Design Template by Anonymous

Introduction

What is Navigation?

According to Hostinger.com, “Website navigation is a set of user interface elements like menus, search bars, link text, and buttons that help visitors explore the website. Besides browsing, navigation helps visitors understand the relationship between individual web pages.” Navigation is basically how we access different pages and portions of websites. It is the backbone of the user interface and one of the most integral portions of the web design process. A streamlined and efficient navigation system can bring together the perfect site, while an unorganized or unoptimized navigation setup can cause an otherwise perfect site to fail.

Think about a website’s navigation like a modern highway. There are hundreds of rules and signs that we as drivers are expected to know. Without clear lanes and signs, or if drivers just didn’t know the meaning of certain signs, the road would be an unpredictable mess. People would never make it to their desired destination, either due to becoming lost or by being involved in a traffic accident. Website navigation acts exactly the same way, in that it allows the user to quickly and effectively switch pages on a website and find the corresponding information that they are seeking. This makes navigation a crucial area of focus for both web developers and their clients, as it determines how everything is connected and used on their website.

Crowded road with heavy traffic, appears to be poorly designed and causing traffic as a result. — Websites with poor navigational systems can be compared to poorly built highways and roads. Both can cause the user to become confused and frustrated, and prevent them from getting to the correct location or finding the information that they need.

Types of Navigation

There is a variety of differing web navigation types.

The primary and almost sole purpose of web navigation is to allow quick and simple access to any resources that users may seek within a site. Because of the millions of different sites and their corresponding purposes, every site's navigation system will be distinct in its own way. This ensures that the navigation system is best suited for the particular site, affording the best possible experience to users. This tutorial will dive into several different topics of web navigation such as primary navigation, secondary navigation, supplementary navigation, and best practices to keep in mind.