Having a website today is pretty much a non-negotiable. 

Building a business? You need a business website. 

Selling your art? Look into portfolio websites. 

Want to grow your personal audience? Create a personal website. 

Launching a tech startup? You absolutely need a website. 

That said, there are different types of websites for different purposes. You need to pick the type that’s most aligned with your objectives. 

In this article, we’ll break down the difference between websites and web apps, and then show you examples of 14 popular types of websites

Websites vs. Web apps

Typically, in conversation, we refer to anything we access via a web browser as a “website.” However, technically speaking, a website is more specific than that: It’s a group of related and interlinked web pages published by the same owner, on the same domain (e.g., mywebsite.com). 

Most websites are static pages that provide a passive user experience. Site visitors may view content on the website, but they don’t interact with the site's data or create it. Even dynamic websites don’t offer nearly the same level of interactivity that web apps do.

Web apps, on the other hand, are interactive pieces of software that run in your browser. They offer interactive features and complex functionality that allow the user to complete certain tasks. 

For example, Facebook, Google Docs, Airbnb, and similar “websites” are really web apps. They allow you to add and edit your own data, complete tasks, and serve as a tool, not just a passive experience. 

No-code tools like Bubble can help you build a web app as easily ‌as a website. Whether you need a static landing page to promote your product, or a fully-functional web app that is your product, building with no-code makes the development process smoother, faster, and easier. 

In this article, many of the types of websites we show you are actually web apps (more on the website vs. web app distinction here). But first, we’ll get started with true website examples. 

Three types of static (true) websites

Let’s start with a few popular types of true websites. That is, the content on them doesn't change, regardless of the user and their activity. 

Static websites are great for managing online marketing or sharing information. And, with a no-code website builder, it’s pretty easy to build your own website, even without a lot of experience. 

1. Single-page websites (landing pages)

Single-page websites (or “landing page” sites) are the most basic type of website. Often, one of these sites functions as: 

  • A “coming soon” page for a website still being built
  • An interest form for a not-yet-launched product 
  • A simple service description with contact information
  • A web page to download a native mobile-only product 

For example, the Haptic website is a single landing page that gives visitors information about the app and a download link. Poetry.Camera is a similar single-page site that lets visitors get more info about their product, join an email newsletter waitlist, and see upcoming events. 

An example of a "coming soon" site.

2. Brochure websites

Brochure websites are the more “typical” websites you probably think of. They’re composed of several connected web pages that provide information. 

The main goal of these sites is typically marketing or providing info about a product, event, service, or person. They don’t need much interactivity besides a contact form, email newsletter signup, or the like. 

Some examples of brochure sites would be: 

A static brochure website can be as simple or as complex as you need it to be. You’ll notice that some of these examples have just a few pages, while others have dozens or even hundreds of web pages. 

3. Blogs

Blogs are one of the most popular types of websites. By some estimates, there are over 600 million blogs live on the internet, which means that almost a third of all websites are blogs. 

Blogs are content-heavy sites sharing information without having much interactivity. Likes, comments, and social shares typically make up most of the interactivity on blogs. Unlike brochure sites, people usually expect blogs to publish new content over time.

Blogs can be used for all kinds of things: building a personal brand, entertaining an audience, allowing potential clients to find your online business in search engine results, and so on. 

Some example blogs include: 

4 categories of interactive websites (aka web apps) 

But what if you need more than just static content? 

For interactive, functional websites that provide real tools for your users, you want a web app. 

But what type of web app do you need, and what functionality should it have? 

Web apps can be categorized based on the privacy and sociability of the site’s interactivity. Understanding these categories will give you a better idea of what kinds of features and functionality you’ll need to build an effective web app. 

A four-quadrant chart showing open to private content and low to high sociability.

Looking at privacy and sociability, we can sort websites into four basic categories: 

  1. Open consumption: web apps with open content but low sociability 
  2. Open contribution: web apps with open content and high sociability 
  3. Private consumption: web apps with private content and low sociability 
  4. Private contribution: web apps with private content and high sociability

Most types of websites that you’ll create today will fall into one of these quadrants. Let’s break down what each of these categories means. 

Open content vs. private content

The privacy axis of this framework deals with how much of the content on the website or app is available to every user of the site. 

Open content

Open content means that most or all users can see mostly everything. For example, sites like Wikipedia, the New York Times, or IMDb have open content. 

Any visitor to the site can see all of the published content available. 

Private content

Private content means that the majority of the site’s content is private or specific to individual users. For example, sites like Canva or Quickbooks have mostly private content. The vast majority of the content on these sites is created by individual users, and private to those users (or whoever they share it with).  

This is obviously a sliding scale, with many web apps falling somewhere in the middle. For example, Facebook’s content is mostly open to logged-in users, but those users can choose to make their content private. 

Low sociability vs. high sociability

The sociability axis deals with how much users interact with other users on your web app or site. 

Low sociability

Websites with low sociability mean that users rarely or never interact with other users, or other users' content. The user’s experience is unique, but their experience is closed off from other users. 

This includes investment tools like Ellevest, private health portals, or web tools like ChatGPT. 

High sociability

On the other hand, websites with high sociability allow users to interact with each other. Some websites may even depend on high sociability and interaction to function — think social media sites like Facebook or Instagram, or community platforms like Discord. 

With these apps and websites, almost all of the content a user creates and encounters is shared with or by other users. 

Sociability is a spectrum as well, with many websites falling in the middle. Many web apps allow users to have some interaction with other users as well as some experiences on the app that are private. 

Thinking through the framework above and these two spectrums will help you determine what type of web app you need. That is: 

  • How open or private should your site’s content be? Should user content be private or open? Should site content created by the site owner be private or open? 
  • How much user-to-user engagement will your app have? Will users interact with one another and each other’s content, or will experiences in your tool be mostly private? 

Once you’ve decided on the types of functionality your app will have, keep reading for best practices and examples of websites that fall into every spectrum of this framework. 

This list is by no means comprehensive for every type of web app or website available, but we'll walk you through some of the most popular types in each category. 

Open consumption websites

Open consumption websites have open content but low sociability. This means that most of the content on these sites is open to most or all website visitors, but with very few direct user-to-user interactions. 

From a user perspective, these sites typically feel the most similar to the static website types we discussed above. 

Best practices for open consumption websites: 

✅ Make sure your site uses responsive web design for mobile friendliness. 

✅ Since your site content is open, optimize your site for SEO to grow your audience and traffic. 

✅ Create a wireframe before building your site to manage the information architecture of your site and make it easy to navigate and search. 

✅ Offer clear calls to action (CTAs) throughout your site for users to further engage with content. 

Mistakes to avoid for open consumption websites: 

❌ Open consumption websites tend to have a lot of content. Avoid navigational dead ends, intricately nested navigation, or confusing site hierarchies. 

❌ Avoid lumping all of your content into large, generic categories. Instead, create categories and filtering functions to allow users to sort and find what they’re interested in. 

Let’s take a look at some of the most common types of open consumption websites. 

1. Wikis and knowledge bases

Wikis and knowledge bases are websites where users can collaboratively create a “publication” or source of knowledge. They’re educational websites for either general topics or very specific communities and categories. 

In either case, a wiki site is collaboratively edited and managed by its own audience. Every audience member can see all or most of the content created.

Wikipedia and IMDb are great examples of public wikis and knowledge bases. 

2.  News websites

A news website is an informational website where news articles and resources are created and shared with most or all visitors. 

Many news sites now include paywalls, where subscribers can view all content, and general audiences can view a selectionof free content. 

Websites like the New York Times and CNN are two examples of news sites. 

3. Magazine and industry publication websites

Magazine and industry publication websites are another example of an educational website. They can either be an online version of a print magazine, or (more commonly now) a completely online publication. 

Typically, they’re run by a single publication or company and produce a lot of static content that can then be viewed by visitors and/or subscribers. In many cases, subscribers can log into their accounts to manage subscriptions, save and share articles, leave comments, manage email newsletter subscriptions, and more. 

Wired, The Verge, The Atlantic, and so on are all examples of magazine-style websites. 

A somewhat unique example would be a website like Medium. On Medium, the articles and stories are primarily written and published by users vs. an internal team. There are also features for users to react and respond to published content. This gives it a slightly higher sociability factor. 

4. Data aggregation web apps

Data aggregation web apps pull in data from a variety of other websites or web apps to process, analyze, sort, or otherwise work with that data in some way. 

For example, Expedia is a data aggregation web app that pulls in flight, hotel, and other travel booking information. This allows users to sift through data from multiple airlines or hotels at once to book travel faster. 

Ticketmaster is another example of an aggregator. Venues, artists, and other clients who want to sell event tickets can list their events on Ticketmaster, which then collects and sorts all the data to provide a one-stop-shop for consumers looking for event tickets. 

Open contribution websites

Open contribution websites are sites or web apps with open content and high sociability. This means that most of the content on these sites is open to most or all visitors and that there are high levels of user-to-user interactions. These interactions typically come through engaging with content that other users create. 

Best practices for open contribution websites: 

✅ Make sure your site uses responsive web design for mobile friendliness. 

✅ Pay careful attention to the privacy settings of your site so that users can only see user content that's shared with them.  

✅ Focus on strong user interface (UI) and user experience (UX) design to make sure that users can easily interact with your app and other users. 

✅ Don’t neglect your database! Your database will power your entire app, your users’ content, and their interactions with other users. A strong, well-organized database from the start will make it much easier to grow and scale your app. 

Mistakes to avoid for open contribution websites: 

❌ A poor checkout experience (for e-commerce and marketplace sites) can make or break your user experience. Avoid a checkout process that's long, complicated, or tricky to navigate.  

❌ A common mistake with open contribution sites is forgetting to build in content moderation and security settings. If everyone can contribute, spam can quickly become a problem and run down your site. 

5. E-commerce websites

E-commerce websites are online stores where users can buy and sell products. As such, e-commerce websites usually have open content (all users can view all the products available) and medium interactivity (as they need to connect with the seller). 

E-commerce websites have lots of unique functionality, such as: 

  • A checkout and payment processing function 
  • Ability to add products to cart and “wish lists” 
  • User accounts with the ability to view, edit, and change orders
  • Ability to search and sort products 
  • Ability to leave reviews or questions on individual product pages 

Target is an easy example of an e-commerce site. Other e-commerce sites might allow sellers to create their own online store, like Shopify does. 

6. Marketplace websites

Marketplace websites are another type of business website that facilitates transactions. These business websites help connect sellers and buyers to one another, while e-commerce sites facilitate purchases between many buyers and a single seller or company. 

On a marketplace website, anyone can be a seller or a buyer. Common marketplace sites include Etsy and Craigslist. 

Kickstarter is another example of a marketplace web app. Instead of selling a product, the “sellers” are trying to raise funds and the “buyers” are backing a campaign. Although the “product” is different, the process is the same. 

7. Social networking websites

A social networking website is designed to create interactions between users on the platform, (e.g., Twitter, Instagram, and Reddit).

As the name suggests, these web apps have the highest level of sociability. They’re actually built on the premise that users will interact and create and share content. Even the users’ interactions with “the platform” are really interactions with other users’ content. 

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Private consumption websites

Private consumption websites are sites or web apps with private content and low sociability. This means that most of the content on these sites is private to a specific user and that there is very little direct user-to-user interaction. 

These sites tend to be used for very specific purposes, and often require a paid subscription or membership to use. 

Best practices for private consumption websites: 

✅ Privacy is of the utmost importance here! Make sure the privacy settings of your site are set so that users can only see content that's shared with them.

✅ Match your database and design. Creating a UI that makes it easy for users to add, edit, change, and view their own content in the database will go a long way in making your web app easier to use. 

✅ Test your web app early and often. Because private consumption websites are typically used for specific tasks and actions, usability testing will make sure your web app is intuitive for users. 

Mistakes to avoid for private consumption websites: 

❌ Don’t get too in the weeds with web design before you work on functionality. A good web designer knows that good web app design stems from good functionality. 

❌ Not validating all your assumptions with the end user. You may think you know what the user wants or needs, but make sure to test and validate your assumptions before building.  

8. Portal websites

Web portals allow users to log in to perform private tasks or access services online. All or most of the user content and data stored in the app is private to that user. Generally, the tasks are very specific (i.e. “paying a bill” compared to “project management for my agency”) and may be correlated to a specific company or institution. 

For example, web portals often include: 

  • Health or doctor portals for making appointments, finding physicians, etc. 
  • Utility websites for paying bills 
  • Robo investors for managing investments
  • Banking websites for online banking tasks

9. Web tool websites

A web tool — sometimes commonly referred to as simply a “web app” — are sites where users log in to perform private tasks, or tasks that are shared with a select group of other users. The types of tasks performed on web tools are often much broader compared to portals. 

For example, a web app like Quickbooks allows you to manage the entire financial system of your business, including creating and sending invoices, managing reports, tracking financials, logging expenses, and so on. 

Web apps may also allow you to share your tasks or data with other users of the tool. For example, on Trello, you can share your projects, tasks, and boards with other members of your team to collaborate and make project management easier. This is unlike a health or banking portal, where your information is always private to your account.  

It’s also in contrast to an open contribution website, where the shared content is open to most visitors or users to the site, as with Instagram or Youtube. 

Private contribution websites

Private contribution websites are sites or web apps with private content and high sociability. This means that most of the content on these sites is private to individual users but that there are still high levels of user-to-user interactions. 

These interactions are typically the core element or “job to be done” of these websites or web apps, even if the data interacted with stays mostly private. You can think of private contribution websites as facilitating 1:1 interactions between users, while open contribution websites generally facilitate large-group or open interactions between users. 

Best practices for private contribution websites: 

✅ Pay careful attention to the privacy settings of your site so that users can only see user content that's shared with them.  

✅ Have your web designer focus on strong user interface (UI) and user experience (UX) design to make sure that users can easily interact with your app and other users. 

✅ Build in functionality to allow users to group themselves in whatever ways make sense for them. You may want to facilitate 1:1 conversations, group messages, team channels, open channels, and more.

Mistakes to avoid for open contribution websites: 

❌ Avoid making a private contribution site too generic. Private contribution sites perform best when there's a clear community and use case for them. Otherwise, users may feel unclear of when they should use your app in contrast to other community apps. 

❌ Just because a site is private doesn’t mean moderation and safety isn’t a concern. Don’t forget to include clear pathways for users to block or report troublesome users. 

10. Private community websites 

Private community websites create a space for users to log in and collaborate, message, and share information in private conversations or small groups. 

Typically, most groups are “closed” by default, and a group owner or moderator will review and admit new members. 

Popular examples that fall into this category would be apps like Slack or WhatsApp.

11. Dating websites

Dating websites are another example of private contribution websites. The entire site or app experience is based on other users’ content and user interactions, but unlike a social networking site, the majority of these interactions are private. 

Examples include Tinder and Hinge. 

Build any kind of website on Bubble

As mentioned, this list is certainly not exhaustive, and many websites or web apps in each of these four framework categories use multiple types of web app functionality. 

For example, ProductHunt is an open-contribution web app that borrows functionality from marketplace-style web apps, as well as wikis and social networking sites. Within this framework, there’s no limit to the types of web apps and online tools you can create. 

No matter what type of website or web app you want to build, you can build it easier on Bubble. 

Bubble’s no-code website builder gives you full-stack development tools to build any website type you need. No need to be a professional web designer, either. You can get started with a template to save time or start building exactly what you envision from scratch. 

Either way, you can start building your web app (for free!) on Bubble.