https://www.webbyawards.com/winners/2017/websites/website-features-and-design/best-user-experience/
The Webby Awards are a really interesting and fun way to look at how important good web design is. To think that there’s a whole award ceremony dedicated to quality experiences in websites or applications gets me excited about making sure my designs are the best they can be.
There are dozens of categories for winners on their website, including film, advertising and media, and of course, user experience design. So, I decided to see what website won the best user experience in 2017. The Webby this year went to Apple, for offering “the best user experience through innovative design and useful functionality.” This is interesting because it touches on a few things I read about on Usability.gov and other sites about web design. I’ve learned that a website shouldn’t simply usable to users, it should also be beautiful and even fun for the user.
Apple has always been known for its elegant and minimalist designs, so it’s no wonder their website for their products and services won this award. After all, the co-founder of the company, Steve Jobs, wasn’t really essential to engineering any of Apple’s products, but is the reason Apple is so focused on a beautiful design experience for its users.
Apple’s website is sleek, plain, and uses high resolution images that clearly display content and products. What’s interesting is that the content is organized in a centered-way, instead of the typical F-pattern. This works for Apple because their logo still displays at the top-left corner of pages, making it easy for users to move back to the home page. The contrasting is also especially good, the fonts are sharp and easy to read, and the images for their products are very large. There’s no cluttered content, no confusing hierarchy of information, and the result is a sleek and easy-to-use website. The Webby Awards chose a very deserving winner for their best user experience design.