Website Design Templates

What are Website Templates?

A website template (or web template) is a pre-designed webpage, or set of HTML webpages that anyone can use to “plug-in” their own text content and images into to create a website. Usually built with HTML and CSS code, website templates allow anyone to setup a website without having to hire a professional web developer or designer, although, many developers do use website templates to create sites for their clients. This allows anyone to build a reasonably priced personal or business website that can then be listed in search engines so users can search for your specific product or service. In the case of website templates, each design we offer is a self contained (or stand alone) downloadable complete website that you can use to “plug-in” your text and image content with little, or no, editing of the layout or design elements.

Types of Web Templates

Webpage templates may be self contained zip file downloads, or part of a proprietary web builder interface, or included with an html software editing program. They may be responsive, adaptive or static in design or configured specifically for mobile. The file extension can be .html .htm .php or .asp. In all cases they will be built using html and css code. If it’s labeled as “responsive”, the layout will flex in width to fit the specific device viewing screen regardless of whether it’s a desktop computer, tablet or smartphone. Therapist website design using templates.

“Website templates allow novice web developers to quickly build a website without the need to create webpages from scratch.”

What Can a Web Template Include?

Text and .jpg, .png or .gif images, jQuery and CSS3 animation, shopping carts, contact forms, dynamic image galleries and slideshows, a PDF download links page, and video players (including embedded Youtube movies) are just a few of the features that can be built into a design.

Web template designs and code vary widely from vendor to vendor, so when selecting a website template, you will want to make sure it already includes the functions, scripts and applications you require for your web development project. Text, stock photos, scripts and 3rd party plugins can be added to the ready-made pages. The included stock images can be replaced with the users own .jpg images or edited as the project requires.

New Webmaster? If you’re planning to setup your first website, or are new to using self contained downloadable pre-made webpage designs, all templates include step by step instructions and built-in features. For more help see how to build a website.

Website Templates and Developers

Because our website templates are complete stand alone zip file downloads that include multiple pages and built-in scripts, we do have many developers that use our designs to create sites for their clients. Additionally, any website template we offer can be purchased by a client and they can then outsource or hire a developer to complete their website using our design and layout. Using a website template as a base and having a professional complete the site will allow for a great savings over having a developer create a new web site from scratch. There are no restrictions on how a website is setup using one of our webpage template designs once purchased. See our template users agreement for more details on usage and restrictions. Read more about templates for web development.

“Using a website template as a base and having a professional complete the site allows for great savings over having a developer build the base layout.”

About HTML and CSS Design

HTML and CSS are both plain text code languages that are used to allow web browsers to render webpages as designed. See html and css for more detailed information. The current revision is HTML5 and CSS3 which is referred to as “web standards”. The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) maintains and updates these standards.

Mobile and/or Responsive
Web templates come in many flavors so you should carefully consider your options before committing to a design to use. It’s best to choose one that will be compliant and viewable on mobile and also passes the Google Mobile-Friendly Test. To read about the pros and cons of these options see choosing responsive or mobile.

Types of Mobile Web Templates
Responsive
Full website with mobile version (adaptive)
Mobile & mobile optimized
Mobile upgrade (for older websites)

Adaptive Design
This type of web template is similar to responsive design and will usually include Media Queries css code like responsive designs. The main difference is that it more specifically targets desktop, tablet and mobile devices separately with either a whole new design and/or a new set of webpages. Detection of some kind, css, jQuery, php, or asp will be used to re-direct the viewer to the pages configured for their specific device. There can be some gray area here as to when a web template is responsive and when it is adaptive. See mobile sub-sites and also responsive vs. mobile.

Example Black Web TemplateWhite Sample Website LayoutExample Website Style
Web Template Examples

Web “Builder” Programs

Website building programs offered by Wix, Weebly, Squarespace, web.com, Godaddy and others include a proprietary editing program that allows the user to edit their website directly on-line though a web browser interface using their web template library. Although this sounds convenient, something to keep in mind is that you may spend many hundreds of hours creating and updating your website and you do not have a copy of it anywhere except inside the web builder’s program cloud. Since our web templates are download to your computer, you will have a copy of your website that you can upload with any other hosting service and are not locked into a single company provider. Read more…

Why Choose Self Contained Over a Site Builder

Site, or web builders, sometimes referred to as a CMS, or “content management system”, are proprietary programs that allow editing and publishing of website content from a central interface like a web browser.

Proprietary CMS and web builder systems are offered through many hosting companies, however, when using the stock website template designs included with the host package, your website will not be “portable” and you would find it difficult to place your site on your computer and switch to another hosting company at a later time. Additionally, search engine optimization can be more difficult to setup as well as adding applications or animation like you may see on other websites. Customization in these cases can be more limiting. Large scale websites are more difficult to manage with these programs. Self contained webpage templates do not have these drawbacks. Read more…

With web templates all source code and files are included in the download. There are no restrictions of any kind on what you can add, or remove, from the designs, allowing you more flexibility and unlimited expandability on your website. They are stand alone applications so you will always have a backup copy of your entire website on your computer.

“Website templates help make affordable professional looking websites available to everyone.”

Minisites

Website Templates and a Unique Website
If a user is concerned that by using a website template, they will not be getting a unique website, you may want to consider that many billions of websites exist, and countless templates are available from a vast number of companies. The odds are nearly astronomical that a surfer would ever see two sites that are using the same website template design. Additionally, when setting up your website you will most likely edit all text and replace most images to make your website project unique. All our templates also use global CSS code and allow for easy color changes as well as font and some layout & design modifications. Unlike a CMS or site builder system, stand alone templates allow for modifications to any part of the webpages.