Web Development Trends to Look Ahead in 2023

Top Web Development Trends to Watch Out for in 2023

1. The Rise of Mobile-first Development

We’re living in a time when people like to access the internet via mobile devices – like smartphones and tablets – rather than desktops and laptops. According to StatCounter, by November 2022, more than 60% of the entire web traffic came through mobile devices. Hence, every business should optimize their websites for mobile.

Moreover, this also makes it mandatory for businesses to have a mobile app. Now, there are several things that go into web development optimized for mobile devices. To ensure mobile-first development, the development team must:

• Add CSS queries for changing screen elements based on device capabilities.
• Focus more on vertical screen orientations.
• Have meta viewport tags that can help web browsers in rescaling websites.
• Use web layout models like Flexbox.

Unlike other web development trends on the list, mobile-first development isn’t a trend that’s going to subdue anytime soon, until and unless mobile devices go out of fashion, which is something that isn’t going to happen for many years to come.

Consequently, your business should be well-equipped to target mobile devices.

2. Chatbots 2.0

Since the emergence of AI, there has been one segment that has surely benefitted from all of it; chatbots. A chatbot allows businesses to take care of client interactions on their websites and apps.

Chatbots are deployed for banking, sales, requirement gathering, and so on. Over the short run of chatbots, they have evolved fast, and for the better. So far, the best-case scenario for deploying a chatbot is providing 7×24 customer service.

Chatbots have become intelligent over time. They are no longer limited to encouraging customer engagement but these virtual robots can now streamline customer service processes.

Moreover, the advancements in AI, ML (machine learning), DL (deep learning), and NLP (natural language processing) have boosted their ability to engage in complex conversations with humans on their own, i.e., without the need for human involvement.

Chatbots 2.0 can start conversations, engage customers, guide them around, and ensure they get 1:1 responses. Salespeople and marketers can take it from there.

ChatGPT and its alternatives are here with a bang!

3. Parallax Scrolling

Parallax scrolling is a new trend in website development, where the content in the background of a webpage moves at a different pace than the content in the foreground during scrolling.

Adding parallax scrolling is tricky for web designers as it doesn’t go well with the mobile-first development approach. That is because most mobile screens don’t provide support for the feature yet.

Nonetheless, this won’t stop developers to integrate it into newer websites and webapps. A workaround for this problem is to turn the effect off on mobile devices. One way of doing so is to use media queries in a website’s CSS.

4. Voice Search is Getting Better, Bigger

The next name on our list of the top web development trends in 2023 is based on Search by Voice. Google introduced voice search to make life simpler for people by avoiding writing lengthy search queries. Moreover, it allows them to search for specific queries and also to search quickly.

Today, we have virtual assistants like Google Voice Search, Apple Siri, Microsoft Cortana, Amazon Alexa, and a slew of others. Generation Z and Generation Alpha are especially in love with virtual assistants.

In a recent report published on Hootsuite, 22.5% of all internet users between the ages of 16 to 64 use a voice assistant. The remarkable thing is that this huge chunk doesn’t even include Gen Alpha who are surfing the web more than their parents and older siblings.

17% of men and 16.3% of women in the 55-64 age group have ditched typing search queries for voice search.

Owing to the rise in voice search and the use of virtual assistants, developers need to optimize their websites and web apps for voice search for navigation.

Doing so is not just a trend but also essential for enabling people with hearing and vision problems to access the web easily.

More and more websites and web apps are adding accessibility features to allow even people with disabilities to access and use them conveniently.

5. Glassmorphism is the New Kid in the Town

Since web development is a rapidly evolving field, developers and designers are constantly on the lookout for introducing something novel, innovative, and different. One of the recent standouts in website development is the introduction of glassmorphism.

Also known as glass textures, glassmorphism fills web designs with depth and texture. It allows web developers and designers to combine a blur effect with opaque pixels to invoke the feeling of seeing through a glass in users.

Apple introduced galssmorphism in 2020. Next, Microsoft did it with Windows 11. The trend is likely to mushroom and sprawl in 2023.

The USP of glass textures is that the design allows buttons, sliders, and other UI elements to stand out.

6. PWAs are Getting Popular

The term “PWAs” stands for progressive web apps. It is a recently born web development trend that is going strong over time, and will continue gaining momentum in 2023.

A progressive web application offers the best of both worlds; the flexibility of traditional web applications and the ease-of-use of standalone built-in offline apps.

PWAs are made possible by the incessant development of modern APIs. This allows anyone to use an app from anywhere, anytime, and on any device with a single codebase.

Progressive web apps try to bridge the gap between not requiring active internet connectivity to enjoying doing things on your mobile devices, like taking pictures, doomscrolling on Facebook, incessantly loading reels on Instagram, playing co-op in PUBG, and so on, and getting a seamless, offline-like experience.

Many believe that, in the longer run, PWAs will replace traditional web apps completely. Maybe some day, but not in 2023. Or may be?

7. The Key to Page Speed Optimization is to Code It

Although we have come to a time when writing code is not mandatory at all to develop a website with options like Wix and WebFlow, coding webpages for page speed optimization is still an essential act to excel in website development.

Web connectivity is getting faster and faster and so does the urge for users to get fast experiences. The slower a website or web app loads the more the chances are of the user abandoning it.

Google recognized it and added page speed as an important factor in ranking websites for Google SERPs. Consequently, slow-loading webpages are even penalized, especially those that load sluggishly on mobile devices.

According to WebFx, a website ranking on the first page of Google SERPs takes merely 1.65 seconds to load.

Also, 40% of users will abandon a webpage if it takes more than 3 seconds to load. Thus, it is essential for your webpage to load quickly.

There are lots of things that web developers need to do to ensure optimizing page speed in addition to coding for it. This includes compressing images, condensing code, and using a CDN.

8. Conventional Programming Languages Join Web Development with WebAssembly

WebAssemly is a novel way of writing code for the web. It allows unconventional web development programming languages like C# and Rust to run on a website. Instead of replacing JavaScript, WebAssembly goes astonishingly well with JS.

The major standout for WebAssembly is that it allows code written in different languages to run faster on the web at native-like speed. In fact, it is more than just a web development trend to look out for in 2023 and years beyond.

That’s because the W3C WebAssembly Working Group and Community Group are developing it as a web standard. As a consequence, major web browser vendors provide support for the technology.

Two of the most popular examples of WebAssembly deployment are Figma and Google Earth. WebAssembly facilitates running performant, resource-intensive tasks over the web like video editing, video gaming, and CAD applications.

9. WordPress is Still on the Top

May of 2023 will be a huge occasion for WordPress as it is going to complete 2 decades in website development and management. Even after 2o years, WordPress is just as relevant to web development as it has ever been before. Thus, it is one of the perennial web development trends.

Developing websites in WordPress allows businesses to save a lot without sacrificing accessibility. WP does most of the lifting when it comes to developing and operating a website with a wide range of pre-made themes, an extensive plugin system, server hosting, domain purchasing, and CMS.

Overall, about 43% of all known websites use WordPress. Not all websites use a content management system. However, for those who do, 13 out of every 20 websites are powered by WP. One of the main reasons for WordPress’s huge popularity is being an open-source software.

A website can be about anything. It can be the front desk for a grocery delivery business or a gaming and dating platform, a bankable information source, a massive online repository for developers, and whatnot! WordPress powers them all.

1 out of every 5 WP websites also uses WooCommerce, which is a powerful plugin to make websites and webapps build with WordPress sales-ready.

To sum it up and avoid digressing, leveraging WordPress in web development is almost necessary, especially when it comes to eCommerce.

10. It Never Gets Easier, You Just Keep Getting Better

Unlike other trends on our list of the top web development trends in 2023, this is less of a web development trend and more of a web development best practice.

Gone are the days when web developers were only required to have the knowledge of HTML to create websites. Today, web devs need to know a galore of tools and technologies alongside the trio of web development, which is JavaScript, HTML, and CSS.

These technologies include PHP, jQuery, CSS and HTML frameworks like Bootstrap, Foundation, and Tailwind CSS, programming language frameworks such as Django and Laravel, WordPress, Angular, and so on.

The recent developments in technologies like artificial intelligence, machine learning, AR & VR, web 3.0, IoT, and blockchain are also influencing the way websites and web apps are being developed. Therefore, developers need to tirelessly expand their skill sets to stay relevant and job-ready.

Check out 10 emerging mobile app technologies to look out for in 2023.

Why Do You Need a Web Development Company Like Apptunix?

Web development is a complex process, especially for someone unfamiliar with the digital landscape. Moreover, there are so many options available that one can easily get confounded with which ones to choose and which ones to leave.

If you feel baffled tackling web development tasks on your own then you need to hire an experienced web development company like Apptunix.

We are a global mobile app development company with overseas offices in the USA (Texas) and the UAE (Dubai).

Conclusion

Web development is already big but getting bigger by the day. The expansion of the web is closely associated with the development of the internet which is getting faster. We are already on our way to web 3.0.

Therefore, to stay relevant in cyberspace, one needs to have an impeccable website to demonstrate presence over the web, and that can only be ensured by following the best web development practices.