Whats the best width for a paysite?

[Globofun]

I guess that 800 is ancient history, so what would be best?

1280?

Thanks!

[thebes]

I wonder if there are enough people still at 1024 to make that the better choice. Plus a lot of people with really wide displays use a browser thats not as wide as their screen (most sites look like shit at 1920 wide).

[apcwebmaster]

I think the 1024 standard will hold for a while, I still use on on my desktop because I can get decent refresh rates and sharpest picture with it

[RobertFrans]

and if you optimize for 1024 .. don't assume everyoen is teh same .. and everyoen has their taskbar at the bottom ... some peopel preffer the side ;-)

So with that said .. if you go for a fixed with 950px seems like a good size to me.

[facialfreak]

Yep .... 950 - 990px is about the industry standard now ..

Depends on how much of a border you like around your page.

[Blinky]

I guess the best answer is to make your sites fluid width, with a good design you should be able to work something out, but it'd be pretty hard for a paysite when you rely on mostly pictures.

[Hammer]

1280 is too wide. I'd stick to 1024. It's not an issue of how big someone's monitor is but what our eyes are comfortable looking at. Netpond is a good example, no offense, but on a large monitor with the browser opened to full width the lines are very long and get tiring to read after a while. The same is true of a paysite. You want to keep everything to a width that is comfortable on the eyes and doesn't require a lot of side to side movement.

[Mihx]

1024x768 still seems to be the most common resolution by far - and it will probably remain that way for at least another year or two, or more (it took quite a while for 800x600 to reach fairly insignificant numbers afterall).

Here are the resolution stats for my review site for this year:

1. 1024x768 37.17%
2. 1280x800 15.24%
3. 1280x1024 14.23%
4. 1440x900 7.19%
5. 1680x1050 6.53%
6. 800x600 5.33%
7. 1152x864 3.09%
8. 1920x1200 2.51%
9. 1280x768 1.65%
10. 1280x960 1.02%

[RobertFrans]

Originally Posted by Mihx

1024x768 still seems to be the most common resolution by far - and it will probably remain that way for at least another year or two, or more (it took quite a while for 800x600 to reach fairly insignificant numbers afterall).

Here are the resolution stats for my review site for this year:

1. 1024x768 37.17%
2. 1280x800 15.24%
3. 1280x1024 14.23%
4. 1440x900 7.19%
5. 1680x1050 6.53%
6. 800x600 5.33%
7. 1152x864 3.09%
8. 1920x1200 2.51%
9. 1280x768 1.65%
10. 1280x960 1.02%

looking at only the width (a vertical scrolbar is kind of standard anyhow) .. 1280+ seems to-be standard.

And well here at least any new monitor/laptop .. has at least 1280.

But yeah will take a year or 2 more before most people have switched .. not everyone buy's new stuff each 2 years

[Mihx]

Originally Posted by RobertFrans

looking at only the width (a vertical scrolbar is kind of standard anyhow) .. 1280+ seems to-be standard.

And well here at least any new monitor/laptop .. has at least 1280.

But yeah will take a year or 2 more before most people have switched .. not everyone buy's new stuff each 2 years

Actually you're right about that. I blame the fact that I missed that, on substandard brain activity because I haven't had breakfast yet .

Still, the fact that the highest percentage of people are using monitors with a horizontal resolution above 1280 doesn't change the fact that well over a third are still only on 1024, so unlike the now insignificant 800x600 numbers, it's probably safe to say that designing for lowest (significantly) common denominator - 1024x768 - is still a very good idea.

[Globofun]

I'm at 1680, and so many sites are way too small in my opinion. (I mean new paysites that are made at 800) I just don't get it why people still use a width of 800 in 2008!

[Mihx]

Originally Posted by Globofun

I'm at 1680, and so many sites are way too small in my opinion. (I mean new paysites that are made at 800) I just don't get it why people still use a width of 800 in 2008!

They are probably afraid of scaring off those 5-8% still using that resolution (we all hate horizontal scrollbars afterall ).

The question is though, are those people who still haven't bothered to replace their 15" monitor from 1999, particularly likely to have the broadband connections that are really a requirement for most remotely video heavy paysites these days?
And whether or not they are still sticking to that ancient monitor for financial reasons, are they likely to want to spend 30 bucks on porn when they haven't felt like, or been able to spend a couple of hundred on a new monitor in the past 6-8+ years?

I rather doubt we're talking about many sales lost by saying "screw you!" to the remaining 800x600 users.
If you stick to that resolution you also risk annoying some of your more likely customers. As you mention, an 800 pixels wide site tend not to look particularly impressive on our 22" 1680x1050 widescreen monitors. In fact I almost have to zoom in to around 130-150% in Opera to even see it .

[born2blog]

definitely no less than 1000px wide

[apcwebmaster]

For regular browsing I actually prefer 1024 because like Hammer said all the extra eye movement probly stresses the eyes but I do like the extra working space 1280 provides. You might also find that some gamers prefer 1024 for various reasons

[thebes]

I'm not too surprised that so many are still at 1024. That was a standard for years and some people aren't so techy, so they keep their antiquated equipment well past its reasonable service life. Also some new umpc's and such are at 800 or 1024 wide- those at 800 will be used to scrolling sideways.

What does surprise me is that only 2.5% have a resolution as high as I do (and on a laptop!). I knew it was small and always preview my important work on a second screen... But still, with HD coming on strong I'm surprised that one is so low. I suppose there is no point in offering 1080p for a few more years and can see why most HD in adult is at 720p.

[Mihx]

Originally Posted by thebes

I'm not too surprised that so many are still at 1024. That was a standard for years and some people aren't so techy, so they keep their antiquated equipment well past its reasonable service life. Also some new umpc's and such are at 800 or 1024 wide- those at 800 will be used to scrolling sideways.

What does surprise me is that only 2.5% have a resolution as high as I do (and on a laptop!). I knew it was small and always preview my important work on a second screen... But still, with HD coming on strong I'm surprised that one is so low. I suppose there is no point in offering 1080p for a few more years and can see why most HD in adult is at 720p.

In terms of HD videos on paysites, aside from the fact that very few people are actually on screen resolutions higher than 1680x1050, I also think any additions to file sizes are much better spent on higher bitrates for 720p videos, rather than trying to aim for 1080p videos at similar or only slightly higher bitrates (although admittedly the very few 1080p sites I've seen so far did go quite a step further with 8000 kbit vs. the 4-5000 kbit that is typically used for 720p videos).

While they've got the resolution requirements right with either format, the actual quality of downloadable HD porn videos still falls far short of Blu-ray movies or broadcast HD - even taking into account the no doubt obvious differences in camera and production equipment.
Viewed on particularly a large screen (like a HDTV rather than a typical 19-22" monitor), those "low" 4000 kbit bitrates still give you minor (or sometimes not so minor) pixelation, artifacts and other image quality issues that proper hi-def is supposed to eradicate entirely (and usually manages to do with flying colors in Blu-ray movies - assuming good transfers - and even lower bitrate broadcast HD).

When they double that 4000 kbit bitrate things do start to get much better though, but there's still quite some way to go up to 40,000 kbit that Blu-ray movies typically top out at with their variable bitrate .
Damn those Internet bandwidth limitations .

[porndragon]

So are people still using set size aspect in their sites like width="950" or do you guys preffer setting it for any size by using %'s like width="35%" so it resizes to any resolution?? or am I the only one who does that?

[Mihx]

Originally Posted by porndragon

So are people still using set size aspect in their sites like width="950" or do you guys preffer setting it for any size by using %'s like width="35%" so it resizes to any resolution?? or am I the only one who does that?

Aren't fluid designs like that likely to screw up the page structure and layout if we're talking about sites with much more than a very basic content area plus perhaps one sidebar?

Also, as other people pointed out further up the thread, making use of the full browser width on monitors with high resolutions isn't necessarily particularly user friendly, because it doesn't really feel natural and relaxing to almost have to turn your head to read or see a full line of text, rather than just resort to eye movement as you do with a book - or a website with a fixed width where at least the main content area probably shouldn't be much wider than around 1000 pixels.

[frederix]

no more than 1024 in my opinion.

[AbsolutePorn]

Try somewhere between 1024 and 1280