likely continue in the new year, we can expect more page builder contenders to come.
2. Augmented Reality and Virtual Reality
Augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR) take the browsing experience to the next level. In the eCommerce industry, AR gives customers better insights into the product’s functionality and appearance. The AR Display plugin and the Ozisti multi-purpose theme are two from the many options that allow users to adopt this technology in their WordPress site.https://www.youtube.com/embed/AXOB6bmB5OU?feature=oembed
Meanwhile, VR benefits the tourism industry and event-based projects by showcasing the destination’s potential at minimum cost. For non-commercial purposes, VR is ideal for improving a gallery’s value and supporting other content. As we barely scratched the surface of these technologies, expect more innovations to come in 2020.
With a little bit of creativity almost any business, especially one that sells physical products, can benefit from this trend. From letting potential customers try out glasses frames with their front camera, to see if it suits them, to furniture stores that can let users see how that new beanbag chair will look in their living room before making a purchase.
3. Video Backgrounds
The video background trend’s popularity might dip for a while due to the growing need for fast load speeds. Nevertheless, we can expect its strong comeback in the coming year as video backgrounds prove effective at grabbing visitor attention and decreasing bounce rates.
Aesthetically, the combination of video copy creates an immersive experience that leaves a good first impression. Furthermore, you can give out more information without being obtrusive or cramming the web page with blocks of texts. If you have difficulties in keeping your visitors engaged, this is the trend you should get behind.
With many countries seeing continuous improvement in internet infrastructure and the coming 5G revolution, fast connections and advanced video compression will allow you to have the best of both worlds – a beautiful, video background and a fast loading site.
4. Minimalism
Minimalism, in contrast to video backgrounds, becomes popular following the rising need for fast load speeds. Instead of slowing down, this recurring trend shows no signs of stopping as it benefits website speed, SEO, and navigation greatly.
The latter is particularly vital for delivering a great customer experience and removing distractions that keep visitors from enjoying your content. As a result, you get a clean and clutter-free website.
5. Asymmetry
The asymmetrical design takes off as more and more websites find it effective for grabbing visitor attention. Combined with the minimalist concept, asymmetry lets you highlight essential parts of your content and artistically showcase images, improving the site’s aesthetic value. Home Societe is one of the many websites that successfully adopted this design concept.
If you’re looking for an artistic way to make your site stand out from the competition, you should consider following this trend.
6. Multi-Purpose Themes
With the rising popularity of WordPress among various industries, multi-purpose themes slowly replace niche themes as the user’s main choice of template. This type of theme is not only cost-effective but also has excellent usability. You get to build all kinds of sites regardless of their niche and purpose.
The most significant perks of the multi-purpose theme generally include scalable functions, customization freedom, and eCommerce features. The latter is particularly ideal for eCommerce stores that want to improve SEO by using a blog. In short, everything you need is available in one big bundle.
7. One-Page Design
Following the success of minimalism, the one-page website design quickly gained popularity due to its simplicity. As it caters to websites with a small amount of content, the one-page design is perfect for highlighting crucial information and removing distracting elements. Additionally, the absence of the multi-level menu lets your website load much faster and, therefore, reduces the bounce rate.
Known for having simple and easy-to-operate navigation, the one-page web design can help you gain traction from mobile users. Considering that mobile devices contribute to 52.2% of this year’s global website traffic, this trend is unlikely to end anytime soon.
Wrapping Up
As more and more people become aware of the importance of having a website, the competition is getting fiercer than ever. To survive in this competitive environment, you need to have an eye-catching site capable of leaving a good first impression. By keeping up with the latest WordPress web design trends, you get an early start to fulfill the market’s demands and appeal to new visitors.