So, what is responsive web design? Responsive web design, or just responsive design, is a type of design principle that depicts designing websites in a way that makes them optimal for viewing and navigation across a wide range of devices.

With responsive web design, web designers can create websites that can be viewed across traditional personal computers (PCs), smartphones and tablets. In fact, it was the growing use of mobile devices for web browsing that made responsive design rise in popularity so fast.

Since so many people are using their smartphones and tablets to browse the web, web designers had to start adapting. Many people are using mobile devices – smartphones and tablets – to view websites, even if they’re not responsive in nature.

I realise the ‘Mobile First’ design gang will probably jump in at this point, but unless your mobile traffic and conversions seriously out weigh your ‘desktop’ users – Then in my opinion its not the right way to go, you should be designing for your main audience and giving them a display that’s optimised for them first. I would first check out the type of visitors they are getting on Google Analytics and see if most of their visitors are coming from the desktop vs mobile phones, and decide with the client from there.

I don’t pressure my clients to change their websites. I simply explain what responsive design is to them and then let them make that decision on their own.