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Professional Web Design Forums

May 1st, 2008 in How-To | 116 Comments

by Sean Hodge

Web design-related forums are a place where you interact with other designers, exchange ideas or discuss your first drafts. When you have a problem, you can post the issue, and then receive feedback on possible design or coding solutions from community members. This interaction is a great way to establish contacts and build relationships. Forums are used for networking and marketing purposes. They are practical places to solve problems and can serve as a form of social diversion.

What is a good forum?

As designers and developers, we choose a forum depending on its ability to approach our needs. In best case the forum should be large enough, moderators should be cooperative and the posts should be responded quickly. There is nothing worse than posting a thread on a forum and no one replies to it.

In forums, users develop a reputation over time. The forum software can be used to track this. Some forums allow users to rate each other as well. Also, the more you participate and the more professional input you bring to the community, the more other members will recognize you and respect your opinion.

The quality of the community is reflected by the level and depth of responses from community members. How well the forum is run has a direct impact on our ability to use it. The forum needs good moderation and clear guidelines. Even the design of the forum plays a role in our decision to use it. After all, every forum has its own personality.

The diversity of content on forums is immense. Often, advice takes the form of Q&A-discussions, but it can also take the form of articles, and tutorials as well. Threaded discussions are a huge part of forums, but some forums have areas that operate differently — marketplaces are an example, or design showcases.

Content Management Systems often have great forums for web designers. E.g. if you’re a Wordpress user, you may frequent the Wordpress Forums. There you can pose installation questions, share your recent themes, extensions, modifications and plugins and ask for a help in building a WordPress-template.

The type of career path you’ve chosen may lead you to forums as well. If you’re a freelancer then you may frequent forums such as the Freelance Switch Forum.

While such types of forums are of use to a web designer, there are forums specifically designed for working web design professionals. We’ve compiled a list below. We’d like to hear your experiences with these or other web design forums.

Web Design Forums

Sitepoint Forum
Sitepoint has a huge community of members, with over 250,000 members. It’s an excellent place to network, get programming tips, or practical business advice. There is a thriving marketplace where you can buy or sell websites and designs, among other things. Sitepoint’s forum is well managed and well maintained. It has a clean flexible layout and sets a high quality standard for web design forums.

Designers Talk Forum
This is an active forum with a clean design. It has a handful of sections dedicated to web design, coding, and others. This forum also has areas dedicated to graphic design and other disciplines related to web design. There are over 25,000 members in this community.

Stylegala Forum
Stylegala is a well-known site that promotes great site design, standards based practices, and news on client side solutions. The forum isn’t very active and the number of users isn’t disclosed. It does have a good clean design though. There are some popular discussions that you may want to participate in.

Dynamic Drive Forum
Dynamic Drive has a growing library of freely available code snippets and packaged solutions. Their forums are a popular place to discuss web design coding issues and solutions. Most of the sections in the forum are dedicated to coding topics related to web design. There is a Javascript section, and a CSS section, for example.

Digital Point Forum
This is a popular forum with a large user base, about half the size of Sitepoint. Its members are very active. Networking, conversations, advice, and more is thriving. It has sections on Design & Development, Search Engines, Business, Marketing, and others. It’s professionally managed and maintained. And has an active marketplace. The design is functional, though not remarkable.

Webmaster-Talk.com
This forum is focused on those that run sites. Web design is a big part of running a site. So, there are plenty of sections on that topic. Also, you may find sections like Internet Marketing and Making Money Online interesting as well. This forum has over 50,000 members. It’s also active as well. The design is clean, and sections like the marketplace have unique designs as well.

Kirupa.com
“Kirupa.com is a site that aims to make designers better developers, and maybe even help developers become better designers.” The forum has over 100,000 members. It’s a web design forum that has a strong trend toward Flash and Gaming. It’s a fun forum with enthusiastic and active users.

Dev Shed Forum
This is a large community with over 200,000 members. It focuses on programming mostly, though it does cover general web design topics, and graphic design as well. It is an active community, with multiple posts, and replies every day. Site design is simple and bland.

Chawlk
Basically, Chawlk unites the members and contributors of the 9rules community and offers them a compact platform for professional and not-so-professional discussions. Among other communities, you’ll also a find communities related to design, coding, blogging, technology, software etc. Interesting topics are selected by moderators and added into Editor’s picks.

CodingForums.com
This is an active forum focused on coding. Many of the languages covered are for web design. Under the Client Side section, there are topics on graphics and general web design issues as well. There are over 50,000 members and more than 5,000 active. The forum design is simple and usable.

Ozzu Forum
This forum covers web design and development topics. They also cover Graphics, Internet Marketing and more. It has over 30,000 members. The forums are active. They are well moderated and have been successfully running the forum for over 5 years.

HTMLforum.com
Website Design and Development are topics covered. It also covers Server Administration, Marketing, and Business topics. The design is a little bit distracting. This forum has over 30,000 members. The forums have regular active posts.

Webdevforums
This forum is moderately active with over 25,000 members. There were quite a few posts without replies in important sections like Client & Server Side Scripting. There is more activity in Web Designs, HTML Reference, and CSS Section though. This forum covers many important areas of web design, though only some of the forum sections are active.

Webdevforums

Talk Freelance
This forum is focused on web freelancers. It has over 15,000 members. The threads are active, and replies appear responsive. They cover web design and development topics. There is a popular marketplace. The forum has a bright inviting design.

Cre8asiteForums
This forum presents a friendly and inviting environment. There are over 15,000 members. The forums are active, with numerous lengthy threads where many members showed themselves to be helpful. Numerous website topics are covered. The site has some sections not seen on every web design forum, like Law, Ethics, and Green issues.

Web Design Forum
This forum organizes its topics into visualizing website design and coding websites. There are over 10,000 members. The posts are active, and there are plenty of lengthy tutorials and discussions. They have a well developed reputation system, and the forums are well moderated. The design is basic and stylistically dated, but the team running the site seams dedicated to standards based design.

Killersites Forum
Killersites are a network of websites branded cohesively that assist with educating on web design topics. Their forum is not the largest, or most active community, but it appears to be professionally managed. The sections on General Web Design, which includes topics such as CSS and HTML, are reasonably active for the size of its membership base. They have around 7,000 members.

Webdesignerforum.co.uk
If you’re looking to network with web designers from your area you may want to search for a forum that caters to your region. Webdesignerforum.co.uk is a forum from the United Kingdom. It has a little over 3,000 members. However, it’s extremely active for it’s size.

Further forums

Since web design is a profession that touches on numerous skills, forums that are dedicated to areas such as graphic design may be helpful as well. Graphic-Forums.com, Talkgraphic and Renderosity are dedicated to graphics design and have a large community willing to help you out; there are a number of subsections dedicated to specific software you are using to create your works.

Sean Hodge is the creative mind behind AiBURN.com, a weblog about design, creativity, inspiration and graphics.

Published in How-To, May 1st, 2008
Tags: coding, community, design, forum

1.

bee poll (May 1st, 2008, 3:30 am)

Nice, as always. Thanks! A lot of forums i didn’t know about there.
2.

James Kilper (May 1st, 2008, 3:39 am)

Hi, I use webdesignerforum.co.uk alot, and would like to vote for it…but I can’t! :(
3.

Ben Jacob (May 1st, 2008, 3:40 am)

What about The Mint Pages [http://mintpages.net] A closed community for skilled developers and Designers as they say.. (Actually I don’t know whats Inside. I never get an Invite from its admins..) May be not useful for [non Skilled-] Developers and Designers
4.

Christopher Bolton (May 1st, 2008, 4:04 am)

I only ever use webmasterworld.com, I can’t believe you missed it.
5.

Gavin Laking (May 1st, 2008, 4:13 am)

I migt be a bit biased but Link [designers-forum.com] is quite good sometimes - a bit quiet at the moment though!

Gav
6.

Rob Hawkes (May 1st, 2008, 4:16 am)

I can vouch for Webdesignerforum.co.uk, it’s fairly small but it has an amazing community. I’ve been a member there for just over 2 months now and I will not be going back to larger forums that have too many egos.

It’s a shame I can’t vote for it in the poll.
7.

Razvan (May 1st, 2008, 4:20 am)

Talk Freelance is one of the best!
8.

Jules (May 1st, 2008, 4:51 am)

I would like to recommend Link [accessifyforums.com] for helping to create accessible sites.
9.

Adam (May 1st, 2008, 4:56 am)

where is qbn.com?
10.

Doug S. (May 1st, 2008, 5:07 am)

You guys forgot ActionScript.org, for Flash development there is nowhere better. There hare dozens of post daily, and loads of very talented Flash developers to help you fix your problems. Not to mention the other resources on the site… If you do Flash work you have to know this site.
11.

Quech (May 1st, 2008, 5:07 am)

MintPages is a decent forum. The fact that it’s private makes it special. Not very busy these days though.
12.

Karinne (May 1st, 2008, 5:11 am)

Nice list there! Here’s a new community forum that opened up in February of this year - Link [www.thewebsqueeze.com].
13.

justin (May 1st, 2008, 5:15 am)

i personally like some of the smaller sites, like web design company forums such as 24/7 media Link [www.24-7media.de]
14.

Reymond (May 1st, 2008, 5:40 am)

Another very good forum is Cristalab Link [www.cristalab.com], is one of the best spanish forums in developer and design web.
15.

Kyle (May 1st, 2008, 5:51 am)

I have always been a fan of CSSCreator.com for all of your CSS needs.
16.

BlooApple (May 1st, 2008, 6:01 am)

Those are good forum for Designer !!! Nice Work !!
But can somebpdy tell me which is the best tutorial site for web designer from the way they think how to place everything in their and much more details than other tutorial ?
17.

Jeff Andersen (May 1st, 2008, 6:53 am)

Thanks a lot for featuring TalkFreelance.com, hope to see some of the knowledge of Smashing readers get carried over to our community! We’re in for a bunch of new changes over the next while, progressing as a bustling community with a wealth of knowledge to share. I actually had to double-take when I read Smashing and saw us there :)
18.

Ryan (May 1st, 2008, 7:25 am)

i second the vote for Link [www.webmasterworld.com]
19.

Phil (May 1st, 2008, 7:41 am)

AllGraphicDesign is one that I frequent often, and I really enjoy it. The people are very friendly, helpful and knowledgable. Link [www.allgraphicdesign.com]
20.

segfaultii (May 1st, 2008, 7:53 am)

for german users:
Link [www.xhtmlforum.de]
21.

Chris (May 1st, 2008, 8:03 am)

Professional? Really? The average user age on TalkFreelance is probably around 15, DigitialPoint is filled with scammers and MFAers…

Anyway, a spelling correction for you..”The site has some sections not scene>/strong> on every web design forum, like Law, Ethics, and …” should be ‘seen.
22.

bryce driesenga (May 1st, 2008, 8:38 am)

designwire.org is another good one. :)
23.

Jordan (May 1st, 2008, 8:42 am)

I think it may not have been featured for the fact that it isn’t public and that membership is moderated. It’s kind of hard to showcase a forum when you’re not able to publicly see it!

I’d recommend Link [mintpages.net] to anyone that is highly skilled in in programming, webdesign (with major focus being on xhtml/css–aka tableless coding), graphic design, and similar interests.
24.

TechiesBox (May 1st, 2008, 9:05 am)

I’d recommend techiesbox.com.
25.

Lucas (May 1st, 2008, 9:25 am)

Can you maybe, as a follow-up to this post, have a look at the best designed Forum software? I’m looking to install one for my site but most of them are pretty standard and not very visually appealing - there are a couple of interesting ones from this post but it would be a great round-up feature in the future.
26.

Nout van Deijck-Blog (May 1st, 2008, 9:35 am)

Thanks for the information!
Designers Talk is a great forum!

Nout van Deijck - Blog
(about (web)design, typography, science, news and more)
27.

Sean Hodge (May 1st, 2008, 10:15 am)

@Lucas - A post about Forum software is a good idea. I’ll look into it.

@Chris - Thanks for the word choice correction.

@Everybody - Thanks for leaving links and reviews on more forums. It’s great to hear about the forums Smashing readers are passionate about.
28.

Immy (May 1st, 2008, 11:13 am)

Thanks a lot. Was looking out for such places on google, but i guess i can surely trust whatever smashingmagazine recommends.

Thanks guys
29.

rob (May 1st, 2008, 11:50 am)

i guess qbn.com its not here because even though the guys are great artists all (or the 95%) are assholes
they barely help you. every thing its about their egos and irony

anywas they dont deserve it!
30.

Digilee (May 1st, 2008, 12:00 pm)

If you want The Designer Forum then where else but Link [thedesignerforum.com]?
31.

Vikas J (May 1st, 2008, 1:18 pm)

I visit Dynamic Drive quite often. The userbase there is very active. There are only about 10-20 people that actively participate but among them you can get any question related to Flash/ CSS/ HTML/Javascript/PHP answered. There are other sections that I don’t use too so I don’t know about those.

Other, larger, busier forums are filled with people who think they know how to code for the web properly and are only perpetuating bad standards.

That’s why I like DD.
32.

Shimer (May 1st, 2008, 1:20 pm)

most of the forums you linked are MORE related to SEO forums, design part is only a small part of that, we already know these forums. you would have mentioned FireworksGuru.com which is for Adobe Fireworks and related
33.

Marc Dandoy (May 1st, 2008, 1:51 pm)

You guys forgot to include Link [www.tutorialfx.com]

It has an ingenious site design.

Great article, though.
34.

Edmund (May 1st, 2008, 1:57 pm)

I know I’m going to sound like every other person above me mentioning a forum, but I feel that WebForumz.com should definitely be on that list. There’s over 13,000 members and the forums are incredibly active. Everyone is friendly and welcomed and the forum runs smoothly. There’s never spam to be found and it’s got a PR of 4, which is higher than some of the ones listed above.

Edmund.
35.

dloop (May 1st, 2008, 2:12 pm)

R.I.P. Dreamless.org!
36.

Paul (May 1st, 2008, 3:20 pm)

this is a great list. once again, thumbs up to smashingmagazine. thanks.
37.

Matt (May 1st, 2008, 4:51 pm)

Good post, as usual, guys! Thanks so much!
38.

Matthew Magain (May 1st, 2008, 5:45 pm)

Thanks for including SitePoint on your list, Sean! Our moderators work hard at creating a friendly and helpful community, so it’s nice to see someone recognizing that.
39.

genelu.com (May 1st, 2008, 5:56 pm)

Too many of the same forums … all with the same format. I think forums could work better than they do now and instead of addressing the design, how about the flow?
40.

Pat Andrew (May 1st, 2008, 6:47 pm)

I run a smaller art community site but hope to become one of the bigger players soon. We’ve been around for quite a while now, but haven’t gained much traction in the forums.
Link [www.visualdesigncore.com]
41.

web templates package (May 1st, 2008, 11:40 pm)

Thanks for giving the names of various forums. Though we get forums on seraching in google but there is no brief attached with forum names. The brief yoo have provided are of great help.
Thanks again.
:-)
42.

Kel (May 1st, 2008, 11:40 pm)

What about Link [www.estetica-design-forum.com]
43.

Philip The Web Site Design Guru (May 2nd, 2008, 12:26 am)

Thanks for you supplied the several name of various forums. An Internet forum is a web application for holding discussions and posting user-generated content. Internet forums are also commonly referred to as Web forums, message boards, discussion boards, (electronic) discussion groups, discussion forums, bulletin boards etc. Since web design is a profession that touches on numerous skills, forums that are dedicated to areas such as graphic design may be helpful as well. Each forum is important for web designing.

Link [www.netresults.ie]
44.

me (May 2nd, 2008, 2:16 am)

Nice list… but my favorite is missing.. Link [www.ultrashock.com]
45.

Marcus Stade (May 2nd, 2008, 2:28 am)

I run a design forum for swedish designers and developers. We have well over 12000 members and counting. The forum language is swedish however, which is really our niche. As can be seen by your list, there are plenty of international communities.

We recently redesigned our site, check it out at Link []!
46.

hadrus (May 2nd, 2008, 5:57 am)

Really nice list. But I’m use Link [4users.ucoz.ru] [4users.ucoz.ru]
47.

hema (May 2nd, 2008, 6:29 am)

very good list for webdesigners and webmasters, here i have a list of forum
Link [hemasunder.wordpress.com]
48.

Jonathan (May 2nd, 2008, 6:33 am)

I visit DigitalPoint and Designer’s Talk fairly regularly.

I would also recommend V7N.com - it’s a good webmaster / web design forum.
49.

David (May 2nd, 2008, 6:35 am)

I search a nice open forum. Know someone something?
50.

Pallian (May 3rd, 2008, 1:05 am)

Check out the forums of this guy: Link [timothysykes.com]
51.

carmelo (May 3rd, 2008, 4:10 pm)

i am using Link [www.talk-mania.com] a lot. it is very good for photoshop tutorials and free downloads
52.

knedl (May 4th, 2008, 2:34 am)

Great post as always, I like the forum they use at Link [forums.crowdspring.com] which is nicely implemented into the design.
53.

Polr (May 4th, 2008, 4:41 am)

I use webdesignerforum.co.uk all the time, the help and support is brilliant.
54.

Roger (May 4th, 2008, 7:36 am)

You’re just missing the best forum ever made the incredible and real time Metaforum : Link [www.planetblur.org]
55.

Em (May 4th, 2008, 11:17 pm)

R.I.P. dreamless.org indeed.

Most of the regulars from dreamless moved on to YH (yayhooray.org), B3S (butt3rscotch.org), or HH (humhum.be), all of which are either private, or invite-only. Seems to be the way things are going on the ‘tubes.
56.

Tom (May 5th, 2008, 11:08 am)

The Sitepoint and Digital Point forums are always very helpful.

You can find an answer to almost any question when searching through the thread archives first.

Or do a Google search using:

site:sitepoint.com/forums “your keywords”

site:forums.digitalpoint.com “your keywords”
57.

Felicity (May 5th, 2008, 1:57 pm)

i frequently (daily) am on Link [estetica-design-forum.com]
58.

mario (May 6th, 2008, 12:08 am)

check that forum - Link [www.dh-zone.com]
59.

Harry Roberts (May 6th, 2008, 1:44 am)

Yeah, I regularly (daily) use estetica-design-forum.com.

Also, mintpages.net is great - invite only but it’s a must for designers/developers of the higher ilk.
60.

Sarah (May 6th, 2008, 2:49 am)

Digitalpoint, stylegala, talk freelance, designer’s talk, sitepoint and html forum. They are my most visiting forum. Your collection is not doubt great. Thanks for sharing

Link [www.smashingapps.com]
61.

Geoserv (May 6th, 2008, 4:00 am)

I use SitePoint the most, definitely the best forums going.
62.

Alok Jain (May 6th, 2008, 8:31 am)

I am registered in few different forums and I normally find solutions of different problems on different forums so can’t vote for any one particular forum.
63.

welshstew (May 7th, 2008, 4:29 am)

nice list, but I use webforumz.com Link [www.webforumz.com]

great forum, well moderated, lively, all that you want and need.
64.

firewalker (May 13th, 2008, 3:55 am)

Nice lists! But most forums visited only when people are asking technical questions, it’s rare to find web forum which focus on designers relationship.
65.

andreea (May 14th, 2008, 12:55 pm)

You missed Talk-mania.com
One of the best photoshop tuorials i have ever seen
66.

Simon (May 16th, 2008, 12:17 am)

Webmasterworld.com should have been top of that list!
67.

automatic_ab (May 18th, 2008, 5:55 am)

Thanks for the great article. I bumped into SmashMag by mistake while researching for web project. I’m so glad I did; I’ve been on here ever since. I spend a lot of time on Sitepoint and own a few of their books. I’ve learned tons there from the forums, design contests and it’s a cool place to just hang out. Everybody is super helpful. I’m glad that I know now that there are other places to go though. Thx again.
68.

Herb (July 6th, 2008, 2:01 am)

Hi, nice article
I go to Link [simplelance.com] too
69.

Herb (July 6th, 2008, 2:03 am)

Hi, nice article
I go to simplelance.com too
70.

analu (July 17th, 2008, 8:02 am)

Hi, good info, and very professional forum, sitepoint must have info
about

creative design and web design like creative-works.us

and designout.us
71.

analu (July 17th, 2008, 8:04 am)

great info, !!!! oh !!!! and the best one to logos, creative-works.us
72.

Елена Итарьева (August 4th, 2008, 3:34 pm)

В офисе так нудно было, хорошо что нашла ваш сайт. Читаю с огромным интересом:)
73.

Rene (August 6th, 2008, 4:36 am)

thanks. helpfull.
but i saw forums with 10,000 members, but only 2-3,000 posts… wich means they probably got registered-spammed, so this number is not exact, lol
74.

Someone (August 18th, 2008, 12:32 am)

What about this one? Link [www.astrotalk.ir]

Does it seem nice?
75.

Айдар Ю (August 18th, 2008, 9:35 pm)

В нашем офисе так нудно было, хорошо что нашел ваш сайт. Читаю с огромным интересом:)
76.

Елена Фролова (August 19th, 2008, 9:13 pm)

Жесть! Реально жесть написано. :)
77.

Dave (September 13th, 2008, 8:15 pm)

I would definitely have to put down Link [www.webradiance.com] not the busiest forum but it has no ads and the people on it are pretty knowledgable in all areas :)
78.

Kathrynborlandbest (October 7th, 2008, 8:28 pm)

Recently, my husband started with the potential problem and our relations are deadlocked.
After all, I love sex … I encouraged him to go to the doctor, and he is afraid.
Maybe someone who will help us, tell of impotence pills and where to buy them anonymously. In advance thank you to all who help!
Sorry if in the wrong section leave a message!
79.

SallyHilvbaters (October 8th, 2008, 12:01 am)

My husband and I want to go on a awesome long vacation soon. We were looking for suggestions. Anyone have any awesome locations? A means to save a lot dough would be awesome as well. Vacationing is pricey these days.
80.

Jonathon Cristiansen (October 9th, 2008, 6:55 am)

I’m surprised that Link [www.designateonline.com] isn’t mentioned. It’s certainly one of the best forums from a visual design point of view.
81.

Edmon (October 14th, 2008, 1:16 pm)

I m having a problem of disabling the background of my drop down flash
button design in web,I mean I want to insert only a button in the web page,can you help me.