Weston Walker 📚

Posted on Jul 1, 2022 • Originally published at thefullstackdev.net

Bootstrap CSS is still the sh*t. But we can make it better.

#css #design #webdev

Bootstrap is an amazing CSS framework for those who struggle with design, css, or need to build something quickly.

But the Bootstrap components you copy and paste from the documentation have flaws.

These flaws are holding back your designs!

Here are 5 design tips to correct those flaws and improve Bootstrap.

1) Bring attention to alerts

Add dark borders and svg icons to draw user's attention.

<div class="alert alert-primary rounded-0 border-0 border-start border-primary border-4" role="alert">
    <p class="fs-6 mb-0 d-flex align-items-center">
        <!-- https://heroicons.com/ light-bul-->
        <svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" class="me-1" width="16" height="16" viewBox="0 0 20 20" fill="currentColor">
            <path d="M11 3a1 1 0 10-2 0v1a1 1 0 102 0V3zM15.657 5.757a1 1 0 00-1.414-1.414l-.707.707a1 1 0 001.414 1.414l.707-.707zM18 10a1 1 0 01-1 1h-1a1 1 0 110-2h1a1 1 0 011 1zM5.05 6.464A1 1 0 106.464 5.05l-.707-.707a1 1 0 00-1.414 1.414l.707.707zM5 10a1 1 0 01-1 1H3a1 1 0 110-2h1a1 1 0 011 1zM8 16v-1h4v1a2 2 0 11-4 0zM12 14c.015-.34.208-.646.477-.859a4 4 0 10-4.954 0c.27.213.462.519.476.859h4.002z" />
        </svg>
        <span>A simple primary alert—check it out!</span>
    </p>
</div>

2) Tables don't have to match your database

HTML tables don't have to be a copy of your database structure. Remove column names, id's, and combine fields when it makes sense.

<div class="border-0 shadow bg-white rounded">
    <h3 class="fs-5 px-3 pt-3">Users</h3>
    <div class="px-2 pt-2">
        <table class="table table-borderless fs-6">
            <tbody>
                <tr>
                    <td>Mark Otto</td>
                    <td class="text-end text-muted">@mdo</td>
                </tr>
                <tr class="bg-light rounded-4">
                    <td>Jacob Thornton</td>
                    <td class="text-end text-muted">@fat</td>
                </tr>
                <tr>
                    <td>Larry the Bird</td>
                    <td class="text-end text-muted">@twitter</td>
                </tr>
            </tbody>
        </table>
    </div>
    <div class="p-3 bg-light rounded d-flex justify-content-end">
        <buttons class="btn btn-link text-secondary text-decoration-none">Cancel</buttons>
        <buttons class="btn btn-primary">View</buttons>
    </div>
</div>

3) Secondary buttons don't need a background color

Giving primary actions a background color and secondary actions no background color will establish a heirarchy of importance.

<div class="card border-0 shadow p-2">
    <div class="card-body">
        <h5 class="card-title">Special offer</h5>
        <p class="card-text">Are you sure you want to cancel your subscription? We have a special offer if you want to stick around!</p>

        <buttons class="btn btn-primary">View Details</buttons>
        <buttons class="btn btn-link text-secondary text-decoration-none">Cancel</buttons>
    </div>
</div>

4) Stop labeling everything!

Devs love to label values. Stop it! Display information as if it were a sentence in a book, not a key value pair.

<div class="card border-0 shadow">
    <img src="..." class="card-img-top" alt="...">
    <div class="card-body">
        <h1 class="card-title fs-5">Rocky Mount, MI</h1>
        <h2 class="card-title fs-6 text-muted fw-light">100 miles away</h2>
        <p class="card-text fw-light"><span class="fw-bold">$150</span> night</p>
    </div>
</div>

5) Shadows > Borders

Card borders often feel clunky. Shadows emphasize elements and give the page depth, making the element feel closer to the user.

<div class="card border-0 shadow p-2">
    <div class="card-body">
        <h5 class="card-title fs-5">Collaborate</h5>
        <p class="card-text">
            Share your work with hundreds of like minded individuals around the world!
        </p>
    </div>
</div>

More Bootstrap design tips??

If you enjoyed this, consider checking out my new project - Better Bootstrap

There you will find a free book containing more Bootstrap design tips like the ones in this article.

Top comments (24)

Jonathan Linat • Jul 3 '22

Be careful with points 2 and 4: declaring labels and headers is important for Web Accesibility.

Juan A. Fuentest Torcat • Jul 4 '22

Very useful, I love how much the UI improves with very small but well thought changes. Great stuff for us full-stack devs that are too focused on logic and performance and miss the more important user experience

NeilFranci • Jul 2 '22

This give me a flash back when I was a fresher, the manager was yelling at me when having no knowledge about the UI/UX and the he hire a designer and I learn so much about UI/UX so now I can understand what look good 👍

Medea • Jul 1 '22

This is nice!

Marco Klein • Jul 2 '22

Some very cool tips, illustrated in a nice way :) thanks!

witty code • Jul 4 '22

Thanks, this is great!

Regarding tables - I think you should add the id (or alternate row id) to the table to allow dynamic sorting of the table

Vic • Jul 4 '22

Nice!

Jack T. Neely • Jul 4 '22

Great stuff!

Jeet Mandaliya • Jul 3 '22

That is a great article @wes_walke

I totally see the point of shadows>borders.

what is the best way to translate shadows>border design when it comes to dark theme? White shadows look a bit off and black shadows aren't really providing the visual separation that borders provide in dark theme...

Weston Walker 📚 • Jul 3 '22 • Edited

Hi Jeet!

Making something a lighter gray in dark mode gives the illusion of elevation. Spotify is a good example of this!

Jeet Mandaliya • Jul 5 '22

That's actually great advice, thank you!

Ashley Sheridan • Aug 24 '22

A lot of these recommendations go against what would typically be advised to make content more accessible:

This is actually very good advice, and makes those notifications more accessible. There are other enhancements that could be done too, but probably beyond your immediate point in your post.
Removing the table headings makes the table more difficult to read, especially so if the table is large enough. Screen reader users may struggle even further. Also, removing the 'view' link forces an extra select step to view the (details?) of that user. The select action alone introduces many extra accessibility issues for keyboards users or those relying on speech actions.
Secondary buttons need styles that indicate that they're buttons. Removing the background colour effectively makes it appear as text. With the text colour being pale enough to fail colour contrast requirements, it might actually not be very visible to some users at all. At the least, it needs to show the area which is interactive.
We shouldn't ever remove labels. While some text might seem obvious in context for a sighted user, people don't always browse the web in the same way. Screen readers have a variety of methods to allow for navigation and interaction which might lead to some content being announced without the context of its surroundings, forcing the user to manually navigate forwards and backwards to gain that context. There are specific WAI guidelines that aim to ensure that things are labelled correctly on the web.
Shadows might look better, but they are completely removed in High Contrast Mode. You can add a transparent border and set the foreground colour of the element to account for this, as borders do get displayed in HC mode, and the colour will be adjusted automatically (in most cases).