Web Design Blogs Every Web Designer Must Follow – ColorWhistle

If you are looking for design inspirations, ideas and technical tips and tricks, these 10 web design blogs are great places to go looking!

Any creative process needs that little something to get started.

An insect could inspire an artist, a babbling brook is fodder for a poet, falling leaves can get the creative juices flowing for a fashion designer – but it all starts with something.

For website and graphic designers the creative process is driven as much by their own creative inclination as it is by the business’ need.

So how does one get inspired on a daily basis?

Is it even possible?

This is where website design and website development blogs come into play.

They can provide both design inspiration and technical help; essential when you are in a field as competitive as website development.

Best Web Design Blogs

With that in mind, I have put together a list of web design blogs that you could follow in 2018 just for that extra bit of inspiration. Also, this post makes a great companion piece for my previous blog SEO Trends in 2017.

1. Webdesigner Depot

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Webdesigner Depot gives you daily news, views, resources and techniques related to website design and website development. These daily posts are delivered to your inbox every morning.

There are detailed articles on web design like how to create hero images, polls for things ranging from when you will start to use CSS grid layout to Is VR the new Flash, and resources like updates on Spark Video or interviews with the who’s who in the business (like Jon von Tzetchner of Vivaldi). There are even cartoons to relax your mind.

You can follow them on Twitter, see updates on Facebook, or just simply enjoy the daily updates that are bound to help you out.

2. CSS Tricks

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CSS Tricks, which was started in 2007 by Chris Coyier, is the resource to turn to when you need CSS tips and tricks. Although the blog has evolved to include other aspects of website design and website development, it remains the best resource for all your CSS needs.

An example is one of Chris’ latest entries on the subject of CSS Color Level 4. The blog also shares other resources like design trends featuring non-rectangular headers. The design with the jagged edges is certainly something to think about. As the subtitle on the blog says “Dashes of flair to kick up your designs a notch”.

As a designer you can feel those creative wheels turn in your head, no? The best feature on the blog is the detailed trials on different aspects of CSS. Like the latest on PostCSS where Chris writes about his experiences of working with PostCSS. There are detailed code snippets, rationale and explanations that make it worthwhile to subscribe to this blog.

3. Smashing Magazine

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This one, like Webdesign Depot, seems to be a favorite with several designers. Smashing Magazine is a great site with beautifully and clearly demarcated categories for different aspects of web design. You get section for Coding, for design, for mobile, for graphics, for UX design and for WordPress. The subsections are also clearly marked making navigation simple.

Of course, the blog has been around since 2006 and hence all the material! For any web designer who wants to go in really deep into their craft, this is the resource to head to. There are books and e-books that you can buy, newsletter you can subscribe to and workshops and seminars for which you can book tickets as well.

Clearly, this is the best website for web development resources (if you have a bit of OCD, then this is gold – it is so wonderfully organized!). One of their latest posts is for Out of the Box design inspiration and the graphics they curate surely inspire.

4. ColorWhistle

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Here’s one you should be familiar with, ColorWhistle is a web design and SEO company in Coimbatore and has been provided the web with stunning designs for several years now. We update blogs regularly with content that will genuinely help you to keep improving your web design and SEO efforts – whether or not you decide to hire our services. We hope you’ve bookmarked this page!

5. Design Bombs

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If I liked Smashing Magazine for its organization, I love Design Bombs for its clean layout. This website gives you not just informative blogs but also some great themes and equally great deals on various other resources (for example 20% off on TemplateMonster).

This blog covers a whole range of web design topics from WordPress to roundup of website designs and more. The site even has an entire page dedicated to design inspiration.

6. Hongkiat

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If you aren’t using this resource yet, then you probably should. Hongkiat features several contributors who provide multiple viewpoints on the same subject. There are also distinct categories like technology where contributors share their know-how on specific subjects; for example, how to create custom slash commands in Slack.

There are some great tips for WordPress themes, resources for wordpress web developers and so much more. The best part of this website is that it allows you to reap the benefits of multiple contributions on the same subject, all neatly linked to each other.

7. Design Shack

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This is a beautiful clean layout which makes you want to click on the topic and read. Visually Design Shack features the latest blog on the top of the page and other blogs follow. There are over 3,000 blogs featured under more than 11 categories. There is a design gallery to choose from where you can get inspiration for subjects ranging from magazines to apps.

You can subscribe to their newsletter and their community is has over 15,000 members which means that you get to choose from a wide variety of inputs. You can buy icons, submit your creations, get inspired.

In short, your website design journey is sure to become easier. I particularly liked their post on trying something other than white for backgrounds of websites. More inspiration our way (the asymmetrical background is a great idea to build on for an art gallery client or even a restaurant client).

8. Design Taxi

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This isn’t an exclusive website development or website design blog. But this is the blog to go to for ideas on everything. No, really. The Design Taxi blog covers a wide range of topics that can activate your creativity cells.

Even just browsing through some of the Infographics they curate is enough to get the ideas started. This is especially helpful if you are looking to add more content to your website in the form of articles or videos or even just pictures.

The posts on Design Taxi are fun and unconventional but isn’t that what the creative process is all about?

9. LogoDesignLove

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This is one of the top blogs for logo design stories and inspirations. Branding is a critical exercise for any business, even one that is primarily online. Hence along with the website design, you will be involved in creating the brand for the website as well.

A logo is pretty much the brand. The Nike swoosh or the three point star of Mercedes Benz are universally recognized. Thus for web designers who are also involved in graphic design and logo design, LogoDesignLove has some great stories that can inspire you as well.

10. Logobird

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This blog has excellent resources for logo designers and graphic designers with guides on choosing designers, inspirational designs and artist stories, and they also compiled a handy list of the best logo design blogs available.

11. Vandelay Designs

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According to their website, Vandelay Designs aims to equip small businesses and entrepreneurs with the tools that they need to make their venture a success. Their blog is designed to be educational, providing ideas and technical details of various aspects of website design and web content development.

They also provide a vast array of tools – design graphics, UI kits, PSDs, brushes, vectors, mockup templates, responsive web templates and much more. In addition, there is a lot of reading material in the form of e-books and marketing material.

Their blog covers a wide range of topics including tips and tricks for creating design styles, information on promotions on websites like iStock, free items like Photoshop gradients. This particular blog caught my eye and not just because it is recent and featured on the top of the page – How to borrow design ideas from a website without downright copying it.

For putting this list together I went through quite a few blogs that are out there. This list is reflective of what I as a website designer feel provides some of the best resources we need in our job – inspiration, ideas and the actual tools.

12. WordPress News

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A good place to start is with WordPress’ own blog. WordPress is of course the tool that a lot of webmasters and web design companies will work with and being up-to-date with the latest news, rules and tips can help you to stay one step ahead of the competition.

13. Shawn Barry Creative

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Shawn Barry is a web designer who runs his own blog where he offers tips, advice and tutorials. There are many blogs like this on the web but Shawn’s is especially interesting and useful and his YouTube channel will introduce you to some of the more advanced concepts within web design. Well worth checking out!

14. Chase Jarvis

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Chase Jarvis is mainly a photographer who has become very well-known online after interviewing the likes of Tim Ferriss. His blog is filled with all kinds of design-related content though (including web design) as well as photography advice. Photography advice is something that more advanced web designers should definitely look into as it can offer an endless resource of custom, professional images.

15. UX Booth

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As the name suggests, UX Booth is all about the user experience. This is an important aspect of web design to consider and a very modern view point. There’s a thriving community here and a lot of great advice that can help to make your user experience more seamless and intuitive.

16. Smart Passive Income

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To learn all there is to know about web design, you shouldn’t just be reading about web design. Why? Because web design is predicated on other factors – such as SEO and marketing. Smart Passive Income is one of the best online introductions to digital marketing, all written in a friendly and accessible manner. There’s a lot of content here on web design too and a lot of content that is indirectly relevant to your web design.

17. SpeckyBoy Design Magazine

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Like Shawn Barry Creative, SpeckyBoy began life as the personal blog of a web designer. Since then it has somewhat ‘exploded’ and now generates a huge amount of traffic. It’s a great place for getting quick tips and useful advice you likely didn’t know – for instance ways to save time using PhotoShop. Add this to your pull list and you’ll constantly be learning new skills and tricks.

18. Design You Trust

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If it’s a constant stream of content you’re looking for, then the hourly updated collective design blog and community Design You Trust won’t see you wrong! This is a fantastic place to dip into from time to time if you want ideas and inspiration for design that extends well beyond just web design. Here you can also find information on publishing, video design and more – much of which can serve a number of purposes for web designers and business owners as well!

19. Collective Ray

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You can never stop learning when you’re involved in web design. Collective Ray have chosen the best web design blogs you must follow in 2016. Their RSS feeds to make helps us to keep updates on these many web design blogs.

Web design Blogs – Wrapping Up

Other than these blogs, other essential blogs for wordpress web developers would be SEO blogs like moz.com and backlinko.com, the latter is very much a source of phenomenal and tested SEO strategies. I didn’t add them to the list, just to keep the list purely design oriented. But as providers of turnaround web solutions, blogs on SEO, SEM, digital marketing and everything else should also probably make it on the list.

Which is a great idea to work on – a comprehensive list of must-subscribe blogs for web development companies. Perhaps even a list on responsive web design blogs. This is the beauty of blogging. It becomes a platform to share ideas, provide inspiration, get inspired, teach and learn.

Some other web design blogs that caught my eye and are useful to us:

If there are any particular web design and development blogs out there that can get on this list, let me know in the comments section.