Standard Website size

andrwleong · Mar 10th, 2008, 15:29

Hi all

I was wondering what the standard website size should be for a website to meet good usability.

unitedcraig · Mar 10th, 2008, 15:40

A lot of people say that most people should design for the 1024x768 size, however, there are a lot of users still with 800x600, a lot of schools and colleges use this size, as do a lot of users in poorer countries.

The best thing to do would be to get some analyzing software in your site, sites such as
http://www.statcounter.com/
let you put a small bit of code in your site which analyise your user's stats such as operating system, browser, screen size etc, this can help decide on your screen width.

Hope this helps

Craig

unitedcraig · Mar 10th, 2008, 15:41

http://www.anybrowser.com/ScreenSizeTest.html

This is also a good site that lets you see what you site looks in different size monitors

Craig

andrwleong · Mar 10th, 2008, 15:59

woooow thanks for the advice and links people. Your all again very helpful

May be 800x600 because it will be alright in both cases?

as were 1024x768 would mess up on 800x600.

do you agree?

unitedcraig · Mar 10th, 2008, 16:51

sorry what exactly do you mean by this, are you going for the 800 or 1024??

pagerss · Mar 10th, 2008, 16:53

No andrwleong,

800*600 is not so recommended except if your site is for iPhone or such device

In some other topic here in webforumz i see that 800*600 browser resolutions is less than 5%. If you can do resizable ok but in other 95% you will have a lot of empty space.
Good luck

unitedcraig · Mar 10th, 2008, 16:56

Pagerss, i agree to a point, but if you actually read the whole post

Quote:

Always design for the lowest common denomonator.... in most cases 800 x 600, but in our 'techy' case, 1024 x 768

You have missed this

It all depends on the site, as this is a site for web developers and designers there is a large percentage with large resolutions, but your individual site may differ

craig

frinkky · Mar 10th, 2008, 17:58

Play it safe, analyse your own web stats and make a decision on your figures, not someone else's. If its 5% do you really want to lose 5% of your revenue?

andrwleong · Mar 10th, 2008, 20:34

hahaha your all so helpful.

I am trying to follow good web desgin practice in developing an e-commerce website. Developing a website that is usable by all should attract and keep customers (making it sticky)

So the plan is develop a website that will fit comfortably for everyone, unless they use a mobile phone that is lol.

andrwleong · Mar 10th, 2008, 20:40

oo people i found a great source.

you should all check this out

http://www.hobo-web.co.uk/tips/25.htm

frinkky · Mar 10th, 2008, 21:54

Check this out: http://www.themaninblue.com/experime...olutionLayout/

Cater for everyone

Rachel · Mar 11th, 2008, 04:05

I have found that my answer to this changes depending on the target audience for the site. I have one client who is targeting older (50 + years old) people as his target market. He is not expecting them to have the latest technology so we built the site to the 800 spec.

For a tech savvy audience, though, I would not do this.

So I would say the answer depends. :-)

Rachel

Monie · Mar 11th, 2008, 04:47

If you have plenty of time, you could develop/design 2 layout (CSS), one for 800x600 and one for 1024x768 and code your page so that it will detect what size the user screen are and use the IE Conditional to select which CSS File to use

danny322 · Mar 11th, 2008, 09:23

How do u do that monie? Conditionals?

Monie · Mar 12th, 2008, 04:38

Pardon me danny, I was giving you the wrong solution there!
What I want to say is use javascript to detect the user screen resolution and apply the CSS file according to what they screen size are!

If their screen size is 800x600, use style1.css file, if 1024x768 use style2.css file.
Do you get what I mean?

Again sorry for the confusion

Cheers...

frinkky · Mar 12th, 2008, 04:49

Or just design your pages to look good at 75opx wide

then play around for the next 18months till 1024 is REALLY the new 800.

Bah, its all hypothetical crap - design you site as you see fit. I like fixed width (750px) and i'll wait till someone says go bigger they look **** before i change.

Monie · Mar 12th, 2008, 06:44

That means doing the work 2 times.. not a problem if IE and FF understand what you want

hugepixels · Mar 13th, 2008, 03:55

In most of my projects I used 800 x 600 but I recently I decided to play on the middle like 900-1000 width.

Monie · Mar 13th, 2008, 04:57

I develop my site for wide screen monitors!
But with a flexible content, I have view them in 1024x768 with no problemo