Most websites are “mobile-friendly” now. That’s just expected. Almost every site built in the past few years technically works on phones.
But there’s a difference between a site that at first glance looks mobile friendly, and ticks a lot of the technical mobile friendly website design checks vs one that’s actually pleasant to use on a device.
Around 65% of website visitors are now on mobile. That’s not a trend anymore – it’s the reality of how people use the web. If your website has friction points on mobile, you’re losing potential customers every day.
The real question has moved from “does my site work on phones?” to “how well does it work?”
The problem: Technical vs. practical mobile friendly website design
I see this regularly with clients. Their site loads fine on mobile. Looks okay at first glance. But then you try to actually use it like a customer would – fill out a form, navigate to a service page, find contact information quickly – and the experience starts to falls apart.
Text that’s too large or too small. Elements overlapping or going off the page. Super long pages that are hard to scroll through. Forms that don’t work properly. Interactive elements that aren’t usable or have layout quirks when you tap them.
The site is responsive. It adjusts to different screen sizes. But it still wasn’t designed with mobile users actually in mind.
Why do business owners miss this? Usually because someone told them their site is mobile-friendly, and they haven’t actually verified it themselves. Or they checked it once on their own phone, saw it loaded, and assumed everything was fine.
But loading isn’t the same as working well. And a quick glance isn’t the same as completing a full customer journey.
The device complexity challenge
Here’s what makes mobile friendly website design complicated: the massive range of devices people use.
Tiny phone screens. Large “phablet” style phones. Tablets. Your site needs to work well across all of them, not just pass a basic test on one device.
Traditional web design uses breakpoints – specific screen sizes where the layout changes. This approach requires design compromises. You design for desktop, then tablet, then phone, and at each breakpoint you have to make decisions about what to show, hide, or rearrange.
This is still the standard approach, and it works. But it’s not perfect. CSS and mobile-first design are evolving. One interesting development is container-based queries, where elements adjust dynamically based on their container size rather than the screen size. This creates more flexible designs that adapt naturally to any screen without the usual compromises. It’s still quite new though, and not widely used yet.
For now, the bigger issue is older sites or sites built cheaply that don’t even have proper breakpoint-based responsive design. That’s where you see the real inconsistencies and compromises.
Google’s mobile-first reality
Google has fully moved to mobile-first indexing as of late 2023. That means they use your mobile version to determine your search rankings.
Your mobile and desktop content can differ. But if your mobile experience is poor quality, it hurts your search visibility. Google is indexing and ranking based on what mobile users see and experience.
This isn’t coming. It’s already here. If your mobile friendly website design isn’t actually good, you’re not just losing conversions – you’re losing visibility in search results.
What actually matters for mobile friendly website design
Page load speed
This is critical on mobile but often invisible to business owners until they actually test it.
Mobile users are on slower connections than desktop users. They’re less patient. If your pages take more than a few seconds to load, people leave.
Large images are usually the culprit. An image that loads fine on desktop can kill your mobile load time. Proper image optimisation for mobile isn’t optional. Often simple changes can make a big impact in website speed.
You can test this yourself with PageSpeed Insights – just enter your URL and check the mobile score. It’ll show you exactly what’s slowing your site down on phones.
Navigation
Good mobile navigation means minimal taps and minimal back-and-forth.
If someone has to open your menu, scroll through options, tap a category, go back, try another category, and finally find what they’re looking for – that’s too much work.
Your main navigation should be clear and direct. Important pages should be easy to reach. Common actions shouldn’t require multiple steps.
Forms
Forms are where a lot of mobile experiences fall apart.
Good mobile forms are set up to work with your phone’s auto-fill. They pre-populate fields where possible, so users can simply tap the autofill value and not have to manually type each field. The form feels smooth, not clunky.
Bad mobile forms have tiny input fields that are hard to tap. They don’t recognise auto-fill. They require unnecessary information. They’re too long, or have frustrating error messages. They feel like you’re fighting with them.
If your main conversion action is a form – contact, booking, quote request – and that form is frustrating on mobile, you’re losing a lot of potential business.
Touch targets
This is a common mistake in mobile friendly website design: clickable elements placed too close together.
On desktop, you have a precise mouse cursor. On mobile, you have a finger. Buttons, links, and any clickable elements need proper spacing. If they’re too close together, people keep tapping the wrong thing.
This seems minor until you experience it. Then it’s incredibly frustrating.
Interactive elements and media
Interactive elements are higher risk for mobile responsiveness issues. FAQs, accordions, tabs, sliders, calculators, tables – anything that requires interaction or displays complex information.
These elements often work fine on desktop and then break or become clunky on mobile. They need extra attention during design and testing.
Image galleries are a big one. A gallery that looks great on desktop can be nearly impossible to navigate with touch on a phone. Video players sometimes don’t work properly on mobile devices. These aren’t just nice-to-have features – if they’re on your site, they need to work well.
Third-party services and integrations
Booking systems. Chat widgets. Payment processors. Appointment schedulers. Calendar integrations.
These are often not built by your web developer. They’re third-party tools embedded into your site. And they’re also a common source of mobile problems.
Pop-ups that cover the whole mobile screen with no clear way to close them. Chat widgets that block important content. Booking calendars that don’t scale properly and require horizontal scrolling.
You have less control over third-party tools than your own website code. But you still need to test them thoroughly on mobile. Sometimes the solution is choosing a different provider. Sometimes it’s changing how the tool is implemented.
If a third-party service is making your mobile experience worse, it’s costing you conversions. That matters more than convenience.
Content strategy for mobile
Here’s a hidden problem with mobile friendly website design: writing for the wrong audience.
If 65% of your visitors are on phones, you’re writing primarily for mobile users. Those users are scanning and browsing. They’re not settling in to read long, detailed articles on a small screen.
But many business websites are written for desktop users. Long paragraphs. Detailed explanations. Comprehensive content that goes on for pages.
On mobile, that feels like too much. People get overwhelmed and leave.
This doesn’t mean dumbing down your content. It means formatting and structuring it for mobile readers. Shorter paragraphs. Clear headings they can scan. Information that’s easy to find quickly.
You can have detailed content. Just make sure it’s readable and navigable on a phone.
Common mistakes to avoid
One of the biggest mistakes I see with outdated or low quality websites is trying to improve mobile design by showing and hiding sections or content based on device.
Some sites have these complex setups where certain content is hidden on mobile and shown on desktop, or vice versa. Different sections visible on different devices. Complicated layers of conditional visibility.
This shouldn’t be necessary with proper mobile friendly website design.
If your site is built properly with modern responsive design, it should handle section ordering and mobile styling naturally. You shouldn’t need complex rules about what to show and hide on different devices.
When you see sites doing this, it usually means the underlying responsive design isn’t working properly. They’re patching problems instead of fixing the foundation.
What to do: The user journey test
Think through the different journeys users take on your website. Someone browsing your services and sending an enquiry. Someone looking for your contact details. Someone making a purchase or booking an appointment.
Pick your most important user journey. The one that matters most for your business.
Now go through that complete process on your mobile phone. Actually do it like a customer would. Don’t just glance at it – complete the full journey from start to finish.
Pay attention to friction points. Anywhere you feel frustrated, confused, or like you’re working harder than you should. Anywhere you’re waiting for something to load. Anywhere the interface feels clunky or unclear.
Those friction points are costing you conversions.
With 65% of visitors on mobile, fixing even small pain points can significantly improve your results from traffic you’re already getting. You’re not trying to get more visitors – you’re making your site work better for the visitors you already have.
You can use Chrome’s device preview to test different screen sizes (right-click on your site, select “Inspect,” then click the device icon). Google Search Console has a mobile usability report that shows specific issues Google has found. These tools help, but nothing replaces actually using your site on your phone like a real customer.
When to get help vs DIY
If you find minor content or wording issues during your mobile test, you might be able to fix those yourself.
But if you discover technical problems – styling issues, interactive elements not working properly, elements overlapping or going off the page, third-party integrations causing problems – contact your web developer.
These require proper fixes. The last thing you want is to solve one problem and create three others without realising it. An ongoing website maintenance service helps you stay on top of mobile issues.
If your third-party services are causing mobile issues, you might need to choose a different provider or get developer help to implement them differently.
The goal isn’t perfection. It’s removing unnecessary friction from the mobile experience.
Conclusion
Mobile friendly website design is no longer about whether your site works on phones. It’s about how well it works.
The technical requirements are just the baseline. What matters is the actual user experience – can people easily do what they came to do on your site when they’re on a mobile device?
With 65% of visitors on mobile, this isn’t a secondary consideration. It’s your primary audience.
Test your site today. Go through your most important customer journey on your phone. Find the friction points. Fix what you can, and get help with what you can’t.
Small improvements in mobile experience often lead to significant improvements in conversions. You don’t need a complete redesign – you just need to remove the obstacles that are getting in people’s way.
