800 x 600 is finally dead
31st March 2008 by David North
For most this screen resolution has been gone for some time however from a web development perspective a lot of websites still ensure that 800 x 600 screens have no horizontal scrolling. This was originally because it was thought a large enough percentage of visitors were still using this resolution however the fact that some high profile (and benchmark) website are still optimised for 800 x 600 and above certainly hasn’t helped to see this limiting factor being removed. A lot of people have been saying this for a long time - Screen Resolution and Page Layout.
The new style that BBC News have just adopted shows that they now think this small resolution is now dead and finally we can use some of the unused browser space. Isn’t it so much easier to read? Lets hope everyone follows the lead if they haven’t already.
I think you’re right. Also layout frameworks like blueprintCSS and YUI are also sealing 800×600’s fate by forcing 960px-wide pages.
With so many developers taking note of what the Big British Castle do I think we could see a massive shift in UK web design towards the higher resolution…and not before time, some of us are on widescreen monitors now!