A trend is only worth following if it helps your visitor do something: understand what you offer, trust you, or book. Here is what we are actually using on client sites this year, and what we are leaving out.
Worth using
Big, confident typography
Headlines are getting larger and shorter. A clear promise in five words, set big, does more than a paragraph nobody reads. Variable fonts make this cheap: one file covers every weight, so you get strong type without slowing the page down.
Bento layouts
Content arranged in a grid of cards of different sizes, like a lunch box. It works because it lets people scan: one big card for the main thing, smaller ones for the rest. It also collapses cleanly into a single column on a phone. Our own projects page uses it.
Real photos over stock
Visitors recognise stock photos instantly, and they trust them less. Photos of your actual team, venue, food or vehicles win every time, even if they are less polished. For Mosaic by L’Adresse, the site is built around their own event photography, and it shows.
Motion with a purpose
Small entrance animations, hover states that confirm what is clickable, a smooth reveal when a section scrolls in. Modern CSS can now drive animation from scroll position with no JavaScript at all, which keeps it fast. The rule: motion should explain something, and it must respect the "reduce motion" setting on the visitor’s device.
Rounded, soft interfaces
Pill buttons, rounded cards, generous spacing. It reads as friendly and modern, and larger rounded buttons are simply easier to tap on a phone.
One strong accent colour
Instead of a rainbow, one bold colour used for the few things that matter: the main button, a highlight, a badge. It tells people where to look.
Accessibility as a design choice
Readable contrast, visible focus states, real text instead of text inside images. In the EU, the European Accessibility Act made this a legal requirement for many consumer websites in 2025. Designed in from the start, it costs almost nothing.
Speed as a feature
The most underrated trend. A site that appears instantly feels premium. Every trend above is worth nothing if it adds three seconds of loading. See our web development best practices for how we keep sites fast.
Sites that AI assistants can read
More people now ask ChatGPT or Google’s AI Overviews before they click anything. Clean HTML, clear headings, structured data and an llms.txt file help those tools understand and mention your business correctly.
Worth skipping
- Scroll-jacking. Taking control of scrolling to force a "cinematic" experience. People hate it, especially on phones.
- Autoplay video with sound. Nobody has ever been happy about this.
- Huge hero sliders. The second slide is almost never seen. Pick one message.
- Glass effects everywhere. Blurred, transparent panels look nice in a mockup and are hard to read in real life.
- Chatbots that pop up in two seconds. Let people look around first.
The one question to ask
Before adding anything to your site, ask: does this help someone understand, trust or book? If not, leave it out. Most great websites are defined more by what they left out.
Layouts also have to survive every screen size, which we cover in responsive web design techniques. If you want a site that uses the good parts of 2026 and none of the rest, start a project with us.
