Remember when everyone talked about “the fold”? As in, “We need to keep the important information above the fold.” And, “Visitors won’t see if it’s below the fold.” I’ve even had clients insist on having me design their entire site to show above the fold due to this paranoia. Well, at some point when I wasn’t looking, apparently the fold disappeared. Hunh.

I’ve read an assortment of articles about it lately but the one that really illustrated it (literally!) was this one Life Below 600px. Good point! Stuff below the fold is there, it will get seen, because guess what? People know how to scroll! We have become super users!

OK, I’m being a little facetious but still – people are getting more comfortable with how the internet works.

I still think that we need to keep items of the utmost importance above the legendary fold – phone number, contact info, main message – but there is no need to squish everything into that space. Oftentimes people want to put everything they possibly can above the fold because visitors supposedly decide in 3 seconds whether to stay or not. The writer of the Life Below 600px article made an astute observation about that: “…having no space and information overload will most definitely make your visitors leave before the 3 seconds are up.” Good point – too much info with no white space is scary!

GuidedCreative.co.uk is a really great example of a website that has embraced the new fold-less era.

And here are a couple more articles that also explain it rather well:

Theaccessibility.com – There is No Fold

Boxesandarrows.com – Blasting the Myth of the Fold

 

Amy Carriere also writes at her personal blog Life, Design, Roller Derby and thinks web design is just the bees knees!