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Marco Roman
5,527 PointsWeb Developers vs Web Designer Careers
Hello guys,
My friend and I were having a discussion about whether it would be a greater investment to become a web developer or web designer. I would like your opinions on the subject matter. I am looking into becoming a web developer and have learned through this site a ton of knowledge. A friend of my friend said that the industry is looking for web designers and that "that's where the money is" but I have read so much that the starting pay for a developer is greater and the industry for a developer is in higher demand. Any thoughts on whether I should continue in my web development path or do more design work? Yes, I do enjoy developing!
5 Answers
Spen Taylor
13,027 Points
In my opinion web developers would be rarer to come by than designers (and therefore better paid), I don't know anybody who would call themselves a web dev in real life, but I know plenty of "designers" - most of whom have graduated university and are still producing awful websites :/ both in terms of function and style!
Nicholas Wimsatt
4,633 PointsBoth designers and developers are in demand for the web industry so any path you go down will net you a good job with some networking. The important thing is to do what you enjoy doing and if you have a talent for it that's great.
With recent improvements to CSS developers can design websites without much help from an actual designer using Photoshop so that is a plus too.
Chase Lee
29,275 PointsI'v heard that if you can come up with good design ideas by yourself. Then becoming a web design is much better.
James Page
9,621 PointsWhy not straddle the middle? I want to build and test the ideas I come up with, so I want to do both (amongst many other things).
Charly Epic
3,564 PointsYea, I agree to James. If you really love to publish your own project, you'll need both paths anyway. I'm a web designer because I really love to create designs on photoshop and then see them get functional on the web, so its kind of a natural thing, that I've learned HTML/CSS and some typoscript, because I use Typo3. But I'm on my way to learn PHP, because my project ideas are becoming much more complex and I cant realise them without.
So stick to all you need to realise what you need, that would be my suggestion. And if you decide to work with other guys together, stick to the thing you like most and let your friends do their thing. Just be sure you know at least some basics about that, what they do.