How important is "web design" to you as someone browsing the web?

[Cromulent]

I'm building a website and wanted some feedback. I'm a programmer with zero design skills so I've been using a prebuilt CSS framework (Bootstrap 5) to build my website. It is a highly technical site so doesn't have to look flashy or anything. I've seen some other sites in my niche which are also very simple in terms of design and they seem to be doing ok.

My main goal is to present the information in a fast manner so I don't want to require downloading kilobytes of JS and CSS just to view the website. I'll also be using a CDN to speed things up.

What is your view on this topic? Do you leave sites if they look "plain" or not very interactive?

 

[Cromulent]

Thank you all. Very useful information. I'm slowly nearing completion and I'm excited and nervous about launching the website.

 

[Cromulent]

I really hate how UI and UX have become buzzwords that nobody in the industry actually seem to understand, but good "design" is 100% about the User Interface - how people engage and use your site - and User Experience - how satisfying it is to use, how simple to navigate, how logically structured, etc.

As long as your site delivers your information without fuss and clutter, is simple to access and navigate and everything can be easily found (or searched for) then it doesn't really matter what it "looks" like.

Also Bootstrap and every other site/CSS framework out there sucks. They're all bloated with cruft and use the "latest" trends and technologies for largely no reason.

I get your point. The reason I use Bootstrap is I have no idea how to make things look and feel in a way that makes information easy to comprehend. Maybe I should look at some graphic design courses or something similar.