Website questions, answered.

An API is a defined way for one piece of software to ask another for data or actions, such as a site asking a payment service to charge a card. Read the full entry →

The back-end is the server-side part of a site that visitors never see: databases, logins, payments, business logic and the APIs the front-end calls. Read the full entry →

Only if it stores data, has accounts, takes payments directly or calls private services; a brochure site does not. Read the full entry →

A cache is a stored copy of something, like a page or image, kept closer to the visitor so it loads instantly next time instead of being fetched again. Read the full entry →

You are probably seeing a cached copy; hard-refresh the page, and if the host caches too, wait for it to purge or trigger a new deploy. Read the full entry →

A CDN is a network of servers around the world that keeps copies of a site's files and serves each visitor from the location nearest to them. Read the full entry →

A CMS is software that lets people create and edit website content through an admin screen instead of editing code. Read the full entry →

Not always. Small sites can keep content in simple files or a form-based editor; a CMS earns its place when non-developers publish often. Read the full entry →

A cookie is a small piece of data a website stores in the browser to remember something between visits, like a login or a cart. Read the full entry →

CSS is the language that controls how a web page looks: colours, fonts, spacing, layout, animation and how the design adapts to each screen. Read the full entry →

A database is organised storage for a site's data, such as users, orders and posts, that the back-end reads and writes on request. Read the full entry →

DNS is the internet's address book: it translates a domain name like example.com into the IP address of the server that hosts the site. Read the full entry →

DNS answers are cached; wait for the old records to expire (their TTL), and double-check the record type and value your host asked for. Read the full entry →

A domain name is the human-readable address of a website, such as example.com, that points to the server where the site lives. Read the full entry →

Search for it at a domain registrar, pay the yearly fee, and point its DNS at your host. Read the full entry →

No, you rent it; renew it before it expires or someone else can register it. Read the full entry →

Use .com when you can get it, because people assume it; other endings work fine when they fit the brand. Read the full entry →

A dynamic site builds each page on the server when it is requested, so it can show personalised or constantly changing content. Read the full entry →

A favicon is the small icon shown in browser tabs, bookmarks and search results that identifies a website at a glance. Read the full entry →

The front-end is everything that runs in the visitor's browser: the layout, styling, content and interactions of a website or app. Read the full entry →

Full-stack describes work, or a developer, that covers both the front-end a visitor sees and the back-end that stores data and runs the logic. Read the full entry →

A homepage is the main page at a website's root address, the page that tells a new visitor what the site is and where to go next. Read the full entry →

HTML is the language that gives a web page its structure: headings, paragraphs, links, images, forms and every other element on the page. Read the full entry →

No, it is a markup language: it describes structure rather than running logic. JavaScript is the programming language of the web. Read the full entry →

HTTP is the protocol browsers and servers use to exchange web pages; HTTPS is the encrypted version, shown by the padlock, and is now the default for every site. Read the full entry →

It is being served over HTTP or has an invalid certificate; enable HTTPS at your host and redirect all HTTP traffic to it. Read the full entry →

Yes on most modern hosts, which issue and renew certificates automatically. Read the full entry →

JavaScript is the programming language of the web: it runs in every browser and makes pages interactive, from menus and forms to games and 3D. Read the full entry →

No. They are unrelated languages that share part of a name for historical marketing reasons. Read the full entry →

JSON is a lightweight text format for structured data, readable by people and machines, and the standard way web APIs send information. Read the full entry →

A landing page is a single page built for one goal, such as a sign-up or a purchase, usually the page a visitor lands on from an ad or campaign. Read the full entry →

A homepage introduces everything you do; a landing page pushes one action for one audience. Read the full entry →

As long as it takes to answer the visitor's objections; simple offers can be short, expensive ones usually need more proof. Read the full entry →

A PWA is a website that can be installed to a phone or desktop home screen and can work offline, behaving much like a native app. Read the full entry →

Responsive design is building one website whose layout adapts to every screen size, from phones to wide monitors, instead of separate mobile and desktop sites. Read the full entry →

Open it on a phone and check that text is readable without zooming, buttons are easy to tap and nothing scrolls sideways. Read the full entry →

A sitemap is a list of a website's pages: an XML file for search engines, or a page of links for people, that shows what exists and how it is organised. Read the full entry →

A static site is made of pre-built HTML files served the same way to every visitor, which makes it fast, cheap to host and hard to break. Read the full entry →

A URL is the full address of one specific resource on the web, made of a protocol, a domain and a path, like https://example.com/pricing. Read the full entry →

The slug is the readable last part of a URL that names the page, like how-to-bake-bread in /blog/how-to-bake-bread. Read the full entry →

A web app is software that runs in the browser and lets people do things, such as edit, book, chat or buy, rather than only read. Read the full entry →

It reaches everyone without an install and updates instantly; native apps get deeper device access and app-store discovery. Read the full entry →

A web browser is the app that requests web pages and turns their HTML, CSS and JavaScript into what you see and click. Read the full entry →

Browsers ship features at different times; check that the CSS or JavaScript you rely on is supported, and provide a fallback when it isn't. Read the full entry →

Web hosting is the service that stores a website's files on internet-connected servers and delivers them to visitors around the clock. Read the full entry →

Yes. The domain is the address; hosting is the building. You need both. Read the full entry →

For a static site, the free tiers of modern platforms are often enough; check bandwidth limits and whether you can use your own domain. Read the full entry →

A web page is a single document on the web, identified by its own URL and written in HTML, that a browser renders for a visitor. Read the full entry →

Most need a home page, a services or products page, an about page and a contact page; more pages help only when each answers a distinct question. Read the full entry →

A web server is software, and the computer running it, that receives requests from browsers and responds with web pages and files. Read the full entry →

A webhook is an automatic message one service sends to your URL when something happens, like a payment provider announcing a completed order. Read the full entry →

A website is a collection of linked web pages published under one domain name, stored on a server and viewed in a web browser. Read the full entry →

A domain name, somewhere to host the files, and the site itself, built by hand, with a builder, or from a one-sentence description. Read the full entry →

It ranges from a few dollars a month on a DIY builder to five figures at an agency; the biggest factors are custom design, number of pages and features like checkout. Read the full entry →

No. A web page is one document; a website is the whole set of pages under one domain. Read the full entry →

A/B testing shows two versions of a page to different visitors at random and measures which one gets more of a chosen action. Read the full entry →

Above the fold is the part of a page visible without scrolling; it has to state what the site is and invite the next step. Read the full entry →

No. The headline and main action should be; the proof and details can follow, as long as the top makes people want to keep going. Read the full entry →

Breadcrumbs are a small trail of links, like Home › Guides › Hosting, that shows where a page sits in the site and lets visitors step back up. Read the full entry →

A call to action is the button or link that asks the visitor to take the page's main next step, such as Book now, Get a quote or Buy. Read the full entry →

The outcome the visitor gets, in their words: Book my cleaning, Start my free trial, Get the template. Read the full entry →

A colour palette is the fixed set of colours a site uses, typically a background, text colours, one accent for actions and a few states such as success and error. Read the full entry →

Conversion rate optimisation is the practice of improving the share of visitors who take a desired action, by testing changes to copy, design, speed and flow. Read the full entry →

It varies too much by industry, price and traffic source for one number; compare against your own past results and improve from there. Read the full entry →

Dark mode is a colour theme with light text on a dark background, offered as an alternative to a light theme or matched to the visitor's system setting. Read the full entry →

Dark patterns are design tricks that push people into choices they did not intend, like hidden fees, fake countdowns, confusing opt-outs or hard-to-cancel subscriptions. Read the full entry →

A design system is a shared library of reusable components, tokens and rules that keeps every page of a product consistent and faster to build. Read the full entry →

Figma is a browser-based design tool where teams create wireframes, mockups, prototypes and design systems together in real time. Read the full entry →

Font pairing is choosing two or more typefaces that work together, often a distinctive one for headings and a neutral one for body text. Read the full entry →

The footer is the bottom section of every page, holding secondary links, contact details, legal pages and often a newsletter sign-up. Read the full entry →

A layout grid is the invisible system of columns and gutters that aligns everything on a page, giving a design order and rhythm. Read the full entry →

A hamburger menu is the icon of three stacked lines that opens a hidden navigation menu, mostly used on phones. Read the full entry →

The hero section is the large opening area at the top of a page, usually a headline, a short promise, a call to action and a visual. Read the full entry →

Information architecture is how a site's content is organised, grouped and labelled so people can find things and understand where they are. Read the full entry →

Mobile-first is designing and building for the smallest screen first, then adding layout for larger screens, so the core experience works on phones. Read the full entry →

A mockup is a static, full-detail picture of a page as it will look, with real type, colour and imagery, but no working interactions. Read the full entry →

The navigation menu is the set of links, usually across the top of a site, that lets visitors move between its main sections. Read the full entry →

A prototype is a clickable simulation of a website or app used to test flows and interactions with real people before building the real thing. Read the full entry →

Social proof is evidence that other people use and trust a product, such as reviews, client logos, case studies and counts, used to reduce a visitor's doubt. Read the full entry →

A style guide documents a brand's visual and written rules, such as logo use, colours, fonts and tone of voice, so everything published looks and sounds like one brand. Read the full entry →

Typography is the choice and arrangement of type, meaning fonts, sizes, weights, line length and spacing, to make text readable and give a site its voice. Read the full entry →

Usually one or two families: one for headings, one for body, with weights providing the variety. Read the full entry →

UI, or user interface, is the visible, clickable surface of a website: buttons, type, colour, spacing, icons and the states each element shows. Read the full entry →

Usability testing is watching real people try to complete tasks on a site to find where they get stuck, confused or lost. Read the full entry →

A user flow is the path a visitor takes to complete a task, such as landing, comparing, choosing and paying, mapped step by step. Read the full entry →

UX, or user experience, is how it feels to use a website: whether people can find what they came for, understand it and finish what they started without friction. Read the full entry →

UX is how the whole experience works and flows; UI is the visual and interactive surface people touch. UI is part of UX. Read the full entry →

Watch real people try to complete a task on it, note every hesitation, and fix the biggest one first. Read the full entry →

Visual hierarchy is arranging elements by size, colour, contrast and position so visitors see the most important thing first and the rest in order. Read the full entry →

White space is the empty space around and between elements; it separates ideas, guides the eye and makes a page feel calm and premium. Read the full entry →

A wireframe is a simple, low-detail layout of a page, boxes and labels without colour or imagery, used to agree on structure before visual design begins. Read the full entry →

A 3D website uses real-time 3D graphics, like a rotating product, an explorable scene or a whole world, rendered live in the browser rather than as video. Read the full entry →

Agencies commonly quote five figures for custom WebGL work; productised builders offer set models for a fraction of that. Read the full entry →

When the 3D shows the product or experience better than a photo could, yes; when it is decoration that slows the page, no. Read the full entry →

A bento grid is a layout of rounded tiles in different sizes, like a bento lunch box, used to present several features or facts in one scannable block. Read the full entry →

A custom cursor replaces or decorates the system pointer with a designed shape, often one that grows, labels or reacts to what it hovers. Read the full entry →

A game world website turns a site into a playable place: visitors move through a 3D world, like driving a car through a city, where each location is a page, product or store. Read the full entry →

Yes; the world can be a neighbourhood, a store or a stadium, as long as every stop still leads to a clear page and action. Read the full entry →

Glassmorphism is a style of translucent, frosted-glass panels that blur whatever sits behind them, with a thin light edge to suggest thickness. Read the full entry →

glTF is the standard file format for 3D models on the web, often called the JPEG of 3D; GLB is its single-file binary version. Read the full entry →

A gradient mesh is a soft, multi-point blend of colours that flows like an aurora, often animated slowly behind a hero section. Read the full entry →

A grain texture is a faint layer of noise over a design that removes the flat, digital look and adds warmth like film or print. Read the full entry →

GSAP is a widely used JavaScript animation library for precise, timeline-based motion, including its ScrollTrigger plugin for scroll-linked effects. Read the full entry →

Hover effects are visual changes that happen when a pointer moves over an element, like a card lifting, an image zooming or a link underlining. Read the full entry →

An immersive website surrounds the visitor with an experience, often full-screen 3D, sound and motion, so browsing feels like entering a place rather than reading a page. Read the full entry →

Kinetic typography is text that moves, such as letters that assemble, words that slide in or headlines that scramble, to add energy and emphasis. Read the full entry →

Liquid glass is a glass-like interface style where panels refract and bend the content behind them, with highlights that move as if the surface were a thick, fluid lens. Read the full entry →

Lottie is a format for lightweight vector animations exported from design tools and played in the browser, often used for icons and illustrations. Read the full entry →

A magnetic button drifts toward the cursor as it gets close, then snaps back, making the button feel physical and inviting a click. Read the full entry →

A marquee is a band of text or logos that scrolls continuously across the screen, often used for client logos, announcements or bold statements. Read the full entry →

Micro-interactions are small, single-purpose animations that respond to what a visitor does, like a button that presses in, a heart that fills or a field that shakes on an error. Read the full entry →

Small CSS transitions on transform and opacity cost almost nothing; heavy JavaScript animation libraries and animating layout properties are what slow pages down. Read the full entry →

Morphing is smoothly transforming one shape, element or layout into another, so the eye follows the change instead of seeing a cut. Read the full entry →

Neumorphism is a soft, extruded style where elements look pushed out of or pressed into the background using matching light and dark shadows. Read the full entry →

Page transitions animate the change from one page to the next, such as a fade, slide or shared element that morphs, so navigation feels continuous. Read the full entry →

Parallax scrolling moves background and foreground layers at different speeds as you scroll, creating an illusion of depth. Read the full entry →

No, as long as the content is real HTML text in the page and the effect does not delay loading. Read the full entry →

Layer elements and move each at a different rate tied to scroll position, ideally with CSS scroll-driven animations or transforms. Read the full entry →

Particle effects animate many small points, such as sparks, dust, stars or confetti, to create atmosphere, motion trails or bursts of celebration. Read the full entry →

Raymarching is a shader technique that draws 3D scenes described by maths instead of meshes, stepping each pixel's ray forward until it hits a surface. Read the full entry →

Scroll-driven animation ties an animation's progress to scroll position instead of time, so elements animate exactly as far as the reader has scrolled. Read the full entry →

Scrollytelling is telling a story through scrolling: each scroll step reveals, animates or transforms content, so the page plays like a film the reader controls. Read the full entry →

People usually mean scrollytelling: large product visuals that rotate, zoom and reveal features as you scroll. Read the full entry →

A shader is a small program that runs on the GPU for every pixel or vertex, calculating colour and shape; shaders create effects like liquid metal, glow, ripples and gradients. Read the full entry →

A shockwave effect is a ring of distortion that bursts outward from a point, bending the image behind it like a blast or a stone dropped in water. Read the full entry →

Smooth scrolling eases the page's movement so scrolling glides rather than jumps, either natively in the browser or with a library that interpolates scroll position. Read the full entry →

Sticky scroll pins a section in place while the rest of the page keeps scrolling, often while its contents change, like a slideshow driven by scroll. Read the full entry →

A text scramble effect cycles random characters before settling on the real word, as if the text were being decoded on screen. Read the full entry →

Three.js is the most widely used JavaScript library for 3D on the web; it wraps WebGL with cameras, lights, materials and models so developers can build scenes quickly. Read the full entry →

The View Transitions API is a browser feature that animates between two states of a page, or two pages, by morphing matching elements from one to the other. Read the full entry →

WebGL is the browser technology that draws hardware-accelerated 2D and 3D graphics inside a web page using the device's GPU, with no plugin. Read the full entry →

Yes, if the page's text and layout render first as HTML and the 3D scene loads after, or on interaction. Read the full entry →

Modern phones run WebGL well; scenes should lower their resolution and effects on small or weak devices. Read the full entry →

WebGPU is the newer browser graphics and compute API that succeeds WebGL, giving web pages closer-to-native access to the GPU for faster 3D and parallel computing. Read the full entry →

Automated tests are code that checks other code: unit tests check small functions, and end-to-end tests drive a real browser through whole user flows. Read the full entry →

A bundler combines a project's many source files and dependencies into optimised files the browser can load efficiently; Vite, webpack and Turbopack are common ones. Read the full entry →

Code review is having someone other than the author read a change before it merges, to catch bugs, security issues and unclear code. Read the full entry →

Code splitting breaks a site's JavaScript into smaller chunks so each page downloads only the code it needs, loading the rest on demand. Read the full entry →

A component is a self-contained, reusable piece of interface, like a button, card or navigation bar, with its own structure, style and behaviour. Read the full entry →

Container queries style an element based on the size of its own container rather than the whole screen, so components adapt wherever they are placed. Read the full entry →

CSS Grid is a two-dimensional layout system that places elements into rows and columns at once, making complex page layouts possible with a few lines of CSS. Read the full entry →

CSS variables store reusable values, such as colours, spacing or fonts, in one place so a whole site can be themed or changed consistently. Read the full entry →

The DOM is the browser's live, tree-shaped model of a web page; JavaScript reads and changes the DOM to update what visitors see. Read the full entry →

Flexbox is a one-dimensional CSS layout system for arranging items in a row or column, with easy alignment, spacing and wrapping. Read the full entry →

Git is a version control system that records every change to a project's code, so teams can work in parallel, review changes and roll back mistakes. Read the full entry →

GitHub is a platform that hosts Git repositories online and adds collaboration tools like pull requests, issues and automated workflows. Read the full entry →

Hydration is the step where JavaScript attaches to server-rendered HTML in the browser, turning a static-looking page into an interactive one. Read the full entry →

Incremental static regeneration serves pre-built static pages but rebuilds individual pages in the background on a schedule or on demand, so content stays fresh without full redeploys. Read the full entry →

Islands architecture renders a page as static HTML and hydrates only the few interactive parts, the islands, instead of the whole page. Read the full entry →

JSX is a syntax that lets developers write HTML-like markup inside JavaScript, used by React to describe what a component renders. Read the full entry →

Lazy loading delays downloading images, video, scripts or components until they are about to be needed, usually when they scroll into view. Read the full entry →

Linting is automatically checking code for errors, risky patterns and style problems before it runs, using a tool like ESLint. Read the full entry →

A media query is a CSS rule that applies styles only when conditions are met, such as a screen width, dark mode preference or reduced-motion setting. Read the full entry →

npm is the package manager and registry for JavaScript, where developers install shared libraries (packages) into their projects. Read the full entry →

In component frameworks, props are the inputs a component receives from its parent, and state is the data a component manages itself that changes over time. Read the full entry →

A pull request proposes merging one branch of code into another, where teammates review the changes and automated checks run before anything goes live. Read the full entry →

React is a JavaScript library for building user interfaces from reusable components that update automatically when their data changes. Read the full entry →

Hooks are React functions, like useState and useEffect, that let components hold state and run side effects such as fetching data or subscribing to events. Read the full entry →

Sass is a CSS preprocessor that adds variables, nesting and functions, compiling down to plain CSS; many of its features now exist in CSS itself. Read the full entry →

Semantic HTML uses elements for their meaning, such as header, nav, main, article, button and h1 to h6, instead of generic divs, so machines understand the page. Read the full entry →

Server-side rendering builds a page's HTML on the server for each request, so the visitor and search engines receive readable content immediately. Read the full entry →

A single-page application loads one page and then rewrites it with JavaScript as the visitor navigates, instead of loading a new page from the server each time. Read the full entry →

Static site generation builds every page's HTML ahead of time, at deploy, so pages are served instantly from a CDN without any work per request. Read the full entry →

Tailwind CSS is a utility-first CSS framework where small single-purpose classes like p-4 and text-lg are composed directly in HTML to style components. Read the full entry →

TypeScript is JavaScript with types: it checks code before it runs, catching mistakes like passing the wrong data to a function, then compiles to plain JavaScript. Read the full entry →

Angular is a full-featured TypeScript framework from Google for large web applications, with routing, forms, testing and dependency injection built in. Read the full entry →

Astro is a web framework for content-focused sites that ships zero JavaScript by default and hydrates only the interactive components a page needs. Read the full entry →

Cloudflare is a global network that provides DNS, CDN, security (DDoS protection and a web application firewall) and edge hosting for websites. Read the full entry →

Edge functions are small pieces of server code that run in data centres close to each visitor, so dynamic responses arrive with minimal delay. Read the full entry →

Firebase is Google's app platform offering a real-time database, authentication, hosting and serverless functions for web and mobile apps. Read the full entry →

Framer is a design-first website builder where designers lay out, animate and publish sites from a canvas similar to a design tool, with AI page generation. Read the full entry →

A hardcoded website is built directly in code, HTML, CSS and JavaScript or a framework, rather than assembled in a page builder, so it carries no platform or plugin overhead. Read the full entry →

For speed, security and ownership it usually is; WordPress wins when many non-technical people edit content daily. Read the full entry →

Yes, when it is built with editable content files or a small admin; otherwise changes go through code. Read the full entry →

A headless CMS stores and manages content but has no front-end of its own; it delivers content through an API to any site, app or device. Read the full entry →

Headless commerce separates an online store's front-end from its commerce engine, so products and checkout run on a platform while the storefront is fully custom. Read the full entry →

Jamstack is an approach to building sites from pre-rendered pages served by a CDN, with dynamic features added through JavaScript and APIs. Read the full entry →

Low-code platforms build most of an application visually but let developers drop into code for the parts the visual tools cannot handle. Read the full entry →

Netlify is a hosting platform for static and Jamstack sites with Git-based deploys, forms, serverless functions and preview builds. Read the full entry →

Next.js is a React framework for building websites and web apps, adding routing, server rendering, static generation and API routes on top of React. Read the full entry →

Yes. Pages can be pre-rendered or server-rendered, so search engines receive complete HTML, and metadata and structured data are built in. Read the full entry →

No-code tools let people build websites and apps visually, by dragging, configuring and prompting, without writing code. Read the full entry →

Node.js is a JavaScript runtime that runs JavaScript outside the browser, used for servers, build tools and command-line programs. Read the full entry →

Remix is a full-stack React framework built around web standards like forms and HTTP caching, now merged into React Router's framework mode. Read the full entry →

Serverless means running back-end code as small functions that the host starts on demand, so you pay for use and never manage a server. Read the full entry →

Shopify is a hosted e-commerce platform that runs online stores: products, checkout, payments, inventory and themes, paid for monthly plus transaction and app fees. Read the full entry →

Most start from the same popular themes; a custom or headless front-end breaks the pattern. Read the full entry →

Yes. A hardcoded storefront can use a payment provider's hosted checkout directly, with no platform subscription. Read the full entry →

Squarespace is a hosted website builder known for polished templates, used for portfolios, small businesses and simple online stores. Read the full entry →

Supabase is a hosted back-end built on Postgres that provides a database, authentication, file storage and APIs, often used as a quick back-end for web apps. Read the full entry →

SvelteKit is the application framework for Svelte, a component language that compiles to small, fast JavaScript instead of shipping a runtime library. Read the full entry →

Vercel is a hosting platform for front-end frameworks, especially Next.js, that deploys from Git and serves sites from a global edge network. Read the full entry →

Vue is a progressive JavaScript framework for building interfaces from components; Nuxt is its full framework for server rendering and static sites. Read the full entry →

Webflow is a visual website builder and hosting platform that lets designers build responsive sites with real HTML and CSS concepts, plus a built-in CMS. Read the full entry →

Wix is a hosted drag-and-drop website builder with templates, an app market and AI site generation, aimed at small businesses and beginners. Read the full entry →

WordPress is the most widely used content management system on the web: open-source software for publishing sites, extended with themes and plugins. Read the full entry →

It remains a solid choice for content-heavy sites run by non-developers; for speed and security with few moving parts, many teams now choose hardcoded or static sites. Read the full entry →

Usually too many plugins, a heavy theme, unoptimised images or cheap shared hosting. Read the full entry →

An agentic workflow is a process where AI agents carry out multi-step work, planning, acting, checking and handing off, with people approving key decisions. Read the full entry →

An AI agent is an AI system that pursues a goal over several steps, deciding what to do, using tools like a browser, terminal or APIs, and checking its own results. Read the full entry →

An AI website builder generates a website from a description: it writes the copy, picks a layout and design and often publishes the result for you. Read the full entry →

It depends on the job: template builders for the quickest start, code generators for ownership and custom behaviour, productised builders for a finished design in one step. Read the full entry →

On most hosted builders your site lives on their platform; check whether you can export the code and move it. Read the full entry →

Bolt is an in-browser AI development environment that generates, runs and deploys full-stack web apps from prompts. Read the full entry →

Claude Code is Anthropic's agentic coding tool that works in a terminal, IDE or desktop app, reading a codebase, editing files and running commands to complete development tasks. Read the full entry →

A coding agent is an AI that works in a real codebase: it reads files, writes and edits code, runs builds and tests, and fixes what fails. Read the full entry →

The context window is how much text an AI model can consider at once, including your instructions, the files it reads and the conversation so far. Read the full entry →

Cursor is an AI-first code editor built on VS Code that combines autocomplete, chat and an agent that can edit multiple files in a project. Read the full entry →

GitHub Copilot is an AI assistant built into code editors and GitHub that suggests code, answers questions and can carry out multi-step coding tasks. Read the full entry →

A hallucination is when an AI states something false with confidence, such as a function that does not exist, a wrong fact or an invented source. Read the full entry →

A large language model is an AI system trained on vast amounts of text to predict and generate language, including code, which powers chatbots and coding agents. Read the full entry →

Lovable is an AI app builder that turns chat prompts into full-stack web apps with a React front-end and a hosted back-end, aimed at non-developers. Read the full entry →

MCP, the Model Context Protocol, is an open standard for connecting AI assistants to external tools and data, such as databases, design files, browsers and APIs. Read the full entry →

One-shot generation is getting a complete, working result from an AI in a single request, without follow-up corrections. Read the full entry →

A prompt is the instruction you give an AI model: the request, the context and any constraints that shape what it produces. Read the full entry →

Prompt engineering is the practice of writing and structuring instructions to AI models so they produce accurate, useful and consistent results. Read the full entry →

Prompt to website is generating a complete site from a written description, where the description decides the structure, copy and style of what gets built. Read the full entry →

Replit Agent is an AI agent in the Replit online IDE that builds, runs and deploys apps from a plain-language description. Read the full entry →

Reviewing AI-generated code means checking what an AI wrote before it ships: that it does what was asked, handles errors, stays secure and does not quietly break other things. Read the full entry →

A system prompt is the standing instruction that sets an AI's role, rules and style for a whole conversation, before any user message. Read the full entry →

Tokens are the chunks of text, often word fragments, that AI models read and write; usage, limits and pricing for AI services are measured in tokens. Read the full entry →

v0 is Vercel's AI tool that generates React and Next.js interfaces and apps from prompts, designed to hand off into a real codebase. Read the full entry →

Vibe coding is building software by describing what you want to an AI in plain language and iterating on what it produces, rather than writing the code line by line yourself. Read the full entry →

Yes. Many production sites start that way; what separates them from demos is testing, security review and performance work after the first draft. Read the full entry →

No, but shipping unreviewed AI code is. Treat the AI as a fast junior developer whose work gets checked. Read the full entry →

Coding agents like Claude Code and Cursor, app builders like Lovable, Bolt and v0, and a host that deploys from Git. Read the full entry →

60 fps means the screen updates sixty times a second, the baseline for motion that looks smooth; each frame has about 16 milliseconds to be ready. Read the full entry →

The back/forward cache keeps a complete snapshot of a page in memory so pressing Back or Forward restores it instantly instead of reloading. Read the full entry →

Compression shrinks text files like HTML, CSS and JavaScript as the server sends them, using Gzip or Brotli, and the browser expands them on arrival. Read the full entry →

Core Web Vitals are Google's three user-experience metrics: Largest Contentful Paint for loading, Interaction to Next Paint for responsiveness and Cumulative Layout Shift for visual stability. Read the full entry →

Yes, as part of Google's page experience signals, though relevance of content still matters more. Read the full entry →

Serve the main content fast, keep JavaScript light so taps respond quickly, and reserve space for images and ads so nothing jumps. Read the full entry →

Critical CSS is the minimal set of styles needed to render the first visible part of a page, inlined in the HTML so the page can draw immediately. Read the full entry →

Cumulative Layout Shift measures how much page content moves unexpectedly while loading; good is below 0.1. Read the full entry →

First Contentful Paint is the moment the browser first draws any text or image from the page, the first sign to a visitor that something is happening. Read the full entry →

Image optimisation is serving images at the right size, format and quality for each device, so pages load fast without visibly losing quality. Read the full entry →

No bigger than they display: generate several widths and let the browser choose the right one for each screen. Read the full entry →

Interaction to Next Paint measures how quickly a page visibly responds after a tap, click or key press, across the whole visit; good is 200 milliseconds or less. Read the full entry →

Jank is visible stutter when a page cannot draw frames in time, making scrolling, animation or typing feel choppy. Read the full entry →

Largest Contentful Paint measures how long it takes for the largest visible element, usually the hero image or headline, to appear; good is 2.5 seconds or less. Read the full entry →

Lighthouse is Google's open-source auditing tool that scores a page from 0 to 100 on performance, accessibility, best practices and SEO, with specific fixes. Read the full entry →

No; green scores and passing real-user Core Web Vitals matter more than the last few points. Read the full entry →

Minification removes whitespace, comments and long names from code so HTML, CSS and JavaScript files are smaller and download faster. Read the full entry →

Page speed is how quickly a web page loads and becomes usable, measured by metrics like Largest Contentful Paint, Interaction to Next Paint and layout stability. Read the full entry →

Run it through PageSpeed Insights or Lighthouse, and look at the field data section for how real visitors experience it. Read the full entry →

Most often oversized images, heavy JavaScript or plugins, slow hosting, or third-party scripts like chat widgets and trackers. Read the full entry →

PageSpeed Insights is Google's free tool that shows a page's real-user Core Web Vitals, where available, alongside a Lighthouse lab audit. Read the full entry →

A performance budget is a set limit, such as total JavaScript size or LCP time, that a site is not allowed to exceed, checked automatically before release. Read the full entry →

Preload and prefetch are hints that tell the browser to fetch a resource early: preload for something the current page needs now, prefetch for something the next page will need. Read the full entry →

Render-blocking resources are stylesheets and scripts the browser must download and process before it can draw the page, delaying the first paint. Read the full entry →

Third-party scripts are code loaded from other companies, such as analytics, ads, chat widgets and embeds, and are among the most common causes of slow pages. Read the full entry →

Time to First Byte is how long the browser waits after requesting a page before the first byte of the response arrives; it reflects server and network speed. Read the full entry →

Web font loading is how a page fetches and swaps in custom fonts; done badly it hides text or shifts layout, done well text shows immediately and swaps smoothly. Read the full entry →

WebP and AVIF are modern image formats that compress photos and graphics much smaller than JPEG and PNG at similar visual quality, supported by current browsers. Read the full entry →

A 301 redirect permanently sends visitors and search engines from an old URL to a new one, passing most of the old page's ranking signals along. Read the full entry →

A 404 error means the server could not find the requested page; it happens when a page is deleted, moved without a redirect or a link is mistyped. Read the full entry →

Alt text is a written description of an image in the HTML, read aloud by screen readers and used by search engines to understand the picture. Read the full entry →

Anchor text is the clickable text of a link; descriptive anchor text tells readers and search engines what the linked page is about. Read the full entry →

Backlinks are links from other websites to yours; search engines treat relevant, trusted backlinks as votes of confidence that can raise rankings. Read the full entry →

A canonical URL tells search engines which address is the main version of a page when the same content is reachable at several URLs. Read the full entry →

Crawling is how search engines discover pages: automated bots follow links and sitemaps, fetch pages and pass them on to be analysed and indexed. Read the full entry →

Domain authority is a third-party score estimating how likely a site is to rank based on its backlinks; search engines do not use the score itself. Read the full entry →

Duplicate content is the same or near-identical text at more than one URL, which makes search engines choose one version and can split ranking signals. Read the full entry →

E-E-A-T stands for Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness and Trustworthiness, the qualities Google's quality guidelines use to judge whether content deserves trust. Read the full entry →

Google Business Profile is the free listing that shows a business's details, hours, photos and reviews in Google Search and Maps. Read the full entry →

Google Search Console is Google's free tool for site owners that shows search performance, indexing status and problems, and accepts sitemap submissions. Read the full entry →

Indexing is when a search engine stores a crawled page in its database so it can appear in results; a page that is not indexed cannot rank. Read the full entry →

It may be new, blocked by robots.txt or noindex, not linked from anywhere, or judged a duplicate; check the page in Google Search Console. Read the full entry →

IndexNow is an open protocol that lets a site notify participating search engines the moment a page is added, updated or deleted, instead of waiting to be recrawled. Read the full entry →

Internal linking is linking between pages on your own site, which helps visitors move on and tells search engines how pages relate and which matter most. Read the full entry →

A keyword is a word or phrase people type into a search engine; SEO matches pages to the keywords their audience uses. Read the full entry →

Local SEO is optimising a business to appear in location-based searches and maps, for queries like near me, through its Business Profile, reviews and local pages. Read the full entry →

A meta description is a short summary of a page set in HTML that search engines may show under the title in results. Read the full entry →

Noindex is an instruction, set in a meta tag or HTTP header, that tells search engines not to show a page in their results. Read the full entry →

Programmatic SEO is generating many pages from structured data and templates, such as one page per city, product or term, to match many specific searches. Read the full entry →

Rich results are enhanced search listings, with stars, prices, FAQs, breadcrumbs or images, generated from a page's structured data. Read the full entry →

robots.txt is a file at a site's root that tells crawlers which paths they may or may not crawl, and where the sitemap is. Read the full entry →

Search intent is the reason behind a search, whether to learn, to find a specific site, to compare or to buy, and a page ranks best when it serves that reason. Read the full entry →

SEO is the practice of making a website easier for search engines to crawl, understand and rank, so it appears for the searches its audience actually makes. Read the full entry →

New pages often take weeks to months to rank, depending on competition, site authority and how well the page answers the search. Read the full entry →

Yes. Clear titles, pages that answer real questions, fast load times and a sitemap submitted to Search Console cover most of the basics. Read the full entry →

If you want people to find it through search rather than only through ads or links you share, yes. Read the full entry →

A SERP is the page of results a search engine shows for a query, including links, ads, maps, videos, featured snippets and AI-generated answers. Read the full entry →

Structured data is code, usually JSON-LD using the Schema.org vocabulary, that labels what a page describes, such as a product, business, FAQ or article, for search engines and AI. Read the full entry →

Not directly, but it can earn rich results that get more clicks and helps search and AI systems understand the page. Read the full entry →

The title tag is the page title set in HTML that appears as the clickable headline in search results and in the browser tab. Read the full entry →

Topical authority is the trust a site earns on a subject by covering it thoroughly and accurately, with many well-linked pages that answer related questions. Read the full entry →

An XML sitemap is a machine-readable file listing a site's URLs, and when each last changed, submitted to search engines to help them discover pages. Read the full entry →

AEO, answer engine optimisation, is structuring a website so AI assistants and search features quote it as the answer, not just list it as a link. Read the full entry →

Publish clear, factual pages that answer the questions customers ask, keep your business details consistent across the web, earn mentions on trusted sites, and make sure AI crawlers are allowed to read your site. Read the full entry →

SEO aims to rank a page in a list of links; AEO aims to have your content quoted as the answer itself. The same fundamentals serve both. Read the full entry →

An AI citation is a link or reference an AI answer gives to the page it drew information from, the visible credit that sends traffic and trust to the source. Read the full entry →

AI crawlers are bots run by AI companies that fetch web pages to train models or to answer questions live; robots.txt can allow or block each one. Read the full entry →

AI Overviews are Google's AI-generated summaries at the top of some search results, which answer the query directly and link to the sources used. Read the full entry →

Answer-first content puts the direct answer to the page's question in the opening sentence, then adds detail, so readers and AI systems get the point immediately. Read the full entry →

ChatGPT search is ChatGPT's ability to search the web live and answer with cited sources, making it an answer engine that sends traffic to the pages it cites. Read the full entry →

Conversational search is asking questions in natural, spoken-style language, like what's the fastest way to build a website, rather than typing keywords. Read the full entry →

DefinedTerm is a Schema.org type that marks a word or phrase and its definition, identifying a page as the authoritative definition of that term. Read the full entry →

An entity is a uniquely identifiable thing, such as a person, business, product, place or concept, that search engines and AI systems store facts about. Read the full entry →

FAQ schema is structured data that marks a page's questions and answers, making them explicit to search engines and AI systems. Read the full entry →

A featured snippet is a highlighted answer box at the top of search results, quoting a short passage from one page that answers the query. Read the full entry →

GEO, generative engine optimisation, is optimising content to be included and cited in answers written by generative AI systems. Read the full entry →

A knowledge graph is a database of entities and the relationships between them; Google's powers the fact panels and many direct answers in search. Read the full entry →

llms.txt is a proposed plain-text file at a site's root that gives AI models a concise, curated guide to the site's most important content and links. Read the full entry →

Perplexity is an AI answer engine that searches the web for each question and writes an answer with numbered citations to its sources. Read the full entry →

A zero-click search ends without the searcher clicking any result, because the answer was shown directly on the results page. Read the full entry →

An A record is a DNS record that points a domain name to a server's IPv4 address; AAAA does the same for IPv6. Read the full entry →

CI/CD is automation that checks and ships code: continuous integration runs builds and tests on every change, and continuous deployment releases what passes. Read the full entry →

A CNAME record is a DNS record that makes one domain name an alias of another, commonly used to point www or a subdomain at a hosting provider. Read the full entry →

A custom domain is your own domain name connected to a hosted site or builder, replacing the platform's default address. Read the full entry →

To deploy is to publish a new version of a website to its host so visitors see it; modern hosts deploy automatically when code is pushed to Git. Read the full entry →

Connect your code to a host (or upload the files), deploy, then point your domain's DNS at the host. Read the full entry →

DNS propagation is the delay before a DNS change is seen everywhere, because resolvers around the world keep cached answers until their time-to-live expires. Read the full entry →

A domain registrar is an accredited company that sells and manages domain name registrations. Read the full entry →

Email authentication uses DNS records (SPF, DKIM and DMARC) to prove that mail from your domain is really from you, so it lands in inboxes instead of spam. Read the full entry →

Environment variables are settings and secrets, such as API keys and database URLs, supplied to an app by its environment instead of written into the code. Read the full entry →

Managed hosting is hosting where the provider handles servers, updates, security, backups and scaling, so you only manage the site. Read the full entry →

Nameservers are the servers that hold a domain's DNS records; changing them at the registrar hands control of all the domain's DNS to another provider. Read the full entry →

A preview deployment is a temporary, shareable URL of a site built from one branch or pull request, so changes can be reviewed live before release. Read the full entry →

Production is the live version of a website that real visitors use, as opposed to development and staging copies. Read the full entry →

A rollback restores a website to a previous working version after a bad release. Read the full entry →

Shared hosting puts many websites on one server that share its resources; it is cheap, but one busy neighbour can slow everyone down. Read the full entry →

An SSL/TLS certificate proves a site's identity and enables HTTPS encryption; modern hosts issue and renew them automatically and free. Read the full entry →

A staging environment is a private copy of a website that mirrors production, used to test changes before they go live. Read the full entry →

A subdomain is a prefix on a domain, like shop.example.com, that can point to a separate site or service while sharing the main brand. Read the full entry →

Uptime is the share of time a website is online and working; monitoring services check it continuously and alert when it goes down. Read the full entry →

A VPS is a virtual machine with its own reserved resources on a shared physical server, giving more control and consistency than shared hosting. Read the full entry →

Average order value is total revenue divided by the number of orders, showing how much a customer spends per purchase. Read the full entry →

Cart abandonment is when shoppers add items to a cart but leave without buying, commonly because of surprise costs, forced account creation or a long checkout. Read the full entry →

Checkout is the sequence where a shopper enters shipping and payment details and places an order; it is where most online sales are won or lost. Read the full entry →

A conversion funnel is the series of steps from first visit to purchase, such as landing, viewing a product, adding to cart, checkout and payment, measured to find where people drop off. Read the full entry →

Digital products are goods delivered as files or access rather than shipped, such as templates, printables, courses, software and design assets. Read the full entry →

Dropshipping is a retail model where the store sells products that a supplier stores and ships directly to the customer. Read the full entry →

E-commerce is buying and selling online: a website that shows products, takes orders and payments, and hands orders to fulfilment. Read the full entry →

From a monthly platform plan with a theme to five figures for custom agency builds; productised custom stores sit in between. Read the full entry →

No. A custom storefront can take payments through a hosted checkout directly, without a store platform. Read the full entry →

Inventory management tracks how many of each product are available, so a store never sells what it cannot ship. Read the full entry →

A payment gateway securely passes card and wallet payments from a website to the banks and card networks, and reports whether each payment succeeded. Read the full entry →

PCI DSS is the card industry's security standard for any business that stores, processes or transmits card data. Read the full entry →

Print on demand produces a product, such as a shirt, poster or mug, only after it is ordered, printing the design and shipping it through a fulfilment partner. Read the full entry →

A product page is the page for one product, with images, price, options, description and the add-to-cart button, where the buying decision happens. Read the full entry →

Product schema is structured data that labels a product's name, image, price, availability and reviews, so search engines can show it with rich details. Read the full entry →

A shopping cart holds the products a shopper intends to buy until checkout; a cart drawer slides in from the side so shopping continues uninterrupted. Read the full entry →

A SKU is a unique code a store assigns to each distinct product variant, such as size and colour, to track inventory and orders. Read the full entry →

Stripe is a payment platform that lets websites accept cards and wallets, run subscriptions and send payouts, through hosted checkout pages or its APIs. Read the full entry →

A subscription charges a customer automatically on a schedule, monthly or yearly, for ongoing access to a product or service. Read the full entry →

An upsell offers a better or bigger version of what a shopper is buying; a cross-sell offers a related product that goes with it. Read the full entry →

Backups are regular copies of a website's files and data kept separately, so the site can be restored after a mistake, failure or attack. Read the full entry →

The CCPA, amended by the CPRA, is California's privacy law giving residents rights to know, delete and opt out of the sale or sharing of their personal information. Read the full entry →

A Content Security Policy is a response header that tells the browser which sources of scripts, styles, images and frames a page may load, blocking injected code. Read the full entry →

Cookie consent is asking visitors' permission before setting non-essential cookies, such as analytics and advertising trackers, as privacy laws require in many regions. Read the full entry →

CORS is the browser rule that controls whether a page on one domain may request data from another domain, enforced through response headers the server sends. Read the full entry →

Cross-site request forgery tricks a logged-in user's browser into sending an unwanted request, such as changing an email address, to a site they trust. Read the full entry →

Cross-site scripting is an attack where malicious code is injected into a page and runs in other visitors' browsers, stealing sessions or data. Read the full entry →

A DDoS attack floods a website with traffic from many machines at once to overwhelm it and knock it offline. Read the full entry →

GDPR is the European Union's data protection law, governing how sites collect, use and store personal data about people in the EU, with consent and rights to access and deletion. Read the full entry →

A JWT is a compact, signed token that carries a user's identity and permissions between a browser and server after they log in. Read the full entry →

Malware on a website is malicious code, often injected through a vulnerable plugin, that redirects visitors, spams search results or steals data. Read the full entry →

OAuth is the standard behind sign in with Google, Apple or GitHub, letting a site verify a user through another provider without handling their password. Read the full entry →

Passkeys replace passwords with cryptographic keys stored on a device and unlocked by fingerprint, face or PIN, and cannot be phished or reused. Read the full entry →

A privacy policy is a public page explaining what personal data a website collects, why, who it is shared with and how visitors can exercise their rights. Read the full entry →

Rate limiting caps how many requests one visitor or IP can make in a period, protecting logins, forms and APIs from abuse and brute-force attacks. Read the full entry →

SQL injection is an attack that slips database commands into form fields or URLs, letting an attacker read or change data the site never meant to expose. Read the full entry →

Two-factor authentication requires a second proof of identity, such as an app code or security key, in addition to a password to log in. Read the full entry →

A web application firewall filters incoming requests to a website and blocks known attack patterns before they reach the application. Read the full entry →

Website security is protecting a site, its data and its visitors from attacks, through HTTPS, updated software, careful input handling, strong logins and backups. Read the full entry →

Take it offline or into maintenance, change every password and key, restore a clean backup, update everything, and find how they got in before going live again. Read the full entry →

Accessible forms give every field a visible label, explain errors in text next to the field, and work fully with the keyboard and screen readers. Read the full entry →

ADA website compliance refers to making a site accessible under the Americans with Disabilities Act, typically assessed against WCAG AA in practice. Read the full entry →

ARIA is a set of HTML attributes that describe roles, states and labels to assistive technology when native HTML elements cannot express them. Read the full entry →

Captions display spoken words and important sounds as text in video; transcripts provide the full text separately, for people who are deaf, hard of hearing or watching muted. Read the full entry →

Colour contrast is the difference in brightness between text and its background; WCAG AA asks for at least 4.5 to 1 for normal text and 3 to 1 for large text. Read the full entry →

The focus state is the visible outline that shows which element the keyboard is on; removing it without a replacement makes a site unusable by keyboard. Read the full entry →

Keyboard navigation means every link, button, menu and form on a page can be reached and used with the keyboard alone, in a logical order. Read the full entry →

Reduced motion is a device setting people turn on when animation makes them dizzy or distracted; sites should honour it by toning down or removing non-essential motion. Read the full entry →

A screen reader is software that reads a page aloud or outputs it to braille, letting blind and low-vision people navigate by headings, links and landmarks. Read the full entry →

A skip link is a link at the very top of a page, usually visible on keyboard focus, that jumps straight to the main content past repeated navigation. Read the full entry →

WCAG is the international standard for web accessibility from the W3C, organised around four principles (perceivable, operable, understandable, robust) with levels A, AA and AAA. Read the full entry →

Web accessibility means building sites everyone can use, including people who are blind, deaf, have limited movement or cognitive differences, whatever device or assistive technology they use. Read the full entry →

In many countries and sectors it is, commonly measured against WCAG; this is general information, not legal advice. Read the full entry →

No. Overlays cannot fix inaccessible code; the underlying site has to be built accessibly. Read the full entry →

Awwwards is an international web design award platform where juries score sites on design, usability, creativity and content, awarding Site of the Day, Month and Year. Read the full entry →

Brand identity is the visible expression of a brand, including logo, colours, type, imagery and voice, applied consistently across the website and everything else. Read the full entry →

A case study tells the story of one project, covering the problem, the approach and the outcome, as evidence that the work gets results. Read the full entry →

The discovery phase is the opening stage of a web project where goals, audience, content, competitors and requirements are researched and agreed before design starts. Read the full entry →

A fixed-price project charges one agreed amount for a defined scope, so the client knows the total cost up front. Read the full entry →

A freelance web designer or developer is an independent professional hired per project or per hour to design or build a website. Read the full entry →

Handoff is transferring a finished design or website to the people who will build or run it, with files, specs, logins and documentation. Read the full entry →

An hourly rate bills web work by the time spent; it suits open-ended work but makes the total cost uncertain. Read the full entry →

An MVP is the smallest version of a product that delivers real value and lets you learn from real users before investing in more. Read the full entry →

Pixel perfect describes a build that matches its approved design exactly, down to spacing, alignment and type. Read the full entry →

A portfolio is a collection of past work that shows what a designer, developer or agency can do; for websites, live links beat screenshots. Read the full entry →

A productised service sells a defined outcome, like a specific kind of website, at a fixed price with a fixed process, instead of custom quotes and hourly billing. Read the full entry →

A project brief is a short document describing what a website must achieve, who it is for, what it must include and what success looks like. Read the full entry →

A retainer is a recurring monthly fee that reserves a set amount of an agency's or freelancer's time for ongoing updates, improvements and support. Read the full entry →

Revisions are rounds of changes a client can request on designs or builds, usually a fixed number included in the price. Read the full entry →

An RFP is a formal document a business sends to several agencies describing a project and asking each to propose an approach, timeline and price. Read the full entry →

Scope creep is the gradual growth of a project beyond what was agreed, through one more page or one more feature, without adjusting budget or timeline. Read the full entry →

A scope of work defines exactly what a web project includes (pages, features, rounds of revisions, deliverables), and by implication what it does not. Read the full entry →

A web design agency is a company with designers, developers and strategists who plan, design and build websites for clients, usually on a quote-based project fee. Read the full entry →

Published guides put most small-business agency projects in the thousands to tens of thousands, depending on scope; always compare fixed scopes, not hourly rates. Read the full entry →

An agency covers more skills and continuity; a freelancer is usually cheaper and closer to the work. For defined, standard sites, productised options are cheapest of all. Read the full entry →

A website launch is the moment a new site replaces the old one or goes public, checked against a list: redirects, analytics, forms, speed, sitemap and search console. Read the full entry →

A website maintenance plan is an ongoing service covering updates, backups, security monitoring, uptime checks and small changes for a monthly fee. Read the full entry →

White label means one company builds a product or website that another company sells under its own brand, with the builder invisible to the end client. Read the full entry →

A broken link points to a page that no longer exists or never did, sending visitors to an error; they build up as pages move without redirects. Read the full entry →

Clean and modern usually means generous white space, a restrained palette, strong modern type, fewer elements per screen and no dated effects. Read the full entry →

Going live means publishing a website so the public can reach it at its real domain, after testing, redirects and final checks. Read the full entry →

Getting a website takes three things: a domain name, hosting, and the site itself, which can be built with a builder, by a professional, or generated from a description. Read the full entry →

Describe it to a prompt-to-website builder that uses proven designs; a working site can exist in minutes. Read the full entry →

A DIY builder on a monthly plan, or a one-time static site on a free host; watch for fees that add up over years. Read the full entry →

A loading spinner shows that something is in progress; skeleton screens that preview the layout usually feel faster than a spinner. Read the full entry →

Make it pop usually means the design lacks a focal point: the fix is stronger contrast, one dominant element, bolder type or purposeful motion, not more colours. Read the full entry →

Ranking on Google comes from pages that answer what people search better than the alternatives, on a fast, crawlable site that others link to; no one can guarantee a position. Read the full entry →

Mobile friendly means a site is easy to read and use on a phone: readable text without zooming, big enough buttons, no sideways scrolling and fast loading on mobile networks. Read the full entry →

When a website is down, the usual causes are an expired domain, a DNS mistake, a hosting outage, an expired certificate or a broken deploy, checked in that order. Read the full entry →

A one-page website puts everything on a single scrolling page, with the menu jumping to sections, suiting simple offers, events and portfolios. Read the full entry →

A plugin adds a feature to a platform like WordPress or Shopify, such as forms, SEO tools or reviews, without custom code. Read the full entry →

A pop-up is a box that appears over a page, often for sign-ups, offers or cookie consent; badly timed ones are among the most disliked web patterns. Read the full entry →

A slider or carousel rotates several images or messages in one space; most visitors see only the first slide, so the first one must carry the message. Read the full entry →

A splash page is an introductory screen shown before a site's real content, like an animation or an enter button; it adds a step between visitors and what they came for. Read the full entry →

A sticky header stays pinned to the top of the screen as you scroll, keeping navigation and the main action always within reach. Read the full entry →

When site owners say the back end, they usually mean the admin area where they log in to edit pages, products or posts, not the server code. Read the full entry →

A theme is a packaged design for a platform like WordPress or Shopify that controls how every page looks. Read the full entry →

A website builder is a tool for making a site without code, by dragging blocks, choosing templates or describing it to AI, usually with hosting included. Read the full entry →

A website template is a pre-designed layout you fill with your own content; it is fast and affordable, but the same design is used by many other sites. Read the full entry →

A widget is a small self-contained feature placed on a page, like a chat box, map, review feed or booking calendar, often loaded from another company. Read the full entry →