Roughly 3-4% of our readers view this site via a mobile device and that percentage is growing week-to-week. They aren’t very high percentages but it was certainly high enough to prompt me into action – I started considering a mobile version of this site.
Let me start by saying that I didn’t want it look like an entirely stripped down version of the full site. I did want to keep the overall layout of the hompage (thumbnails and excerpt), I wanted the internal post images to be re-sized per screen rather than cropped, and most importantly, I wanted the essence of the site, albeit in smaller mode, to reflect on the mobile version.
I experimented with a few WordPress plugins, for some sites these plugins may be powerful enough, but not for me, I wanted more functionality. I also tried a few web services, I wasn’t too happy with them either.
Eventually I chanced upon the solution while browsing WebDesigner Depot on my HTC Hero (much better than the iPhone!), and there mobile site just looked amazing. It has the appearance of a mobile app while still maintaining the integrity and functionality of the full site. I went digging and found out that they were using Mobify, a web service were you can design a mobile layout for your website exactly how you want.
I since discovered that a lot of design blogs were also using Mobify (Smashing Magazine and Abduzeedo to name a couple), so I jumped in and tried it. You can see from the screenshot below what I have built, and it actually wasn’t that hard nor did it test the patience. Speckyboy-Lite looks not too bad:
Mobify Overview
In case you were wondering what Mobify is all about, have a look at this short video below.
Abduzeedo
Smashing Magazine
SitePoint
Veerle's blog 2.0
Webdesigner Depot
Yanko Design
A List Apart
TheDieline
I love Typography
Jeffrey Way
Six Revisions
Avatar NY
DesignM.ag
WebmasterRadio.FM
kristarella.com
CSS-Tricks
Just Creative Design
Amy Stoddard
MyInkBlog
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11 Mar, 2010
Thank you for the compilation and for featuring Just Creative Design. Just realised I never updated my intro picture on the mobile so thanks for reminding me!
11 Mar, 2010
Great collection you have here.
A very well sorted list, I must say.
Thanks for sharing this!
Regards,
Mohit Aneja
Founder – CSSJockey.com
11 Mar, 2010
Thanks for an awesome write-up and congrats to all web designers that made these amazing mobile views!
11 Mar, 2010
Really interesting, i’ll have to get more involved into mobile design.
11 Mar, 2010
Good list, I am going to visit those sites right away.
Best,
12 Mar, 2010
nice article and nice set of example mobile sites using Mobify
12 Mar, 2010
Great examples!
Maybe I should try using Mobify, it looks very easy to quick convert a website to a mobile version.
12 Mar, 2010
Very nice examples
12 Mar, 2010
its a great list. thanks for share
13 Mar, 2010
Awesome list, thank you for taking the time to compile it!
13 Mar, 2010
they all most famous and there are amazing content for learn and inspirations.
17 Mar, 2010
awesome design
how do you made this
17 Mar, 2010
Hi there, wondering what program you used to display the site in the iPhone (saw it was a different app, don’t recognize it)… What is it called, and where can I pick it up?
17 Mar, 2010
If you want more functionlaity for your website than automatic services can offer, please, visit our service MobilizeToday.com. You won’t have to use any subdomain and the essence of your website will be totally reflected in its mobile version.
21 Jul, 2010
My design just got featured in Practical Web Design Magazine.
http://www.alchemyhairsalon.com
http://www.alchemyhairsalon.com/iphone
What do you think?
26 Aug, 2010
Nice list, maybe it’s time for me to create mobile version of Tuvie website.