Web Development Trends Likely to Become More Popular in 2022

Web development has evolved over the years and continues to accelerate at a rapid pace. And therefore website owners must be aware of the changing web development trends not only to stay updated in the competitive landscape but also for providing a better user experience. Failing to do so may affect your website’s performance and can make you lose your existing users to your competitors. So, make sure that you are maintaining your website as per the recent trends in web development.

Let us walk you through some of the top web development trends that will be followed in 2022. A few of these trends might not be the latest but they are expected to become even more popular in 2022.

1. Progressive Web Apps

PWAs have captured the attention of some major brands like Starbucks, Amazon, Flipkart, Twitter, etc. Though PWAs are already popular in the web development community, they are likely to be adopted by a lot more brands and website owners in 2022. The reason behind their massive adoption is the remarkable growth that brands and businesses have reported after switching to PWA.

A progressive web app or PWA is a website in the form of a native app. It can be installed on a user’s device just like a native app and offers a similar browsing experience. It also offers features like push notifications. Speaking from the developers’ point of view, PWAs are relatively easy to develop and involve lower development costs.

With a majority of the web traffic coming from mobile devices today, website owners must revamp their existing web apps into PWAs.

Also Read: PWA vs Native App: What Should Be Your Pick?

2. Motion UI

Users primarily look for convenience and speed when it comes to browsing web applications. But in addition to these, they also expect richer and more interactive experiences, and that’s where Motion UI plays its part. It is widely getting popular and would be one of the leading web development trends going forward in 2022.

Motion UI is a SaaS library that lets you create dynamic UI transitions and animations for your platform. It includes a bundle of transition effects such as slide, spin, fade, and a few built-in animations. It is compatible with all web technologies and can be incorporated into various places on a website like the header, menu, footer, etc.

3. Accelerated Mobile Pages

Though Accelerated Mobile Pages or AMP technology was launched by Google more than half a decade back, it remains one of the top mobile technologies used worldwide even today with more than 1.9 million websites using it.

AMP aims to provide lightning-fast digital experiences to mobile users. In fact, its logo/symbol denotes the same. AMP pages load much faster than usual web pages. This helps improve a website’s bounce rate, conversion rate, and ultimately the overall user experience. A website integrated with the AMP technology also appears higher on the SERPs than the ones which aren’t.

4. WordPress Development

More than 40% of websites today are built on WordPress CMS. That’s because WP makes the process of building and managing a website quite effortless. It’s an open-source platform and its development team keeps adding new features to it to meet users’ needs. Developers should know and be aware of how this CMS is evolving, in order to adapt to its latest enhancements.

The CEO of “Gravity Forms” Karl Hancock hints at the arrival of full site editing, which will enable the block editing functionality not just for the posts and pages but for the entire website.

“2022 will be a pivotal year for the CMS as it introduces the biggest change to theming in the history of the open-source project: Full Site Editing. Scheduled to be introduced in WordPress v5.9, Full Site Editing is poised to introduce major sea change in how web sites are created and managed with WordPress going forward” says Karl Hancock.

5. AI-Powered Chatbots

Though AI-powered chatbots aren’t something new, they are expected to be even more sophisticated and smarter in 2022 in understanding user behavior and needs. This technology uses Machine Learning (ML) and Natural Language Processing (NLP) to better understand the user intent and provide a very human-like experience.

Many industries leverage AI chatbots in their business websites to address customers’ concerns or complaints 24×7. These chatbots are continually trained to adopt a human-like approach so that the users’ experience becomes more personalized and they feel as if they are actually speaking to a real person rather than a bot.

Experts say AI chatbots are the future, and there’s no denying it. In 2022 and beyond, chatbots would become more advanced to tackle human queries and solve many other issues. Also, more and more companies would be embracing this technology in their business strategy.

6. API-First Development

In the traditional code-first development approach, the primary focus is on building the service and its resources. The need to establish a connection with software and devices usually came as an afterthought. Developers make the decisions and create the API later. And in this process, there’s always a certain risk of not being able to deliver what the consumer needs.

With API-first development, the focus tilts towards consumer needs via a feedback loop followed by building out the service. This helps ensure you’re building the right API the first time- every time. This approach allows app developers to work in parallel and helps reduce development time and costs significantly. Additionally, it minimizes the risk of failure of a project by ensuring that all the APIs are reliable and consistent.

7. Micro Frontends

One of the latest trends in web application development that will be eyed by developers in 2022 is Micro Frontends. Micro Frontends is about breaking up the frontend monoliths into smaller, more manageable pieces. Microservices Architecture has been getting immense popularity in recent years because of its ability to allow developers to build flexible backends, unlike the old-fashioned ones. However, it still tags some complications with frontends, where monolithic codebases are used to build interfaces. With the introduction of Micro Frontends, this headache can be avoided.

The Micro Frontends technology allows developers to break down a monolithic frontend into simple units, before testing and deploying them separately. Furthermore, multiple teams can work on different frontend components, and then cluster them to create a great web application. This also makes app upgrades easier and contributes remarkably to the overall web development flow.

Also Read: The Different Software Architectural Patterns You Should Know About

8. Single Page Applications

Single Page Applications or SPAs are JavaScript-based web applications that do not need to load themselves while working on a browser, and dynamically update content without having to refresh the browser. There are many popular examples of single-page applications, such as Facebook and Gmail.

In addition to being cost-effective and easy to build, SPAs also consume less server space and provide information to users efficiently on a single page without the need of navigating anywhere. These sorts of applications have the ability to hold users for a longer period on the website as users do not have to load the page repeatedly.

As netizens expect simpler and faster app experiences, the SPA trend is likely to be adopted greatly in 2022.

Final Thoughts

Web development is changing constantly to meet users’ needs and expectations. Staying on top of these web development trends would help ensure that your website remains up-to-date and consistently attracts and delights your visitors. As we mentioned earlier, most of these trends might not be new but they are expected to make a major impact on web development in 2022.