What is Web Design? What is Web Development?

Whilst they are often used interchangeably, Web Design focuses on how a site looks and feels, whereas Web Development focuses on how it actually functions through code. Website Design is the creative process of planning a site's visual aesthetics and user experience (UX).

Web Designers focus on what users see on their screens and how they interact with it.

Key Responsibilities: Creating page layouts, selecting colour schemes, choosing typography (fonts), and designing navigation flows.

Goal: To make the website visually appealing, easy to navigate, and aligned with a brand's identity.

Common Tools: Designers typically use visual software like Figma, Adobe XD, Sketch, and Photoshop.

Web development is the technical process of building the site's structure and functionality using programming languages. Developers take the visual mockups from designers and turn them into a "live," working website.

Key Responsibilities: Writing code to make buttons work, managing databases, ensuring the site loads quickly, and making sure it functions correctly across different browsers.

Core Categories:

• Front-end: Developing the parts users interact with directly using HTML, CSS, and JavaScript.
• Back-end: Building the "behind-the-scenes" logic, servers, and databases using languages like Python, PHP, or Java.
• Goal: To ensure the website is functional, secure, and performs reliably.

Summary Comparison

Source: theAI Genius