Responsive Web Design – What is it?

It is an approach that calls for the use of those practices and techniques which enable a web design respond according to the users’ preferences and allow them a user friendly experience. It advocates that a website must adjust itself to the device being used by the user. The implication here is that a site needs to be designed and developed in a manner that it automatically adjusts to varied browsing situations.

Principle behind Responsive Web Design

FLEXIBILITY TO ADJUST- This design approach relies heavily on the principle of flexibility. By this I mean that a design must have inbuilt flexible features that adjusts themselves according to the external circumstances. These external circumstances depend on the device or browser that is being used to view a website.

Elements of a Responsive Web Design

Flexible Grid Layout
Such a layout helps making a design responsive to a great extent. In a flexible grid layout, the size of items like pictures, content etc varies automatically according to the size of the screen/ browser. Their size also depends on the zoom in and zooms out values. However it must be assured that the position of the various elements remains fixed on the page on which the grid layout is applied. So whether a site is viewed on a desktop or an iPad, flexible grids helps to deliver a rich user experience.

Images
Another key aspect of a responsive web design is flexible images which are compatible with the flexible grid. It is known that designers have a tough time handling images and they are something that cannot be done away with, therefore, it is required to make them flexible and adaptable to various mediums. CSS comes to the rescue and its properties can be used to add more flexibility to images.

Media Queries
A media query consists of a media type and zero or more expressions that check for the conditions of particular media features. Media Queries and responsive web design go hand in hand. The former provides several ways to create different views of site in such a manner that it looks good on all mediums. It helps in the development of adaptive layouts which is essential to make a design more user friendly. Media queries can be used to adapt the web design to various screen sizes or browsers.

Conclusion

Given the fact that more and more users are accessing the web with devices other than computers and laptops, a responsive design appears as the best answer to cater to the particular needs of these users. At the same time it is clear that responsive web design can help a lot by solving usability and accessibility issues. When it comes to enhancing the user experience, responsive web design really is the need of the hour. It can customize a site to suit the users’ preferences so we can assume that responsive web design will continue to be used in the future for its usefulness.

What’s your opinion on responsive web design? Post a comment and let us know!