Navigation menu design trends to look out for

Are you looking for inspiration to design the navigation menu of your new website? There’s a lot of different designs to choose from aren’t there? That’s a good thing given the fact that designing a navigation menu is one of the most important and hardest things to do when it comes to building a new website. That’s why we’ve taken the time to curate all of the current trends when it comes to navigation menu design. You’ll quickly see that while there are a lot of options to choose from, not every design will be relevant or appropriate for your business. Hopefully, however, this list will give you the inspiration you need to come up with a killer navigation menu for your business’ website.

Simplified navigation

Do you ever think that navigation menus are too complicated? That there are too many categories on them or that they contain too much information? If so then you might like simplified navigation menus. The thought is that most menus are too complicated when it comes down to it and that users don’t like be overwhelmed with choice. Instead, they just need a few options to choose from to find what they need. This actually works really well for most websites. But it won’t work for everyone. Ecommerce websites, for example, will struggle to make this option work.

Sticky navigations

Sticky navs are quite a common sight today. Even though they weren’t just a few years ago. In fact, you’ve probably seen a website that uses a sticky navigation recently. With a sticky navigation, the menu bar literally sticks to the top of the page when you scroll down the site rather than disappearing. This makes it much easier for users to use the nav bar to find a particular page even when they are towards the bottom of the website. The only problem is that a sticky nav can become slightly annoying, especially when it takes up valuable page space.

Sidebar navigations

There’s a good chance you’ve never actually seen a sidebar navigation. They are fairly rare and only really used by more “quirky” companies like design agencies in an effort to differentiate themselves. Rather than have the navigation in the normal place at the top of the page, it is positioned vertically down the left hand side. Cute, but it’s not practical.

Mega navigations

Been on an ecommerce store recently? Then chances are you have seen a mega navigation. These are the huge drop down navigations that contain dozens of different pages or categories in order to make it as easy as possible for users to find what they are looking for. They are practically essential for an ecommerce store because of the number of pages they contain, but they can also be useful for businesses that offer a lot of different services. Careful, however, because they can become overwhelming.

Need help creating your website’s menu? Our website designers can help. Get in touch today.