The Ultimate Guide On Designing Framer Sites (With Templates & Examples)
Learn how to design beautiful Framer sites with this guide, packed with templates and examples for every style and function.
Building a website can be a daunting task. You must consider the layout, colors, functionality, and how it ties into your goals. If you're not careful, stress can take away the excitement of creating a site from scratch. With all the website-building tools available today, you can find one that meets your needs and alleviates the pressure. Framer Sites makes designing and launching a fully responsive website easy and offers a range of customizable templates to help you get started. This article will show you how to achieve that website quickly with inspiring examples of Framer sites to help you get started.
NUMI's Framer design solution will help you achieve your goals with Framer sites. You'll explore examples of websites built with Framer's flexible design tools and learn how to craft your site with little to no effort.
What is Framer?
Framer is a design and prototyping tool for creating high-fidelity prototypes of websites and applications. It allows users to design, develop, and publish interactive prototypes without writing code and provides a range of templates and components to get them started.
The tool’s biggest strength is its ability to create highly interactive prototypes that look and function like an actual website or app. Designers can simulate user interactions, transitions, animations, and complex user flows to create a realistic preview of the end product. This helps both designers and stakeholders visualize how the final project will operate.
Enhancing Remote Team Collaboration with Framer's Prototyping and Feedback Tools
Framer also excels at team collaboration. It allows you to share prototypes with clients and team members, incorporate feedback, and track different project versions. This makes Framer an ideal tool for design teams working remotely or with multiple stakeholders.
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What are Framer Sites?
Framer Sites are responsive websites built with Framer's no-code platform. They give users a visual way to build websites without writing code. Framer sites stand out for their balance of design flexibility and powerful features that streamline the process of building and hosting websites.
Framer sites are especially easy for designers and creators who want to focus on visual aesthetics and user experience without getting bogged down by technical complexity. According to BuiltWith, Framer powers about 81,353 live sites on the internet. Its growing popularity suggests that many users leverage Framer to create dynamic, responsive websites efficiently. Framer offers a compelling option worth exploring if you're considering building a website.
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Our fabuolous design team ensures all your design work is done well. NUMI helps with:
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11 Feature Of Framer For Building Great Sites
1. Vector Editing Tools: Enhance Your Productivity with Framer's Vector Editing Capabilities
Framer offers comprehensive vector editing capabilities that allow users to create and modify graphics directly within the app. This eliminates the need to switch between software for graphic edits, streamlining the design process and enhancing productivity.
2. Prototyping: Build Interactive Prototypes That Look and Feel Like the Real Thing
The prototyping feature in Framer is highly dynamic, enabling designers to create interactive and animated prototypes that closely resemble the final product. This functionality allows for more accurate user testing and feedback, ensuring that designs meet user expectations before development begins.
3. Real-Time Collaboration: Work Together Seamlessly with Framer's Real-Time Collaboration
Framer supports real-time collaboration, allowing multiple team members to simultaneously work on the same project. Changes are synced instantly, facilitating seamless communication and enhancing teamwork. This feature is particularly beneficial for remote teams, as it eliminates the need for back-and-forth emails and ensures everyone is on the same page.
4. Design Handoff: Generate Shareable Links to Simplify the Design Handoff Process
With Framer, you can generate shareable links with all necessary assets and code snippets, simplifying the transition from design to development. This design handoff feature ensures developers have everything they need to implement the design accurately, reducing misunderstandings and improving efficiency.
5. Component Libraries: Save Time and Ensure Consistency with Component Libraries
Framer allows users to create and share reusable components across projects. This saves time and ensures consistency in design elements throughout various projects, making maintaining a cohesive brand identity easier.
6. Interaction Design: Create Engaging and Dynamic Websites with Framer's Interaction Design Features
Framer excels in interaction design, enabling users to create complex interactions with realistic animations and transitions. This capability enhances the overall user experience by making websites feel more engaging and dynamic.
7. Responsive Design: Build Sites That Work on Any Device with Framer's Responsive Design Tools
The platform supports responsive design, allowing designers to create layouts that adapt seamlessly to different screen sizes. This feature is essential for modern web development, ensuring that sites look great on desktop and mobile devices.
8. User Testing Integration: Streamline User Research with User Testing Integration
Framer can integrate with user testing platforms, allowing designers to gather user feedback directly on their prototypes. This integration streamlines the user research process, making it easier to iterate on designs based on real user insights.
9. Version Control: Rest Easy With Framer's Version Control Features
Framer includes version control features that allow users to track changes over time. This makes reverting to previous versions easy, providing peace of mind during the design process.
10. Mobile App Design: Prototype Mobile Apps With Advanced Features for High Fidelity
Framer is particularly adept at mobile app prototyping, offering high fidelity and interaction that closely mimics the final app experience. This makes it a suitable choice for teams focusing on mobile-first designs.
11. Dedicated Content Management System (CMS): Manage Website Content With Framer's Built-In CMS
Framer’s built-in CMS simplifies managing website content, whether blog posts, job listings, or marketing pages. Advanced features like collections, filtering, and conditionals streamline content creation and organization.
Why Consider Using Framer for Your Site
The Framer Advantage: A Designer’s Best Friend
Framer Sites gives designers a head start on web design by letting them create beautiful, responsive websites without any code. When you use Framer as a designer, you bypass the constraints of building for the web and instead focus on your creativity and vision. Framer gives you the tools to create stunning, functional websites that instill your ambitious ideas with life.
Intuitive by Design: A User Interface that Makes Sense
Framer’s user interface is simple and easy to understand. When you open Framer, you won’t feel overwhelmed by myriad options and features that can confuse any user. Framer gives you what you need when you need it.
The UI works the way most design tools do, so you can quickly work on designing your website. But unlike other design tools, Framer’s UI is powerful and gives you access to advanced features without bogging down your creative process.
Empowering Ambition: Unmatched Creative Freedom
Framer doesn’t confine you to simple, static design. The tool helps you craft engaging, dynamic user experiences that stand out.
With advanced animation capabilities and interactive components, Framer takes the pressure off designers to think like developers. You can let your imagination run wild and build stunning websites that look and feel exactly how you envisioned without getting lost in the technical details.
Seamless Collaboration: Build Better Products Together
Even though Framer gives you all the tools to create great websites independently, everything is better together. Framer helps shorten feedback loops, make instantaneous comments, and align your team to your vision.
You can invite stakeholders, like clients and developers, to view your project in Framer and leave comments on the design for you directly. This helps everyone understand your vision and makes it easy for you to implement any necessary changes.
Flexibility and Control: Work the Way You Want
Every designer works differently. That’s why Framer always gives you options. From working with Frames or Stacks to starting from a blank canvas or with a template to boost your workflow, you can customize your experience to fit your style. With Framer’s code injection, they still allow you to have granular control of your product when you need it.
13 Stunning Framer Sites For Design Inspiration
1. Global Predictions: Transforming a Basic Application into Something Delightful
Global Predictions is a multi-asset net worth management platform that empowers everyday people to become better, more intelligent investors. Investors can view all their assets, understand exposures, minimize risks, and act on personalized recommendations based on their investment preferences, all powered by Global Predictions’ proprietary modeling engine.
NUMI designers worked with the Global Predictions team as they transformed a basic application into something that live users found powerful and delightful. NUMI designers set up Figma systems to organize product rollouts.
2. Orange DAO: Improving the Design of a Web3 Portal
Orange DAO features nearly 1,200 Y Combinator alumni as members. An active investor in crypto projects, it maintains the $50M Orange Fund. Through its strong founder network, the DAO supports its portfolio of 140 startups and maintains a fellowship program of 40 Web3 builders.
Orange DAO engaged NUMI to handle the design of the portal, one of the first of its kind in Web3. NUMI improved the design of Orange DAO's existing product surface area. We then helped the DAO design its portal.
3. Beautility Exhibition: An Immersive Digital Art Experience
An art exhibition called Beautility Exhibition has been created with the help of Framer to provide an immersive digital experience. The website includes simulated galleries, artwork that may be interacted with, and interesting descriptions of the artists. Beautility Exhibition provides visitors with a one-of-a-kind opportunity to engage with art in a digital world and form more meaningful connections with artists through Framer.
4. Chris Lund: Showcasing a Designer's Portfolio with Style and Substance
Framer is utilized on the website of Chris Lund, a designer who showcases his creative portfolio, to offer substance in a outwardly engaging and intuitive style. This website offers constantly refreshed, powerful material, liquid-looking over, and easy-to-use intelligent media parts. Using Framer, the Christ Lund can introduce new things in a drawing in a vivid way, so it is both educated and happy to guarantee that guests.
5. Bajgart Office: An Interactive Voyage of Discovery
Bajgart is a website that utilizes Framer to provide a amazing portfolio experience that is both immersive and interactive. Visitors to the website are taken on a voyage of discovery, during which they are presented with various service options and experiences. Bajgart offers consumers a captivating browsing experience by utilizing Framer's interactive features.
6. Pasteapp.io: Enhancing User Experience with Smooth Transitions
Paste is a productivity tool developed by an international team. It is designed to integrate seamlessly with the Mac operating system. Paste aims to enhance daily workflow with intuitive and efficient functionality.
It has gained popularity among professionals, including designers and developers, for its simplicity and effectiveness, making it one of the world’s favorite productivity tools for Mac and iOS users. Paste transitioned to Framer and integrated some seamless and beautiful animations and transitions. Scrolling through Paste shows how innovation and user experience in web design are essential for Paste.
7. Dribbble: A Speedy Transition to Framer
If you, like me, need inspiration for:
- Web design
- Elements
- Tables and much more
Dribbble is a one-stop website. Dribbble is a leading platform for creatives worldwide to share their work, find inspiration, and connect with opportunities. It was launched in 2009, and users can post “shots” of small screenshots of their designs or projects.
The site helps millions find design inspiration and feedback, serving individual creatives and teams, including those from top brands. Pages like For Designers show the use of Framers animation library Framer Motion. When moving to Framer, Dribbble experienced shipping new landing pages ten times faster, and the designers were in charge. Not all Dribbles is on Framer, but they convert landing pages to Framer page by page. Framer is also popular among startups.
8. Contra: Improving the Careers Page for Better SEO
Contra is an all-in-one freelancer platform offering tools to launch, build, and grow freelance careers. It features AI tools to generate portfolio content quickly, job discovery and client management functionalities, and commission-free payment options.
Moving on to the actual page, something about the Contra careers page appeals to me: the floating text that smoothly transitions at the start and the glass visuals that seem right. Contra has made a simple yet smooth page for its careers section. It can report a 65% increase in branded clicks.
9. Whereby: Promoting a Flexible and Inclusive Workplace
It positions itself as a flexible and inclusive workplace, emphasizing a remote-first approach that allows its team to work from anywhere. The platform is a central hub for team collaboration, offering resources on company values, flexible working policies, and diversity and inclusion initiatives.
Whereby is a light yet informative landing page. Their font matches the website’s feeling of a light and cheerful theme. The website isn’t transition-heavy, but that is not a bad thing. Their strength is simplicity, which plays out pretty well.
10. Superhuman: A Dark and Stunning Framer Website
Superhuman is a modern email client designed to enhance productivity with a minimal and clutter-free interface. It reduces distractions by hiding labels and folders until needed and unbolding unread messages to prioritize important tasks.
Superhuman is the first Framer website on this list that is in dark mode by default. The dark palette gives the feeling of a modern yet exclusive feel. When scrolling through the landing page, you see some elements where the Framer animation library is genuinely stunning. Superhuman is my favorite of these amazing Framer website examples.
11. Acapela: A Quick Transition to Framer
Acapela is a tool that helps you stay focused by putting all your work messages in one place. In 2022, Acapela switched its website pages from Webflow to Framer, which made it quicker to get new pages up and running.
12. Threads: Adding Fun Animations to Team Communication
Threads promotes itself as an alternative to Slack, equipped with AI and voice chat for all the essential tools that team members require. Threads uses Framer to design its landing pages, adding fun animations that reflect the platform’s style. The landing pages look great, especially with the eye-catching sky hero image and the cool frosted glass effect at the top.
13. LottieFiles: Improving Website Workflows and Collaboration
LottieFiles makes creating, editing, checking, collaborating, and using Lottie animations easy. A Lottie is an animation file that lets you quickly use animations across different platforms. Jia Yu, a product designer, joined LottieFiles, and their website has changed a lot since then.
A significant change was switching their website pages to Framer. This was because the design team always needed the developers to make design changes. The developers had to create what the designers wanted, which had to be checked and approved before it could be used. With Framer, the designers can create designs in Figma, build them in Framer, and put them on the website, just like designers. This makes things faster and more accessible for the designers and lets the developers work on other things.
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8 Best Framer Templates To Start Your Site Design
1. Mizo: The Framer Template For Portfolio Websites
Miro free framer template is your ideal proposal website template, created to make it easier for designers to:
- Create
- Share
- Monitor
Their decks. Whether you're a seasoned expert or just starting, Miro's effortless features make creating proposals quick and simple. Miro's seamless interaction with tools such as Figma and Notion lets you streamline your process and improve your tactics like never before.
The Mizo's free template and robust tracking features allow you to acquire useful insights for refining your offerings and improving your engagement methods. With the Miro best framer template, you're not simply making pitches but creating experiences that capture and convert.
2. Conversion: The Best Template For Digital Marketing
Conversion is the ultimate ally in building a successful paid advertising and Digital Marketing Organization. It is a sophisticated platform explicitly created for the advertising business that may help you increase customer interaction and boost your online visibility. By embracing conversion today, you can propel unmatched development and innovation in digital advertising.
3. Nairo: An Elegant Template For Portfolio Websites
The Nairo portfolio website template easily and elegantly takes your creative thoughts to new heights. Whether you're an experienced expert or just starting your creative adventure, Nairo's user-friendly interface lets you easily showcase your exclusive vision.
Due to its easy layout and responsive design, beginners may easily navigate the site, while advanced capabilities meet the needs of seasoned creatives. Nairo's portfolio template offers a great platform for confidently expressing your ideas.
4. Nairo Framer Template: A Minimalist Approach To Portfolio Design
Whether you want to establish your presence in the market or simply showcase your creative side, the Nairo website framer template provides the ideal platform to do so confidently. Say goodbye to boring presentations and unimpressive portfolios; with the Nairo minimal portfolio template, your projects will shine brightly and create a lasting impression on your audience.
5. Badejo: A Template To Showcase Your Projects With Style
Looking to leave a lasting impression with your projects? Look no further than Badejo, the ultimate project showcase template. This template will impress clients and hiring managers with its slick style and dynamic features. Whether you're exhibiting creative projects or professional accomplishments, Badejo provides the ideal framework for displaying your work with flair.
6. Badejo Framer Template: Make Your Projects Stand Out
In a world where first impressions are everything, Badejo stands out as the go-to solution for presenting projects with style. Badejo's smooth transitions, customizable features, and clean design ensure your creations shine without distraction. Badejo will help you improve your presentations and wow stakeholders and grasp opportunities.
7. HAYSolutions: A Unique Template For Business Framer Sites
HAYSolutions is a cutting-edge business landing page Framer template created to take your brand to new heights with its distinctive layouts, compelling animations, and simple modification possibilities. Prepare to stand out from the digital crowd and leave a lasting impression on your audience with the HAYSolutions website design template.
Say goodbye to cookie-cutter websites and hello to a dynamic digital presence that accurately represents your company. Whether you're a startup, small business, or major corporation, our template is the ideal way to showcase your services, products, and beliefs with elegance and refinement.
8. Roast: A Crisp Landing Page Template For SaaS Products
Roast is a one-of-a-kind landing page template that will help you navigate the realm of current web design. Roast's basic yet vivid style and eye-catching animations provide a new perspective for exhibiting your SaaS or Digital Product. The streamlined architecture and engaging images will capture visitors' attention from the moment they arrive, setting the stage for an immersive user experience.
How to Create a Framer Website in Easy Steps
1. Sign Up for Framer
To start, sign up for a Framer account on their website. You can choose from a free trial or a paid plan depending on your needs. Once you’ve signed up, you can access the Framer dashboard and create your website.
2. Choose a Template
Browse through Framer’s template library and choose the best suitable template. You can filter the templates by industry, design style, or features. Once you’ve selected a template, it will be added to your Framer dashboard.
3. Customize Your Template
The next step is to customize your template. Framer’s drag-and-drop interface makes adding, removing, and editing elements on your website easy. You can change the layout, add new sections, and modify the design to suit your brand.
4. Add Content
Once you’ve customized your template, it’s time to add content to your website. You can add text, images, videos, and other media to your website using Framer’s built-in editor. You can also import content from other sources, such as Google Drive or Dropbox.
5. Customize the Design
Framer allows you to customize the design of your website without any coding skills. You can change the colors, fonts, and other design elements to match your brand. You can also add animations and transitions to create a more engaging user experience.
6. Test and Publish
Once you’ve finished customizing your website, it’s important to test it thoroughly to ensure that everything is working as it should. Framer allows you to test your website on different devices and browsers so you can see how it looks and functions on different platforms.
After you’ve tested your website, you’re ready to publish it. Click the "Publish" button at the top right corner of your Framer project. This action will make your website live and accessible.
Default Hosting
Your website will default be hosted on a Framer subdomain (e.g., your site.framer.app). This is a quick way to start without setting up a custom domain.
Custom Domain Setup
Go to the Domains page in your Site Settings to use a custom domain.
- Select "Connect a domain you own" and enter your custom domain.
- You must update your DNS records using the Framer DNS settings provided. This typically involves adding A and CNAME records through your domain registrar (like GoDaddy, NameCheap, etc.).
DNS Propagation
After updating your DNS settings can take up to 48 hours for the changes to propagate fully. During this time, your site may not be immediately accessible via the new domain.
Access Your Site
Once the DNS changes have propagated, your Framer website will be live and accessible through your custom domain. You can share this link with others.
Additional Features Staging
Framer allows you to stage changes before publishing them live, which helps prevent unapproved content from going live.
Rollback Options
If you need to revert to a previous version of your site, Framer provides versioning and rollback features to manage deployments easily.
8 Best Practices for Designing a Website With Framer
1. Utilize Responsive Design Features
Responsive design is a must for modern websites. Framer offers robust tools for creating responsive designs that adapt seamlessly to various screen sizes.
Familiarize yourself with breakpoints and constraints to ensure your elements resize and reposition correctly across devices. This is crucial for providing an optimal user experience (UX) on desktop and mobile platforms.
2. Leverage Stacks and Grids
Using Stacks and Grids in Framer simplifies layout organization. These features allow for automatic alignment and spacing adjustments, ensuring a clean and consistent visual composition. This saves time and enhances the overall UI without extensive manual tweaking.
3. Start with Templates
Framer provides an extensive library of templates created by the community and Framer itself. Starting with a template can speed up your design process and inspire creativity. Templates are designed for various use cases, from simple landing pages to complex applications, making them an excellent resource for beginners and experienced designers.
4. Optimize for Performance
Ensure that your website is fast and SEO optimized by following best practices for performance. Framer uses state-of-the-art technology to enhance loading speeds, but you can further optimize images and minimize unnecessary elements to improve performance. This is essential for retaining visitors and improving search engine rankings.
5. Test Across Multiple Devices
Regularly preview your design on various devices to ensure it looks and functions everywhere. Framer’s preview tool is invaluable for checking responsiveness and usability across different screen sizes. This helps catch any issues early and ensures a consistent user experience.
6. Focus on User Experience
Prioritize simplicity and clarity in your design, especially for mobile users. Remove non-essential elements that may clutter the interface and simplify navigation. A clean, functional site enhances usability and keeps visitors engaged.
7. Experiment with Effects and Animations
Framer allows you to add effects and animations easily. Use these features to create engaging interactions that capture your audience's attention. Be mindful only to do animations sparingly, as they can distract from the main content if not used judiciously.
8. Collaborate and Gather Feedback
Framer's collaborative capabilities allow multiple team members to work on a project simultaneously. Take advantage of this by inviting feedback from peers and stakeholders throughout the design process. Iterative feedback loops can greatly enhance the quality of the final product.
Are Framer Sites Free?
Framer offers a range of pricing plans, catering to different needs and budgets for users looking to build websites. Here’s a breakdown of the available plans and what each one includes:
Free Plan
The Free Plan allows users to create websites using a Framer subdomain (e.g., your site.framer.website) with Framer branding included. This plan is ideal for hobbyists or those just starting out, as it provides essential features for experimenting with the platform without any financial commitment.
Mini Plan
The Mini Plan costs $5 per month (when billed annually) and is designed for simple sites. This plan removes Framer branding and allows users to connect a custom domain. It supports up to 1,000 monthly visitors, includes basic features like a homepage and 404 error page, and allows for 50 form submissions.
Basic Plan
Priced at $15 per month, the Basic Plan is suited for personal websites or small businesses. It allows up to 10,000 monthly visitors and includes features such as:
- Up to 150 pages
- Password protection
- One CMS collection
- 500 form submissions
This plan is great for bloggers, portfolio sites, or small business websites requiring more content management flexibility.
Pro Plan
The Pro Plan, costing $30 per month, is tailored for larger sites with advanced needs. It supports up to 200,000 monthly visitors and includes:
- Up to 300 pages
- Advanced analytics
- Staging environment
- Ten CMS collections
- 2,500 form submissions
This plan is ideal for businesses needing robust site capabilities and detailed visitor insights.
Enterprise Plan
For larger organizations or those with unique requirements, Framer offers customized Enterprise Plans. These plans provide tailored solutions with advanced security features, dedicated support, and unlimited capabilities. Pricing for Enterprise Plans varies based on specific needs.
Framer provides flexible pricing options that cater to a wide range of users, from hobbyists using the free plan to businesses requiring advanced features in the Pro Plan. Each tier offers specific benefits for different project sizes and complexities, making Framer a versatile choice for website creation. Whether you’re just starting or managing a large-scale site, there’s likely a Framer plan that fits your needs.
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Subscribe To a Guild of World Class Framer Developers with Our Framer Web Design Agency Today
Framer design is a powerful tool for building stunning, highly interactive websites and apps. NUMI is a dedicated framer design agency that can help your startup harness the full power of a framer for your next project.
With our talented team of framer specialists, we can help you build a gorgeous, functional website or app that your users will love. We can also help you with ongoing needs or future iterations to ensure your site or app stays fresh and up-to-date.