Seems like something is going wrong with your stats on the website’s mobile version? This may be caused by poor UI/UX design and ignoring the expectations users set for businesses today. Here, we covered the main reasons why people skip your website while browsing it via smartphones and how to fix them.  

What is mobile design?

Mobile design is a complex process when designers shape a mobile interface and structure the flow so users can move through it intuitively, without having to think twice. This is called UI (user interface) design and UX (user experience) design. The work on mobile design includes a complex set of actions as designers work with screens that have limited space to work with, taking into account sensory interactions and human behavior in mobile contexts.

To create a responsive website design that works, UI/UX specialists should focus on a lot of factors that affect people’s perception and meet the way they use their smartphones today. A short comparison. If talking about web design for laptops, here designers have a lot of space to put their creativity and add a lot of necessary elements, knowing how exactly people use their laptops. With mobile devices, the situation is slightly different. People use them on the go, so when they try order something or read an article online, it must be convenient for them. 

Understanding this, designers pay great attention to sensor gestures (taps and swipes), big button sizes, simple forms to fill, big fields to put text, and so on. Besides this, there must also be a balance between a pretty interface and simple navigation. And here designers also use specific approaches to build mobile app logic that looks good and feels simple. 

To summarize all we said above, mobile design is about building interfaces that feel natural on a phone, optimized for small screens, touch interaction, and how people actually use apps on the go.

Why is it important for websites?

Mobile design is a top priority today for mobile websites because mobile devices form the main entry point users have into a digital product. Need more evidence? Here’s what Statista says: as of 2025, roughly 62–64% of global web traffic comes from mobile devices, meaning most visits now happen on smartphones and tablets.

We completely change the way we browse websites and web platforms. Even at home, with a laptop right next to us, it’s still easier for us to browse the site on our smartphones. Businesses also understand this tendency and focus on creating mobile versions of their websites or platforms, as it becomes the primary interface for engaging with the client. 

The next important point is SEO optimization, where mobile design plays a key role as well. Google uses a mobile-first indexing principle, meaning it evaluates a website primarily based on its mobile version. A slow page, unreadable elements, or inconvenient navigation affects not only user experience, but also search engine rankings. In fact, technical problems with the mobile version can reduce organic traffic even when the desktop site looks good.

As a result, mobile design is no longer a pretty cover for apps and websites we use every day on smartphones and tablets. It’s standing as a business tool that covers SEO, user experience, technical effectiveness, and conversions as one system to bring businesses measurable results and a loyal audience. 

Why do websites perform poorly on mobile devices?

Even when the website seems workable on desktop devices, users might run into issues when accessing it on mobile devices. The first signs appear through poor statistics – low conversions, visit numbers, and retention indexes. But don’t think the reasons for it hide in the technical part, it may be issues with the mobile websites’ UX. 

Here are some reasons that may cause a poor website performance on mobile devices: 

1. Non-responsive or desktop-only design. For example, when you build your website for large screens, without following a mobile-first approach. So, the screen size doesn’t adapt to smartphones, and people see small text on their screens with small buttons and inconvenient horizontal scrolling.
2. Slow page loading speed. It may be caused by using heavy media materials like pictures or graphics, complex scripts, and videos that significantly slow down the website pages’ loading.
3. Incorrect content structure. Complex menus, large blocks of text without adaptation for vertical scrolling. The users cannot find information quickly, and the UX suffers dramatically.
4. Lack of touch-friendly elements. Means when buttons, links, and forms are too small or placed too close together. What do people get as an outcome? More accidental clicks and total frustration.
5. Incompatibility with different browsers and devices. Your website may work on Chrome, but display incorrectly on Safari or older versions of Android/iOS. That’s why the development team should test the website on real devices and in different resolutions before it goes live. All the time. 
6. Lack of optimization for speed and resources. For example, unprocessed images, lack of caching, and large JS files. This converts into long loading times, lag when scrolling, and increased traffic consumption.
7. User context not taken into account. Remember that people use phones on the go, in different lighting conditions, with just one hand. Putting this at the center of the design process helps you create an effective design that works for modern people. 

What are common mistakes in mobile websites?

The most common mistakes in websites for mobile devices are hidden in poor design responsiveness, inconvenient navigation, defective sensor elements, non-optimized content, and too many pop-ups. They are not always obvious for businesses, but they greatly decrease conversions and make the user experience even worse, regardless of how the website looks on a desktop.

Let’s go into the key mistakes:

1. Lack of adaptation to different screen orientations. The design looks good in portrait mode, but breaks in landscape mode. Mobile-friendly websites should be adapted to mobile screens and display web page info clearly with readable blocks and clickable buttons. 
2. Use of Flash or unsupported technologies. That way, content blocks may not display on modern mobile browsers. As part of the development process, the technical team considers this point and uses the latest tools to ensure the site works across different browsers. 
3. Unoptimized media files and animations. Heavy GIFs, videos, and parallax effects significantly slow down website loading. Optimize their sizes or put not so much graphic content within the page.
4. Lack of responsive forms and autofill. When forms do not adapt to the mobile screen and do not support autofill for mobile users.
5. Overuse of banners and pop-ups. The poor implementation of pop-up blocks of content makes the user experience worse.

How does non-responsive design lead to poor layout on small screens?

Non-responsive design creates for those website screens that are oriented for use on desktop devices, not mobile. So, when users open such a website on a smartphone, they see elements that are “compressed” without changing their structure. A very little text, tiny elements, and non-clickable buttons. In other words, it doesn’t adapt to a mobile screen, so you cannot read the text or take any actions. It useles for mobile users. 

Responsive website design is the core of everything when creating mobile-friendly websites or a web platform.

Why does slow page load speed affect mobile usability?

Because no one wants to wait for a long time to see the web page. Especially when it happens on the go. Today’s users expect to see immediate engagement with the website’s web version – click and here is the main page, click and users go through the items catalogue. It relates more to emotions, so we get a dose of dopamine when pages load faster than a spaceship breaking the sound barrier. And vice versa, we feel more irritated when things go very slowly. 

Even a slight delay of 2–3 seconds can cause a user to leave the site without waiting for it to load. This is confirmed in the latest statistics – 53% of mobile users leave a website if it takes more than 3 seconds to load, so the bounce rate increases when a page loads slowly. Furthermore, slow pages make scrolling and navigating hard, reduce conversions, and make the whole experience worse. 

How do awkward touch controls make mobile navigation difficult?

Inconvenient and awkward touch controls make mobile navigation more complicated due to the fact that users navigate websites for mobile devices with their fingers, not a mouse. If buttons, filling forms, or links are placed too close to each other or in an inconvenient way, it makes tapping them basically impossible. The user constantly makes incorrect clicks, opens the wrong pages, or is unable to complete the form. Would they want to continue this strange click game? Nope. 

Such awkwardness creates frustration, increases the time needed to complete actions, and raises the bounce rate, as people quickly leave a website that is difficult to use.

Why are intrusive pop-ups and interstitials a problem on mobile devices?

Intrusive pop-ups and interstitials can easily cause issues for mobile devices in content perception. Since the mobile screen is small (compared to web screens), any excessive info block that overlaps the main content instantly interrupts user interaction. 

To clarify what we mean, interstitials are full-screen or big blocks of content that appear before the main page or when switching between pages. On mobile devices, they often pop up as full-screen banners with ads, subscription offers, messages, or well-known “Wait” windows.

Together, they make reading, scrolling, and information searching really hard. And also keep in mind that Google takes intrusive interstitials into account in mobile-first indexing, and their excessive use can negatively affect SEO rankings.

How does complex navigation affect mobile usability?

Complex navigation makes a real mess for users who try to understand how everything works on your website. Usually, we intuitively know where to look for the menu, the search sign, or how to scroll the pages. But when these behavioural patterns were ignored, users steps to the unknown land. 

People have a harder time finding what they need if the menu is multi-level or poorly organised. They also make mistakes when navigating, which increases the chance that they’ll leave. 

Why is unoptimized content a major problem for mobile users?

Unoptimized content is a big problem for mobile users. When they see large text, complex forms to fill, cutting pictures or video blocks that slow down the page, it puts user experience on the ground. It forces them to make extra moves, like scrolling a lot, zooming in on the page, and waiting a long time for it to load. It seems like little actions that do not affect users’ experience much, but in fact, the information isn’t perceived correctly, the interaction isn’t as fast, and abandonment is more likely.

In simple input, unoptimized content makes any website feel really weird to use, even if it could give value to users. 

TRIARE experts’ conclusions: How to avoid common mobile design mistakes? 

TRIARE experts advise following these key principles when building mobile-optimized websites:

1. Create responsive websites, following mobile-first approaches. Content and interface elements should automatically adjust to any screen size for user convenience. It must contain only essential info blocks or be optimized in that way to display the same data as on a website, but convenient for a mobile screen. 
2. Optimize loading speed. As we mentioned above, people won’t be waiting more than 3 seconds to see your “star content”. Taking this as a base, minimize the weight of images, scripts, and videos; use caching and modern front-end technologies to make pages open instantly even on slow networks.
3. Simple and intuitive navigation solutions. To make everything simpler, minimize the number of menu levels, make buttons touch-sensitive and easy to press with your finger.
4. Avoid excessive pop-ups and interstitials. They really interrupt interaction and block content, which is especially critical for small screens.
5. Focus on content for mobile devices. We mean short blocks of text, clear fonts, optimized images, and simple forms. They significantly increase the uvery user convenience and speed up information perception.