Sustainable Web Design In 20 Lessons
The practical guide to creating and maintaining lighter, more efficient websites. It covers the basics and gives you tools you can use on your own site the same day.
Also available on Amazon (ebook), Apple Books, Google Books and Gumroad.
In Denmark, you can also borrow it from libraries around the country.
About the book
Websites keep getting heavier
The digital sector has a real climate footprint, comparable to aviation and possibly larger, depending on the estimate.Note 1 Meanwhile websites and digital products keep growing, driven by faster connections and more powerful hardware.
This book is a guide to building efficient, lightweight websites without compromising design or functionality. Across 20 lessons, I share more than a decade of hands-on experience, from hosting and page-weight budgets to images, fonts, JavaScript and caching.
It isn’t a fixed guide to how it must be done. It’s a practical guide to get you started in the field, and to ignite your own thinking so you find more ways to make sustainable websites.Note 2
- 1Peer-reviewed estimates put ICT at 1.8–2.8% of global greenhouse gas emissions, possibly up to 3.9%. Freitag et al., Patterns, 2021. The IEA estimated aviation at 2.5% of energy-related CO₂ in 2023.
- 2What I mean by sustainable: pages built to a weight budget, fewer requests, no third-party trackers, accessible to WCAG 2.2 AA, and maintained rather than rebuilt.
What’s inside
Twenty lessons
- 1Sustainable web design fundamentals
- 2Understand carbon footprints
- 3Green web hosting
- 4Content delivery networks
- 5Page-weight budgets
- 6Death of content
- 7Accessibility
- 8Minimalistic and lightweight design
- 9Dark/light mode and colours
- 10Image optimisation
- 11Video optimisation
- 12Font optimisation
- 13HTML optimisation
- 14CSS optimisation
- 15JavaScript optimisation
- 16React and Svelte optimisation
- 17Trackers and HTTP requests
- 18Service workers and caching · read it free
- 19APIs
- 20Emails and newsletters
Readers
What readers say
“Andersen’s ‘20 lessons’ format offers an easy to follow, practical application of the research and best practices on sustainable web design. If you’re after an in-depth ‘how to’ guide, then this format may be just what you’re looking for.”
“Michael distils years of hard-won experience into a practical, beautifully written guide. This book changed how I approach every project.”
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