Every time a new industry establishes itself, design trends start to take shape. Crypto is no exception. As cryptocurrencies and decentralized finance (Defi) spring out of the void at record speed, so too do the new design trends that define the visual language of crypto.
As a crypto and defi website design agency, we’ve noticed a few design trends that will redefine the industry’s trajectory. Here’s why you should listen and what trends to expect.
Why we know our stuff
Fyresite is full of crypto fanatics. We’ve been working with Crypto since the early days, and we’ll continue to work with it far into the future. In fact, we haven’t been able to work without the soft purring of a mining rig since 2017.
Each engineer and designer blends this crypto fanaticism with what they do best: build great digital products. As a website and app design and development agency, Fyresite is dedicated to cutting edge design.
Most recently, we’ve partnered with Axion to build a better website for a cutting-edge network.
An anonymous community member has just donated $10,000 USD in ETH to pay for major website upgrades, built out by the team at https://t.co/coMqIH90lp
— Axion (@axion_network) December 29, 2020
As usual, we started with research. Our team of expert crypto and defi website designers poured over hundreds of websites to identify and analyze the latest trends in crypto and defi websites. This process revealed a lot about the future of crypto and defi website design.
A lot of the trends we discovered were perennial, but some are pretty new. Here are just a few of the biggest crypto and defi design trends.
Crypto and Defi Website design trends
The following crypto and defi website design trends are quintessential to the industry, whether new or timeless.
- 8-bit design characteristics
- bright colors
- food elements
- dark backgrounds
- illustrations
- futuristic, but playful
Want to see these trends in action? Check out these top crypto websites to inspire your next project.
8-Bit Design Characteristics
Many crypto websites nod to 8-bit pixel designs. It’s computery, retro, and very visually distinct.
IOHK achieves the 8-bit feel with Wolfram’s Game of Life: a visualization that uses Wolfram’s Celular Automaton as an input in Conway’s Game of Life.
Similarly, Pickle employs green pixelated fonts. These classic styles easily achieve a retro, techy feel.
Why does it work so well? The future can be scary, and 8-bit design grounds the new technology in something familiar, retro, and nostalgic while keeping the techy feel. It’s no wonder 8-bit characteristics pop up across crypto and defi website design.
Bright colors
Colors have power, so businesses within the same industry tend to flock toward certain colors to convey a visual message. In crypto and defi website design, those colors are often bright. They include bright purples, pinks, yellows, and gradients. Cryptic, for instance, uses lots of yellow.
But far more popular are pinks and purples. Take Polkadot. Polkadot makes their entire brand pink. Many of the graphics also include a pink-to-purple gradient.
Combined with white backdrops and bold text, the website pops.
These colors are especially popular because the brightness adds a feeling of newness and innovation. Since many crypto and defi websites use dark backgrounds, these colors work especially well.
Food Elements
Crypto and . . . food? It’s a strange combination, but lots of coin, defi, and other crypto websites use lots of food language and imagery.
Bao, Pickle, and Sushi all use strong food imagery and language. Each is named after a food (obviously) and each uses images, coloration, and other design elements inspired by food.
Why it’s a trend is hard to say. One could make an argument that the cultural exchange of cuisine is quintessentially decentralized. But the more likely answer is that food sticks because it’s tasty, fun, and memorable. Oh, and it’s tradable.
Dark Backgrounds
What’s crypto without dark backgrounds? Dark designs are so common on crypto and defi websites that it’s almost a requirement.
However, designers need to be careful, because good dark themes are tricky to pull off. The website can’t be too dark and the accents can’t be too bright. Furthermore, white text on a dark background can be very hard to read.
This is especially important for crypto websites since they often include lengthy technical explanations. But the dark theme is also an industry standard. It’s a delicate art, which you can read more about in Fyresite’s guide to dark theme in UI and web design.
Nonetheless, the dark theme is quintessential for crypto and defi website design. AAVE, for instance, uses a neutral purple backdrop on their website.
Since the protocol is open-source, it should reflect common crypto and defi design standards. When a section has lots of words or numbers, the backdrop seamlessly transitions to white for a better user experience.
Illustrations
What’s a crypto website without a colorful illustration? These illustrations usually use lots of pinks, purples, yellows, and gradients, and they conform to a similar heroic style.
Kraken’s landing page features a detailed illustration of heroic people wielding magic coins of some sort.
But this image isn’t the only one that matters. The entire website is full of illustrations, all conforming to the same artistic style to establish brand consistency.
Most crypto websites, however, use other styles. Ethereum uses lines and pastels to illustrate a futuristic scene.
Regardless of the style, images are extremely popular for communicating visually. It probably caught on because of Ethereum’s prevalence, but it remains an extremely useful visual tool.
Futuristic, but Playful
It should come as no surprise that crypto and defi websites aim for a futuristic feel, but that’s only half of the picture. Most of these futuristic illustrations and design choices are playful, too.
District0x is the perfect example. They employ bright blues and long, animated pipes that run across the website. It’s not just futuristic; it’s playful and positive.
Other crypto websites are similar. Isometric cities, sci-fi supercomputers, and more are all common motifs.
Many of these design decisions are likely influenced by Ethereum. The Ethereum website is full of fun, futuristic illustrations.
Since it plays such a major role in the crypto echosystem, many Ethereum-based technologies use it as inspiration, setting a fun, futuristic tone for crypto and defi design.
Fyresite is deeply involved in crypto and defi website design, so no trend goes unnoticed. We implement these trends in tasteful, strategic ways across websites. Want to learn what Fyresite can do for your crypto or defi website? Reach out today with the form below.