When it comes to web design, trends and opinions are constantly changing and evolving. And some design choices completely polarise opinion. One such design choice is the hamburger menu. The chances are, you’ll have seen and used a hamburger menu on websites or apps. They’ve been around for a number of years now, and it seems that they are everywhere. But what is a hamburger menu, and why should you use one? Well, here at Pumpkin Web Design Manchester, we are Manchester’s leading web design experts. We work with companies and businesses across Manchester, and the surrounding area, including Wigan and Southport, to provide web design solutions that can help businesses grow. As a result, we have produced this guide to everything you should know about hamburger menus in web design.
What is the hamburger menu?
First of all, what exactly are we talking about? Well, the hamburger menu has nothing to do with your favourite fast food establishment. Although it does take its name from the shape of a burger. Three horizontal lines, sitting on top of each other, just like this ☰, indicate a symbol that can be clicked on to to unfold more information and navigation options. This makes it different from a usual menu bar, which is always on display.
What are the advantages of the hamburger menu?
The hamburger menu has a lot of advantages going for it. These include:
- Taking up a very small amount of space, so if you are going for minimalism on screen, the hamburger menu is a great way to achieve this
- Being universally recognized. This icon has been used successfully for almost ten years now and people instinctively know what it means and how to use it. This makes your website easy to use and effective.
- Solves the issue of an unequal navigation bar. If you don’t like the way your navigation bar sits to one side or the other, or the way the different page names take up a different amount of space, you can hide it all underneath the hamburger icon
- Perfect for mobile screens where it may be impossible to read the navigation bar headings. Instead, clicking on the hamburger and opening a pop up menu is a lot more user friendly.
The hamburger menu for local business websites
Ultimately, the hamburger menu is still a great choice for local business websites. But it does take some optimisation to ensure success. For example:
- Titling all pages with suitable names so that your users can find the information they are looking for, without being led in the wrong direction. For example, this would include reducing the ambiguity with “About” pages, where users may think the information will be about the product or service, only to discover it is about your business and your staff.
- Using the hamburger for screen sizes where the top navigation bar doesn’t fit. This way, for desktop users and large screen viewers, your navigation bar will be sufficient to direct them around the site, but for small screen viewers, where the navigation bar would be difficult to read, a hamburger menu is the perfect solution.
For more information, or for professional web design support in Manchester, get in touch with the experts today, here at Pumpkin Web Design Manchester.