15 Beautiful Examples of Whitespace in Web Design

Often found in minimal, flat, and material design, and always associated with beautiful typography, whitespace or negative space is the perfectly proportioned space around and between the elements of a layout.

It is any, and all space found between the margins, leading, letter-spacing, etc. Even though it’s called whitespace, it doesn’t necessarily have to be white. The blank space may be of any color, texture, or even an image.

As whitespace is capable of emphasizing a particular element of a layout, it is one of the most effective ways of guiding your users through a website.

Web design is more or less about communicating a specific message, and whitespace can significantly improve the interaction between users and content, giving you the means to guide your visitors around the site exactly how you intended.

It can also have a tremendous impact on readability. Users are not willing to read cluttered, large chunks of text, therefore, whitespace can be used to establish a clear typographical hierarchy, making reading much more pleasurable.

Structured text with well-proportioned whitespace will also significantly make your content digestible and memorable, helping to improve comprehension.

It can also be used to establish a feeling of sophistication and finesse into your design. Combined with well-structured typography, whitespace creates a feeling of reliability and self-sufficiency. It can send strong signals of quality to your site visitors.

Of course, this is hard to measure, but whitespace can bring harmony and balance to your design. It welcomes its viewers. It enables them to feel comfortable and allows them to find their way around your site in a smooth and timely manner.

Every web designer should take whitespace into consideration, but not all do. While some have mastered the art and have designed web layouts that are as close to web design perfection as you can get, as you have seen from this showcase.