10+ Website Layout Ideas for Your First Design [With Examples]

Looking for great website layout ideas for your website? Read on to know and explore.

The most important thing to consider in the early stages of the website design process is the pattern and structure of the layout.

A functional website layout with interactive elements, clean design, and simple structure allows for a convenient navigation experience for the visitor.

Depending on your business and website goals, there are various creative website layout ideas that you can experiment with – perhaps a two-column layout for your product company or a grid layout for your photography website.

Here, we’ll explore 10+ free website layout ideas for your first website.

What is Website Layout?

A website’s layout defines the basic structure and the arrangement of various elements. It is a key component of website design that helps determine how the website will look to the user, which elements will be included, and which will draw attention.

A good website layout establishes clear navigation for the user, sets the content hierarchy, and helps communicate the brand messaging beyond the textual content on the site.

All in all, the goal of an interactive website layout is to make the website visually appealing, organize the content seamlessly, and improve the overall website experience for the user.

Benefits of Website Layout

Your website layout can make or break the user experience by influencing the readability, flow, and navigation of the content.

Here are the various benefits of prioritizing good website layout ideas-

• Improved user experience: A cluttered website design with a lot of content and media can quickly make users leave your website. Having a clean layout with well-arranged content and simple navigation is important for an excellent user experience.
• Enhanced content flow and readability: Choosing the right layout for your text content can improve the readability and flow. When the content flows smoothly, it makes up for an informative experience for the reader, encouraging them to interact with your website for longer.
• Ensures mobile-friendliness: Having a clean, responsive website layout will ensure that your website visitors have a great time accessing the website through mobile devices. A responsive layout will allow your website to adapt to different screens and devices.
• Gives weight to different content: A good website layout is all about arranging different content or sections based on their importance. You can easily highlight sections that should grab the audience’s attention, giving you more control of the design.

What Elements Should Your Website Layout Include?

There are various elements in a website layout that define the structure of the content and shape the way your website looks and functions. These include-

1. Website header

This is the topmost section of the website that the visitors notice first. It includes the logo of the brand, a navigation menu, search options, login buttons, and more.

2. Navigation menu

The navigation menu is a crucial element of the website homepage that helps users navigate through the site and find what they are looking for. You can choose from various structures and styles for your navigation menu, from scroll-triggered to sidebar, fixed, or mega menu.

3. Website content

This is the core section of your website that includes the main messaging, media, banners, forms, buttons, and more.

4. Website footer

The website footer contains any additional links or information about the brand, such as copyright notices, social media links, subscription forms, or calls to action to get the visitor to interact with the business.

Use headers and footers to create a clean and easy-to-navigate WordPress website. Learn How to Create a Header & Footer in WordPress.

Best Website Layout Ideas

Let’s explore the best modern website layout ideas to make your website visually stand out.

1. Single-Column Layout

First on our list is one of the simplest single-column layouts that arranges the content in a vertical scrollable column. The layout creates a crisp and minimal website design that keeps the focus on the content and visuals surrounded by plenty of white space.

This is a cool website layout idea when you want to emphasize certain elements and offer a comfortable visual experience to the visitors.

You can easily design this layout using the Scroll Sequence widget by Nexter Blocks, which gives you unlimited design possibilities and 100% responsive customizations for an attractive website.

Layout example: Scroll Sequence by Nexter Blocks

Ideal for:

• Personal blogs
• Minimalist designs
• Long-form content
• Mobile-friendly websites

2. Split Screen Layout

A split screen layout divides the screen into two or more sections, vertically or horizontally. With a vertical split, you can convey two different ideas or use two sections to support a similar idea.

You can enhance the visual experience of a split-screen layout using animations, parallax effects, and a flattering color palette to attract visitors.

This layout, for instance, can work extremely well for businesses to display their products/ services on one side with text content on the other.

Layout example: Red Light

Ideal for:

• Side-by-side website layout
• Static image text next to an animation/video
• Contrast between two or more content types
• Highlighting an image
• Giving two or more options for the visitor to choose from

3. Overlapping Elements

If you’re looking to do something unique for your website design, consider going beyond the traditional designs and opt for overlapping various elements for an innovative design.

With this layout, the elements can be stacked and overlapped with varying boundaries to present an interesting design. Whether text, image, or color, this layout is a great way to communicate more information in minimal space.

Layout example: Okalpha

Ideal for:

• Displaying too much information in little space
• Experimenting with layout boundaries
• Eliminating rigid layout format

Design a stunning website homepage that attracts visitors and gets them to stay. Learn How to Edit Your Homepage in WordPress.

4. Break Up Content Layout

If you have a media-intensive website, having too much content, visuals, and other design elements in a simple layout can get overwhelming.

In such a case, you can offset various columns and elements to make it visually appealing.

With this website layout idea, it is important to create a good balance between various elements and, at the same time, make them logically connected to make the website look neat.

Layout example: Alvogen

Ideal for:

• Content-heavy websites
• Giving a visual ladder effect

5. Animation Layout

If there’s one creative website layout idea that can immediately capture the audience’s attention and get them to engage, it is an animation layout.

Designing your website with animated elements and motion effects can help draw attention to specific elements or content and create an engaging visitor experience.

Creating an animation layout is easy with the right WordPress plugins, like the Animated Heading Titles by Nexter Blocks.

This widget will help you design engaging animations for your website headings with access to tons of design options and customizations.

Layout example: Handwrytten

Ideal for:

• Highlighting a certain element, perhaps product USP or pricing
• Showing a product in action

6. Grid Breaking Layout

A grid layout is another simple website layout idea that arranges the visuals and text content into grids. It is an excellent way to arrange the elements in a hierarchy and allow for equal distribution of photos, videos, and text on the website.

One way to use this technique is to give each element or content unit a separate section and space of its own.

Another interesting technique is to arrange symmetrical grids with no gaps between visuals for a more appealing website presence. It can work well as a clean portfolio website layout idea.

Layout example: Combine grids-Daily Inspiration

Ideal for:

• Blogs
• Media Galleries
• Photography websites or portfolios
• Images with text overlays
• Business websites

7. Full-Screen Photo Layout

A full-screen photo layout essentially uses an image or a video as the hero image on the website. This layout immediately draws the visitor in with an engaging visual placed front and centre, supported by a relevant and catchy heading to introduce the business offering.

What makes this personal website layout idea great is its responsiveness, allowing for easy adaptability to various screen sizes. This is an excellent photography website layout idea as it can offer a rich visual experience and create an impact on the user.

Layout example: Molly and Me Pecans

Ideal for:

• Emphasizing a product or its use case
• Pushing a strong branding
• Enabling faster decision-making for users

Make your media website stand out with interactive images and scrolling effects. Take ideas from the Top 19 Scroll Image Sequence Animation Inspirations.

8. Box-based Layout

A box-based layout is similar to a grid layout in that it neatly arranges the content on the website in various boxes. It often follows a structure with one large feature image or video with several smaller boxes underneath.

The content can be neatly arranged within the boxes, and each box can lead to a different webpage where visitors can learn more about a certain topic.

Layout example: TSX Broadway

Ideal for:

• Websites with several media types and file sizes
• Creating responsive visual layouts
• Providing a rich, visual perspective

9. Cards Layout

Similar to the box-based layout, the card layout also uses multiple boxes to display different elements and content. However, a major difference in this website layout idea is that the arrangement is non-hierarchical, all the information has equal attention, and there are no elements or sections that stand out from each other.

It is a modern website layout idea that structures different units of content – text, images, or video – in a single card, giving them a dedicated space. It is great for content-heavy websites as you can import information in separate cards, offering an intuitive yet simple browsing experience.

Layout example: Bose

Ideal for:

• Content-rich websites
• Vlog
• Online stores
• Business websites wanting a professional, coherent website design

10. Magazine Layout

Inspired by printed magazines, the magazine website layout is based on a multi-grid structure to create a complex layout.

This layout plays with the size of different elements and sections, placement, and design detailing. You can modify different sections individually to prioritize major content over smaller elements, cutting big pieces of information into digestible reads for a cleaner layout.

Layout example: Elle

Ideal for:

• News blogs
• Publications
• Online magazines

11. Asymmetrical Layout

This is another non-traditional website layout idea that divides the website into different sections – much like the split-screen layout – but this time, the sections are not divided equally.

It eliminates the standard layout rules to compartmentalize website elements into different, logically related sections and puts them unevenly.

The layout creates a dynamic visual experience with a non-uniform distribution of colour, space, and scale across the website.

This also helps you draw special attention to specific elements or content by giving more visual weight to that section.

Layout example: Underbelly

Ideal for:

• Advanced image galleries
• Placing multiple images and content types
• Portfolios
• Creating a balance between contrasting colors on the site

12. Modular Grid Layout

Finally, modular grid layout is another cool personal website layout idea that lets you divide your content into hierarchically equal sections.

You can create individual box-like sections for different content and experiment with the sizing and spacing to enhance its visual appeal.

The modular grid layout is also highly responsive for various devices and screen sizes, making it an excellent choice.

Layout example: Rock Werchter

Ideal for:

• Blogs
• Business websites
• Media Galleries

Create interactive media galleries that capture audience attention immediately using quality plugins. Check out the 6 Best Photo Image Gallery WordPress Plugins.

How to Choose the Right Website Layout?

Here are the various factors to consider when choosing the right simple website layout ideas-

• Determine which layout type will suit your business offerings the best. For this, check out competitors’ websites and research the industry leaders to take inspiration from their website layouts.
• Experiment with different layout ideas to check their feasibility. You can visualize various layouts to understand which is the most visually effective way to arrange your content.
• You don’t necessarily have to stick with one website layout type throughout the website. To make your website more attractive and engaging, you can choose up to 3 different styles for different pages and improve the look of the website.
• Make sure that your chosen website layout is highly responsive and easily adapts to different devices and screen sizes. This enhances website accessibility and user experience.
• Be consistent with your brand color palette throughout the layout to ensure a uniform website experience and branding.

Wrapping Up

When designing a website, coming up with a good website layout idea will define how your website looks and attract the audience.

A clean, professional, yet creative website layout that aligns with your business will help impact the visitors, encouraging them to keep engaging with your website.

You can take inspiration from the different website layout ideas mentioned in this article to create one that makes your website stand out and create an intuitive website experience.

One other way to improve the functionality and visual appeal of your website is to use Nexter Blocks by POSIMYTH Innovations. This all-in-one plugin gives you access to 90+ Gutenberg blocks.

From visual elements and navigation menus to designing, animations, and customizations, there is a block for everything.

FAQs on Website Layout Ideas