The front end of a website is everything the user either sees or interacts with when they visit the website. It is responsible for the total look and feel of an online experience.
While the term may sound a little technical, website front ends are really an everyday encounter for almost all of us. If you’ve opened an app to check the weather, or scrolled through today’s headlines on a website, you’ve interacted with a front end.
Put simply, the front end is a combination of two different elements: the graphic design (the look) and the user interface (the feel). Each of these is created independently, with most of the technical work going into the user interface using web languages like HTML, CSS, and JavaScript.
Creating a front end experience isn’t a one-person job. In fact, it takes a group of people to create a website that looks as good as it feels to use.
Most often, this group will be comprised of a front end developer — whose job it is to actually write the code for the functions of the website — and a UX or UI developer, who will work on the visuals of the website.
The front end experience usually goes through a few different stages of development, including the creation of wireframes (rough outlines of the user flow), prototypes (working examples of the site), and finally user testing.
Read next: What is a back end developer?