---
title: Leaving 800px
teaser: We've stopped designing for 800px-wide screens as our default.
tags: design
author: Mike McKenna
published_on: 2005-11-18
---

Urged on by, among other things, the recent redesign of [A List Apart], the crew
at ShotGunFlat has finally built up the courage to start to build real, working,
client sites for 1024×768 or better resolution.

[A List Apart]: http://alistapart.com/

I've been looking for an excuse for the better part of two years now, but
finally the usage stats are there to justify the change. We've been tracking
visitation stats on three very different sites for a good several weeks now in
order to gain an understanding of just how many people are still viewing our
work in 800×600 resolution or (gasp) lower.

Here's the skinny:

|Website|Percentage of 800px or lower resolution|
|:---|---:|
|[iheartskiing network]|6%|
|[Shotgun Flat]|9%|
|Our biggest client|18%|

[iheartskiing network]: http://www.iheartskiing.com/
[Shotgun Flat]: http://shotgunflat.com/

Our client site is a unique situation -- a large portion of the site visitors
are park-ranger types who live in remote areas and still use a dial-up
connection -- and 82% of that audience are at better than 800x.

That said, carefully considering a layout designed for 1024x going forward is
now part of our design process. There will still be special circumstances where
an 800x layout will still be necessary, but sooner than later, 1024x will be the
rule.