One of the new buzzwords we are often asked here at Darren’s is if our websites are responsive, and we say yes, all of our websites since 2011 have been responsive. Responsive simply means the site looks as good on an iPhone or Android or an iPad or some other type of tablet as it does on a desktop or laptop.
And that’s a good question that you should be asking because not every website developer designs responsive sites, or they charge you for a mobile site and then you have to manage two sites, but that’s not the point to this post.
Here’s the point, when we do website reviews I often find sites that are not only not responsive, but are also not cross-browser compatible. I can hear it now, you are saying to yourself,
“What the hell is cross-browser compatibility and why do I need to worry about something else?”
Cross browser compatibility means that your site looks good or ‘renders’ the same across different browsers. Just like your site should look good on a smartphone and a laptop, your site should look the same in Firefox as it does in Chrome. And then there’s the always a pain in the ass Internet Explorer. Now, I say that not because IE is terrible, but there are many versions of Internet Explorer still in the wild.
For example, Mrs. Jones might be looking at websites at work, and maybe her company doesn’t allow her to upgrade her internet browser, so she could still be using some janky version of IE 6 that doesn’t render anything properly and makes everybody’s site look like shit. And when she gets home she is using IE 9, or 10, or the new touch-optimized 11. Point is, she should have the same experience across all versions of browsers.
How does this happen?
Well, some design shops are lazy and they only look at what they design in the browser they use. So, if you have a designer who likes Firefox and they don’t check Chrome, your site could look like a million bucks in Firefox but be a complete disaster in Chrome. Or maybe you did it yourself? The same rule would apply. You used some “we promise you the world” site building tool in IE only to find your site looks terrible in Safari.
So, how do you know without having to download 30 different browsers and versions of those browsers? Just click the link below, enter your URL, hit enter and wait a bit. It’s free to use and the test will run your site through all the popular browsers and their various versions and give you an image to view. Then, if you have some issues you can see them first hand and fix them.