Digital media magazine for designers and developers
Web design plus tips and tricks.
The Accessibility Problem With Authentication Methods Like CAPTCHA
27 November 2025 @ 10:00 am
CAPTCHAs were meant to keep bots out, but too often, they lock people with disabilities out, too. From image classification to click-based tests, many “human checks” are anything but inclusive. There’s no universal solution, but understanding real user needs is where accessibility truly starts.
Design System Culture: What It Is And Why It Matters (Excerpt)
25 November 2025 @ 6:00 pm
We’re so happy to announce that “Maturing Design Systems”—a Smashing book by Ben Callahan — will soon be joining the Smashing Library! Ben’s insights and advice are so powerful, we thought you might like to read an excerpt from the book. Subscribe to our Smashing newsletter to be notified when orders are open.
Designing For Stress And Emergency
24 November 2025 @ 1:00 pm
Practical guidelines on designing time-critical products that prevent errors and improve accuracy. Part of the Measure UX & Design Impact (use the code 🎟 IMPACT to save 20% off today). With a live UX training starting next week.
Keyframes Tokens: Standardizing Animation Across Projects
21 November 2025 @ 8:00 am
Animations can be one of the most joyful parts of building interfaces, but without structure, they can also become one of the biggest sources of frustration. By consolidating and standardizing keyframes, you take something that is usually messy and hard to manage and turn it into a clear, predictable system.
From Chaos To Clarity: Simplifying Server Management With AI And Automation
18 November 2025 @ 10:00 am
Server chaos doesn’t have to be the norm. AI-ready infrastructure and automation can bring clarity, performance, and focus back to your web work.
CSS Gamepad API Visual Debugging With CSS Layers
14 November 2025 @ 1:00 pm
Debugging controllers can be a real pain. Here’s a deep dive into how CSS helps clean it up and how to build a reusable visual debugger for your own projects.
Older Tech In The Browser Stack
13 November 2025 @ 8:00 am
There are many existing web features and technologies in the wild that you may never touch directly in your day-to-day work. Perhaps you’re fairly new to web development and are simply unaware of them because you’re steeped in the abstraction of a specific framework that doesn’t require you to know it deeply, or even at all. Bryan Rasmussen looks specifically at XPath and demonstrates how it can be used alongside CSS to query elements.
Effectively Monitoring Web Performance
11 November 2025 @ 10:00 am
There are lots of tips for [improving your website performance](https://www.debugbear.com/blog/improve-website-performance?utm_campaign=sm-10). But even if you follow all of the advice, are you able to maintain an optimized site? And are you targeting the right pages? Matt Zeunert outlines an effective strategy for web performance optimization and explains the roles that different types of data play in it.
Smashing Animations Part 6: Magnificent SVGs With `<use>` And CSS Custom Properties
7 November 2025 @ 3:00 pm
SVG is one of those web technologies that’s both elegant and, at times, infuriating. In this article, pioneering author and web designer Andy Clarke explains his technique for animating SVG elements that are hidden in the Shadow DOM.
Six Key Components of UX Strategy
5 November 2025 @ 1:00 pm
Let’s dive into the building blocks of UX strategy and see how it speaks the language of product and business strategy to create user value while achieving company goals. Part of the Measure UX & Design Impact (use the code 🎟 IMPACT to save 20% off today).