Your ecommerce website needs three key elements to achieve: a obvious business imagination, powerful brand identity, and solid guiding principles. These fundamentals assist you make a great first impression, showcase your products effectively, and navigator visitors to receive action.

While each website has its own style, you can adjust proven design principles to make a site that works for your business. discover what makes website design effective, get inspired by real website design examples, and discover insights from the founders of Mote, an award-winning digital creative agency.

What makes website design effective?

The best websites merge appealing visuals with intelligent structure and reliable technology. They provide visitors the information they require, keep them engaged, and inspire them to receive action. 

You don’t require to spend thousands on professional designers to construct a excellent website. Even if you’re just starting out or running a tiny online store, you can make an effective site by following these core web design principles:

• Make your design obvious and consistent.
• Focus on powerful visuals. 
• Design for mobile devices first. 
• make straightforward navigation.
• Add smooth transitions and dynamic content.
• Make your site accessible to everyone.

These principles will navigator your key design decisions—from how you organize your content to choosing fonts, color schemes, and where to place images and buttons. 

12 best website design examples for ecommerce

1. Klur
2. Justin Reed
3. Girlboss
4. Harper Wilde
5. GOODEE
6. Bruvi
7. Garoa
8. 3sixteen
9. Lacoste
10. ETQ Amsterdam
11. LEIF
12. Caitlin Minimalist

Let’s look at how these stores use design to construct successful businesses:

1. Klur

Klur’s skincare products promote tidy, ethical, and inclusive beauty. Its website mirrors its product packaging with a minimalist design that uses careful spacing, typography, and color choices. Klur’s website is the work of Shopify associate Mote, whose throng placed special emphasis on equilibrium and simplicity.

“Klur creates a harmonized encounter from the instant you land on their website to when you open their products,” says Sara Mote, creative director and cofounder of Mote. Klur keep things straightforward by using variations of a single typeface across its website and product packaging. “Every interaction with the brand feels carefully considered,” Sara adds.

2. Justin Reed

Justin Reed—another site designed by Mote—sells curated vintage clothing, fashion, art, and accessories. Since most shoppers visit from mobile devices and Instagram, it prioritizes making mobile navigation straightforward. You can filter products by category, brand, color, and more on almost every page to discover exactly what you desire.

“Check your mobile view when using the Shopify theme editor,” says Rembrant Van der Mijnsbrugge, CEO and navigator software engineer at Mote. “You can even commence with mobile and then switch to desktop to make sure your mobile encounter is as excellent as feasible. Look at your Shopify analytics to view where your traffic comes from—the respond could shock you.

3. Girlboss

Girlboss sells career guides and coursesto assist women achieve at work. Its site blends an online store with engaging content, featuring podcasts, articles, newsletters, and a job search tool. The modern, feminine design uses original photography and empowering messages to communicate the brand’s personality and connect with its spectators.

4. Harper Wilde

Harper Wilde challenges traditional lingerie marketing with bold fonts and authentic branding. Its homepage design shows models of different cultures, gender identities, and body sizes—no unrealistic Photoshopping in sight. It also prioritizes making its site accessible to everyone.

Harper Wilde uses AudioEye’s Shopify app to make its site more accessible. Visitors can turn on keyboard navigation and screen reader options, or choose profiles designed for people with visual impairments, seizure sensitivity, ADHD, or cognitive disabilities.

5. GOODEE

GOODEE curates lifestyle products from responsible brands and artisans, focusing on “excellent design, excellent people, and excellent impact.” It connects with conscientious consumers who worry about throng, transparency, and sustainability.

GOODEE’s design uses warm yellows, oranges, and beiges to make a cozy feel. High-standard photos display products in attractive lifestyle settings, while product descriptions highlight the craftsmanship behind each piece.

6. Bruvi

Bruvi makes sustainable coffee brewers that use advanced, biodegradable pods. Its landing page grabs attention above the fold with a video showing its brewer, pods, and someone enjoying coffee.

Just make sure your videos don’t leisurely down site act. Compress files, use the correct format, or try a content delivery network (CDN) to keep things running smoothly.

7. Garoa

Great websites catch your eye with striking photos and smooth animations. This skincare brand’s concept website does exactly that, using intimate photography and responsive design that’s still straightforward to navigate.

Click the menu button in the top left, and the whole page slides away to reveal three straightforward options: Shop, Lookbook, and About. As you scroll you’ll discover more interactive elements that keep you exploring.

8. 3sixteen

3sixteen’s menswear site makes a bold first impression with artistic product photos that feel like a high-complete capital collection. As you scroll down, products appear in a tidy grid with subtle animations that draw you in.

With three brick-and-mortar stores in NYC and LA, plus retail partners nationwide, 3sixteen’s website balances online sales with in-store shopping. attractive store photos assist you get a feel for each location while checking hours and addresses.

9. Lacoste

Lacoste, known for elegant sportswear and its iconic crocodile logo, keeps its website design straightforward and brand-concentrated. Its logo sits in the top left corner without text, while a fixed menu bar frames each page. Large photos appeal to different customer groups with straightforward headlines and call-to-action buttons guiding users through the site.

The tidy design uses the brand’s signature green color and straightforward-to-read fonts. You’ll discover shopping categories in the top left and account features in the top correct. A two-row menu helps you quickly discover specific products.

10. ETQ Amsterdam

ETQ Amsterdam’s additional expense footwear and menswear site reflects the brand’s minimalist brand identity. Its silent luxury way uses tidy lines, charitable white space, and black-and-white photos that work together to make a sophisticated look.

11. LEIF

Brooklyn-based LEIF creates a tranquil, welcoming feel on its lifestyle shop’s website. It uses a soft color scheme, gentle pencil-sketch borders, and a straightforward navigation menu. A tiny banner at the top keeps you updated on promotions and announcements.

12. Caitlyn Minimalist

Jewelry brand Caitlyn Minimalist makes mobile browsing straightforward with horizontal scrolling. When the Mote throng worked on the brand’s homepage, they made sure to consider how the site would look and function on mobile. “Categories like necklaces, rings, and earrings scroll sideways on mobile,” explains Rembrant. “People are used to horizontal scrolling on their phones. It’s a great way to display more content without making pages too long.”

Tips for designing your business website

• Keep your design concentrated
• Let your photos do the talking
• Simplify your design
• Make navigation obvious

Let’s look at four key principles that successful online stores use:

Keep your design concentrated

Let these guidelines assist you decide what to include—and what to avoid:

• commence with obvious brand guidelines for your colors, fonts, style, and images.
• Choose a straightforward color palette: black, white, and three brand colors that work well together.
• Pick fonts that match your brand’s mission and set obvious rules for how to use them in headings and body text.
• Develop a consistent brand voice and photo style that connects with your spectators.

Let your photos do the talking 

Highly visual websites tend to be appealing to customers, and product photography lets your offerings talk for themselves.

• Aim for at least half your content to be visual.
• powerful photos make a better first impression than blocks of text.
• display people using your products and use high-standard images that load quickly.

And as long as you keep your site speed lightning-quick, you might also consider videos. “Videos can be powerful for storytelling,” Rembrant says. You can also repurpose them for social media. “They’re bigger than images and work well on platforms like TikTok and Instagram,” he adds. 

Simplify your design

A cluttered website can overwhelm visitors. Too much text reduces engagement, too many images make your site harder to use, and too many calls-to-action feel pushy. Try these tips:

• Use one call-to-action per page.
• Choose photos that back your navigation.
• Add white space to assist content breathe.
• Use high-contrast colors.

Make navigation obvious

Prioritize user interface (UI) and user encounter (UX) design practices to assist customers discover their way around your site easily:

• Put menus, breadcrumbs, and sitemaps where people expect to discover them.
• ponder about how customers shift through your site and make sure they can always discover what they require.
• Prioritize functionality above aesthetics whenever feasible.

recall: a functional website is better than a pretty one that’s challenging to use. “Accessibility is such an significant consideration in design,” says Sara Mote, creative director and cofounder of Mote. “Whenever I make mockups, I always have the accessibility link as a reminder to make sure there’s a schedule to address any accessibility concerns. Many best practices for accessibility enhance the encounter for all users.”