What screen resolution should I design web pages???

Question

I am just getting started on web designing but I am so confused as to what screen size I should design them on. I use Windows XP with a screen resolution of 1024 x 768. The pages look fine but others using 20 in. LCD 1600 x 1200 say it's blurry. Others say it looks good.

What screen size should I have MY PC on when designing?
What a mess!

Answer 1

I always make my pages main area 760 pixels wide.



This is so that it will fit in an 800x600 screen nicely and not go crazy if the page needs a scroll bar and also look good on a 1024 x 800.



I used to advocate the scaling of pages, but now that larger monitor sizes are becoming very common if a page is stretched to 100% on a monitor like mine it can make lines of text much longer than is comforably readable.



Something you learn studying design is to keep text to a maximum of around 15-17 words per line otherwise the eye looses track of where it is.



i do however always make the page content centred, mainly for aesthetic value.

Answer 2

This is simple. Always design your web pages for the lowest possible resolution ; i.e 800 x 600. As you have to cater for the majority of browsers who only have low resolution - this way your website will be accessable to a lot more people.



Try to minimize your content on any 1 page - make links if you need to - this will refresh the page quicker and make people attentive to your content rather than wait 20-30 secs for all items to be display. Particular attention should br to reduce picture resolution or file size. Jpeg is the industry standard but you can still get away with Bit map and Gif for logo types and small pics.



I still prefer to use CRT for viewing design work - the definition is much higher than most LCD.



try this equation for size 500 million computers worldwide ; 60 % are still on dial up and using 16 bit color.

Answer 3

Well nowadays we have the greatest variation of screens ever. They used to use java scripts to check your resolution and serve you html based on that. The answer is no screen size. You should use CSS and relative measures such as percentages, and em measurements. This of course all fails if you are chopping up images and using them to make your site in its entirety, but then again that is bad practice.

Answer 4

The default screen size used is 800x600.