Web Design vs Web Development: What's the Actual Difference?
The two terms get used interchangeably, but they're different disciplines with different deliverables — and knowing the difference changes how you brief a project.
Web design is about how a site looks and how it should behave — layout, typography, color, interaction states, usually delivered as Figma files or prototypes. Web development is what turns those files into a working, deployed site — HTML/CSS/JS, a backend, a database, hosting.
The confusion causes real project problems: a client asking a "web developer" for logo tweaks, or a designer being asked why the site "isn't live yet" when development hasn't started, are both symptoms of not separating these roles clearly at the start.
In practice, the two disciplines are sequential but not separate — the best outcomes come from designers and developers working from the same component system, so a "design change" doesn't become a full rebuild.
When briefing a project, it helps to be explicit about which phase you're commissioning: are you buying a look and a prototype, or a live, functioning product? They're different projects with different timelines.
