A Bite Of The Apple / Apples New Website
Posted by Matt Davies on June 20th, 2007.
Matt Davies has posted 27 articles.
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The New Website
Apple have redesigned their website and what a superb example of a good redesign it is. In this post we would like to take a little look at the new design and what has been done to move it on. Here is an example of the new design:
The Old Website
Also at this stage, before we go into details it might be worth us reminding ourselves of the old site. Here is an example of that:
1. Aesthetics & Usability / Building On The Good
There was a lot right about apples previous website. When you consider the trend setting “glassy” look and the simplistic messaging and colours you have to admit that it was industry inspiring. The previous design had clear priorities; the home page was the shop window, there was a large area promoting the latest product and then smaller areas promoting different areas of the site. Imagery was key and the simplicity of the layout promoted ease of use. When you got in further the site changed from being a marketing tool to being an information giving site, showing the user what they wanted to see when they wanted it.
This strategy is spot on: On the home page of a site you give the user what YOU want them to see. On the inner pages your give the user what THEY want to see.
With this in mind a redesign was always going to be tough, but apple is not a company to put off moving with the times. As their competitors have just updated all their software and design styles to counter Apples super trend setting image, Apple is off again, and what a good job they’ve done of it.
In the redesign they have not only kept the successful strategy of the previous site, they have enhanced it. The shop window area has been made larger. The simplicity of the design elements has been increased. The glassy areas have been slightly toned down but subtle wet floor effects and light bevels have been introduced. The whole thing is slick and builds upon the success of the last site both in regards to aesthetics and in regards to usability.
2. Destroying The Bad / Out With The Old
What was bad about the old design? Not much. However the success of the old design was its downfall. The glassy looking navigation tabs was starting to look dated as everyone replicated it. The tabs are gone and in their place a swish looking nav (more below).
Also the ability to view this site on mobile devices is a lot easier I understand. This is probably due to the new launch of the iPhone. So out goes the bad code, in comes the new…
3. Navigation / Simple Simple Simple
For such a complex site I think Apple’s simple navigation does them credit. 6 items in the primary nav filter you down into main sections of the site. These main sections act as mini home pages which filter you down again into the inner pages with side navigation. Yes indeed they have followed the ‘three click rule’.
Also you will discover more graphic lead navigation in the top areas of some of the main pages. Visual aids are so useful to users and so what better way to utilise this and help filter people to their desired product.
Conclusion
So Apple have done it again. A nice looking redesign to aid their new product launches. Its slick and so very Apple.
What do you think about it reader? Is this another trend setter? Comments most welcome…
Make A Comment
( 23 so far )
23 Responses to A Bite Of The Apple / Apples New Website
I think you are committed to Apple. You’re part of the brainwashing Apple cult. I hope I can join to this cult soon, since as an outsider I can’t feel these trance-like emotional feelings what I’ve read above. As an outsider I think these black backgrounds only allowed on nasty / pr0n sites for the public. It’s not bad, but it’s just an average site. Much better designs available on the net. Nobody uses this style but Apple. So now it’s part of global enlightenment. I saw how my friends transformed to brainless ‘everything what’s apple do is the only one and superb choice’ people. It’s scares me. Maybe I didn’t take the pill yet…
I don’t think it’s anything groundbreaking in terms of setting web design trends. The new refresh is good though - the black is indeed bold, but it works. As dH says, there are many other well designed sites out there which top Apple’s new design as far as eyecandy goes.
It sounds like this is turning into a discussion of Apple’s cult… and I think it kind of misses the point. The design may or may not be the best you’ve had since grandma’s home cookin’, but I think it’s an interesting take on how to take an already successful design that has worked really well for Apple, and then improve it.It would have been really easy for Apple to rest on their laurels- a lot of people do. And yet, they’ve moved the design forward, without losing the ‘Apple’ feel.One comparison which jumps to mind, which is entirely inadequate, is how the Beatles kept changing and developing their music, and yet kept their ’sound.’ You can tell a Beatles song within the first few bars, most often the first few notes, whether it’s from their first album or their last one.The lesson for me, as I consider a redesign of my own site, is how to keep the "Heart of Business" feel, without staying stuck. Thanks for making me think.
dH, are you a designer? If so, do you have an Apple cpu? I’m just curious. I’m not saying that everyone should be on the Apple bandwagon, but I just like to see why you think Matt is brainwashed.Apple’s website is by no means ground-breaking, and of course their are better designs, but it doesn’t mean it’s not a great design. The look of their site also goes along with their branding, especially for the latest iphone commercials.
I really like the design, although I wonder if there are issues for people on slow connections or with any disabilities. I’d be interested to read a review of the site from an accessibility standpoint.I don’t use Apple products so I can’t comment on how easy the site is to use to find things. However, it certainly supports the Apple brand from a visual perspective - that’s for sure.
I think the design is very Apple (if that means anything). It is just what I would expect from them.One really cool thing that I did not notice on first glance was the search. They now have an AJAX search, which I think works very well.Also, I was curious to see how they achieved styling the search box the way that they did in Safari. They used javascript to style it like that.I have always had problems with removing the borders on form elements in safari, and now I know that even Apple does not know another way around it besides JavaScript.
Apple may be innovators in product design, but in website design they’ve always been rather utilitarian and dull. They’re just no damn fun. There’s nothing wrong with their website, but I can’t find anything to get excited about either.
I’m a committed Apple famboy. but I can’t help but be a little dissapointed by the redesign. Lots of it is good, especially the points about the refining of the shop window on the homepage, and i like the glossy blck look.But the navigation bar at the top irks me. The burshed metal just doesn’t fit, it kind of just looks like it is floating there, and I dont love it. And the design just doesn’t seem to flow consistently through the site. Its all dark, but seems to be treated in different ways dependant on te product. This may have been deliberate, but it just doesn’t work for me.
I agree Matt, Apple’s redesign is great. I like how you walked us through some of the more notable changes.I wrote a (very brief) review of Apple’s redesign <a href="http://www.cssglobe.com/article.asp?id=722&catId=5" title="CSS Globe Spotlight Review">over on CSSGlobe.com</a>. Overall, I think Apple’s attention to brand detail is staggering. They’ve married their site to their other products (Leopard’s finder, iTunes 7), right down to the html forms! I’m not sure it’s revolutionary, but Apple improved its already-sleek image.
Oops, didn’t know I couldn’t code a link right in the RTE. Here’s that CSSGlobe link again: http://www.cssglobe.com/article.asp?id=722&catId=5
I like the redesign, but where are the movie trailers? I spent about three minutes scurrying around the site before I finally did a Google search. First I clicked on "itunes" because I figured they probably put the video in with the rest of the multimedia. When I didn’t see the trailers there, I clicked downloads, only to skimp over the small movie trailers box, seeing only the software downloads. Finally, I clicked the apple logo, thinking it would take me to a page with all of the apple signature products (mac, iphone, itunes, quicktime), all to no avail. Thank God for Google.
The issue I have pertains to usability – Where the hell are the navigational sublinks!? I can no longer find a direct link to the developer page, among others, that I now have to actually type in just to load up. The reason Apple’s previous design worked so well was because the link/sub-link setup of their navigation was so accommodating to the amazingly nested structure of the data on their servers.
love the new search, everyone should check that out.
[…] A Bite Of The Apple / Apples New Website, Matt Davies, fadtastic.com […]
As I’ve highlighted before, and very few have seemed to notice, the iPhone page has flaws. When browsing the phone’s features you are left with a little bit of the Mystery Meat Navigation. I would usually just cringe and pass over it, but with Apple pushing the iPhone so hard people are going to want to see what it’s about. Some may be able to decypher what some of those icons mean, I couldn’t so I’m guessing a lot more people won’t be able to either. In the grand scheme of things it’s just a small bump in the road, but when your target audience is average consumers one must watch every little detail. Just thought I’d add that little tid bit of information to the discussion.
I think it is a very good design, and the old one was indeed not original anymore.The new look hasn’t been applied to the Dutch version of the website.It also got wider, the old one could worked better on 800×600 than the new one, which is for 1024x? and up… But anyway, I really like the design, and think it’ll be a trend once again…
I don’t know if this was mentioned or not, because I stopped reading once this post became a whine-fest against Apple; not that I care one way or the other for Apple, but because their company ethic has nothing to do with this post, so, quit crying people.What I really love about the new design is the fact that it’s on black. I am SO SO SO sick of clients and internal checklisters telling me "Black is too hard to read white text on, it hurts my eyes." I’m sorry, but this is a striking example of how black should be used. Take a lesson, guys, this is truly groundbreaking.And the ingenuity of the Home and Search functions are amazing. Good job, Apple.
dylan, after re-reading the article I actually find it difficult to accept that it is a "whine-fest against Apple." There’s hardly a word against Apple’s design here! The search is fantastic though. Clever, intuitive and usable - I likey!
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After some testing, I find it odd that the only section of the new site that works as intended in IE5.5 is the store. All other pages are busted. If they could make the store work, why not test the rest? It hardly seems like a coincidental oversight.
While the tabbed look was getting dated (so many commercial portals use tabs for navigation) the thing to note about apple’s website upgrades is how everything about the look expresses the industrial and interface design of the products they’re selling. The ’simplified’ new nav is really just pushing the look of safari on the iPhone, OSX and even their Windows offering and getting it in front of the user. The site is familliarizing the user with and reinforcing the Apple experience that they’ll pick up from using the products.
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