The use of character illustration in web design is a great and easy way to increase the amount of visual appeal your website has. Not only does it brighten things up and make your site a bit more captivating, but it also, if pulled off well, helps your visitors remember your design (and therefore your website). Although your website’s content is extremely important, a beautiful and engaging design helps to bring everything together.
Below, we have a beautiful selection of web designs that make use of character illustration – from design blogs, to agencies, search engines, to internet applications, and even candy brand websites, to food nutrition repositories.
DesignGiveaways
DesignGiveaways uses a hand-drawn style vector illustration of the website’s masters to jazz up their minimalistic design and add a splash of color. It adds a personal touch to the overall site, and makes it more welcoming to new visitors.
Ewout Van Lambalgen
Silverback
Silverback uses a detailed and quite adorable vector graphic of a gorilla to spice up their website aesthetics, and uses the character as a mascot, making it incredibly easy for users to link the character to the application and website.
SR28
Krolikov
The three-dimensional approach to the Krolikov web design is brough to life with a cheeky and full-of-life rabbit illustration in the top left of the design. Like Silverback (above), the character is used like a mascot.
Moshi Monsters
Foxtie
Another design that uses a character illustration not only to brighten up their design and to make it more appealing, but to also act as an easily recognizable mascot for their website/product.
Adelacreative
Kung Fu Productora
This minimalistic and simplistic design is simply brought to life by using a character illustration; although the character itself is very minimal, too. It adds color, brings the best out of the headings, and is just cute!
Ignaty Nikulin
Sixonefive
Sixonefive uses a character illustration to back-up its tagline “Madness, Chaos & Creation” by using a mad-looking scientist with blue hair. The character is also used next to the website’s header/logo, helping the character to represent the site.
Joseph Payton
The Color Cure
The Color Cure is a highly-illustrated design, using vector-style images in the background, and a colorful palette to represent different services that they offer. The illustrations top the design off, filling some empty space and allowing a good way to ask possible clients to send them an email by the use of a speech bubble.
Siringa
Sean Halpin
Sean Halpin is a colorful but fairly simplistic design that makes use of a simple character illustration to engage with new visitors as a way to introduce whose portfolio they are looking at.
eAnka
PSD Rockstar
PSD Rockstar is highly textured and quite a “grungy” design. Using a clean-cut character illustration in the header spreads things out a little and makes the site more appealing and friendly.
Stoodeo
Fatburgr
Fatburgr is one of my favorites in this showcase, mainly because its mascot-style character illustration suggests what the site is about, puts a smile on your face and automatically makes for a friendly and calm environment.
Creamscoop
Think Orange
As well as being hilarious, the two simple but equally mind-blowing character illustrations on Think Orange’s minimal design fill the white space, and set a good standard for the rest of the site.
Moourl
Cyclops
When it comes to character illustration, aliens and monsters are a big hit, although we don’t see as much of them as most of us would like to when it comes to web design. Cyclops pulls off this monster illustration tremendously well and, as well as brightening up the site, acts as a great mascot.
Elitist Snob
Mail Chimp
The Mail Chimp character mascot illustration is one most of you have probably seen before, whether you use their service, have seen their site in other showcases, or have seen the adorable chimp illustration plastered on advertisements all over the web. It’s perfect, and is enough to make anyone smile!
M&M’s China
Old Loft
Old Loft uses various character illustrations, and helps represent their slogan “let’s work together”; after all it isn’t every day we see an elephant, crocodile, rabbit, lion, bear and eagle working together to place a “WWW” flag in the ground!
Branded07
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Whoa… Wicked! Thanks heaps for posting this. It is really inspiring. I tried illustrating a mascot design for a project of mine and couldn’t seem to get it right. In the end I decided on getting some professional help. The designers at http://www.mascotdesigncorner.com managed to realize my vision of illustrating a character design that was above expectations. I highly recommend them. For the price I paid it was indeed a steal. I guess I am not good at designing at all. Anyway, thanks for providing a source of inspiration I might add. This site rocks big time!