There is dozens of screen resolution options available for users. Not all the users are working their browsers on full screen and it become very hard to choose right width for your blog. All available statistics give small benefit to users. There is only one stats that is working 100 percent – its’ your own.
We cannot give accurate percentage for each resolution that is preferred by users. It may vary from user to user. For most of the sites preferable resolution is 800*600, however for technical blog only one percent users the same.
What is optimal and acceptable choice?
It is not possible to give every user perfect design. However, you should try to settle down most accurate resolution for most people. In other words, it should be acceptable by every user.
In majority of cases, most optimal choice is 1024×768 or higher. Probably, it may be right width for your blog too. When width is optimal, it will give you extra space to include more relevant content.
Let your blog design breathe with some extra width or space. There is only one drawback that you may lose some 800*600 users.
When layout is optimized for right resolution, make sure that it is acceptable for lower resolutions as well. In this case, users would be able to use your site without scrolling down.
• Put your content on left side and side bar should be adjusted at right side.
• Put interlink within your blog and allow users to navigate your content freely
• You can use blog having layout with three columns. One column for content, one for menus and one for widgets. Three column layouts can be quickly browsed by low resolution users.
• You could use vertical space bar. Low resolution users would not be able to see RSS link if it is placed on sidebar. The best idea is to fix it below post so that user can browse it quickly.
Whatever the width of your blog, sidebars should be used intelligently.
The liquid solution
One of the most popular choices is liquid layout. In case of liquid layout, width would be adjusted automatically based on the usage of browser. Sadly, it cause problem with users having browsers with pretty large resolutions.
In certain cases, content will crush or it will become shorter than expectations. When you are using this option, don’t forget to consider the drawbacks of liquid solution. Here again designer has to work with minimum and maximum width.
Is there any perfect choice?
For advance bloggers, there are plenty of choices available to consider. With advance technique, it is possible to give perfect pages with perfect width to each user.
The most popular choices are CSS or elastic layouts that will be changed according to requirement. You just have to make little experiment to get the best solution.
It is true that you cannot please everyone. Yet it is possible to give perfect pages for most of the visitors. You can optimize it for every user but you don’t have to worry much of you cannot do so.
