What is Responsive Web Design?

Browsing the internet with a mobile device has increased by 192.5% since 2010.

The experience of browsing a website from your comfortable home office compared with browsing on your mobile phone is a whole lot different.

Mobile users surf while waiting in line, sitting on the bus, even while going out for a drink. The focus of a mobile visitor differs significantly from a desktop user. A mobile user doesn’t want to keep staring at a loading screen and has absolutely no interest in a whole bunch of irrelevant content.

This is something you have to keep in mind when deciding on building a website. When you design a mobile website, “focus” content is king.

What is “Responsive” Web Design?

There are many different kinds of devices, and they all come with their own screen resolution. Because it is almost an impossible task to make a new website for each kind of device (mobile, tablet, desktop…), some creative industry experts came up with the idea to create Responsive Web Design.

“Responsive Web design is the approach that suggests that design and development should respond to the user’s behavior and environment based on screen size, platform, and orientation. The practice consists of a mix of flexible grids and layouts, images and an intelligent use of CSS media queries.” – Smashing Magazine

Smashing Magazine also put out some very handy guidelines for responsive web design.