You must’ve come across a web developer portfolio. Ever wondered if you need one? If the answer to the following is positive, then yes, you probably need one.
Are you a developer?
Do you want to stand out from the crowd?
Do you want to showcase your projects on a website?
Or maybe you want to impress your potential clients or employers?
It's time to put your skills on display with a portfolio that shines brighter than the pixels on a screen! But where to start? Don’t worry. We’ve got everything you need to create an eye-catching and informative developer portfolio.
What is a web developer portfolio? A web developer portfolio is a website that lists a developer’s experience and best projects. It serves as a medium for potential clients and employers to assess a developer’s skills and competencies.
Since your work mostly circles around developing websites, building an online portfolio would be the best to show off your development skills.
Regardless of whether you are a full stack, back end, or front end developer, a portfolio will always serve as an aid for you. Use this article as a beginner’s guide to building a portfolio. From novice to expert-level web portfolios, we’ve included it all. Along with 6 impressive examples, we’ve also scattered tips here and there to make things easier for you.
How does a portfolio help?
A portfolio serves several purposes like:
- Showcasing your skills and projects
- Demonstrating your expertise and experience
- Networking and finding job opportunities
- Differentiating yourself from others in the field
- Providing evidence of your capabilities to clients and employers
How to build a web developer portfolio?
Since you’re a developer, building a portfolio website might seem like a cakewalk initially. However, that might not be the case for every developer. A website has several aspects like back-end, front-end, design, wireframe, content, etc. Hence, you must devise a well-structured plan to build your website portfolio.
There are 5 basic steps to creating a portfolio:
- Collecting all your information: Education, Work experience, Achievements
- Organizing your information: Deciding the categories and road map of your website.
- Deciding a format: Portfolios can be offline or online, but an online portfolio is your best option as a developer.
- Updating the portfolio: A portfolio is never complete. Updating it periodically is a crucial step.
- Filling the gaps: Create mock workpieces and projects to add to your portfolio.
To learn the above steps in detail and understand all the elements of building a portfolio, read: All About Work Portfolio: Build Your Own In 5 Steps
Choose a host or platform
Here’s the good news, you don’t need a UI/UX designer to build an eye-catching website. Several website hosting platforms offer ready-to-use templates to use in your portfolio. Yet, if you want to develop your website from scratch, there are options for that too.
Here are four hosts that let you develop and deploy your own websites:
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Host pricing: Free to deploy
SSO Login: GitHub, GitLab, Bitbucket, or Email -
Host pricing: Free to deploy
SSO Login: GitHub, GitLab, Bitbucket, or Email -
Host pricing: Paid (Starts from $5)
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Host pricing: Paid but with $200 free credits
SSO Login: GitHub or Google
Here are five more platforms that make things easier by providing templates and easy integration with the hosts:
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Free Trial: Yes
Pricing: $16/mo -
Free Trial: Yes
Pricing: $16/mo -
Free Trial: Yes
Pricing: $10/mo -
Free Trial: No
Pricing: $6.99/mo -
Free Trial: Yes
Pricing: $4/mo
Know exactly what to include in your portfolio: Secrets To Writing The Best Portfolio Table of Contents
Web developer portfolio examples
Here are 3 portfolio examples that have taken it a few notches higher while creating their website.
Jack has designed his portfolio website with user experience in mind. This clearly indicates his expertise and years of experience in the development field. In addition, developing the portfolio in WordPress while calling himself a WordPress expert adds points too.
Let’s skip to the best part.
Observe how he shows off his front-end development abilities by displaying all his skills into an animated spherical globe.
3 takeaways from this website would be
- Easy navigation
- Excellent web design and animation
- Blog section to show off his knowledge
Jack has also added an animation to the cursor. Elements like these market your skills better than just listing them out.
Brittany has combined her software engineering and web development skills to build this extraordinary website portfolio. One great feature of her website is that it literally screams “software developer” when you browse through it. She has also used her portfolio as a tool to market her course on Newline.
Let’s skip to the best part.
Apart from her website being simple yet sophisticated, she has added another intelligent feature to impress her potential employers.
Observe the way she has listed her projects. Here are 3 key takeaways:
- Links to the GitHub project.
- Links to the live web application.
- A display of the list of tools used to build the project.
Bruno Simon’s superior website design has created one of the best portfolios. As a developer, this is one website you should definitely get inspiration from. His interactive experience awes visitors and clients.
His website works like a video game where you can browse his projects and experiences by driving a truck.
Let’s skip to the best part.
Simon’s extraordinary UI design of his past work and projects definitely wins the game. Along with his project display, he has also provided links to the individual websites for it.
The cherry on top, since he has designed his portfolio like a game, he has also added a playground for you to drive the truck through hurdles.
Here are 3 more examples that are a little simpler and more professional.
Jonny’s portfolio is a single-page website that lists only the necessary items. This website has a very clean and professional experience. He has included his services, past projects, and pricing model as per requirement.
Let’s skip to the best part.
He has included a chat box on his website to add something extra. This makes it easier for clients or employers to reach him. Plus, visitors can directly chat with him when he’s online (shown on top of the website).
Williams has created a simple yet informative website as his portfolio. He showcases all his skills with percentages of his expertise. This adds value to your skills and validates your proficiency.
Let’s skip to the best part.
Matthew has classified his projects according to the programming languages used in each project. You can view the projects language-wise, or when you hover over the project, it displays the language used. This is an excellent method to show off your expertise in the given language.
Being a full-stack developer, Cory has designed a simple yet innovative website portfolio. He showcases only 6 of his projects. Hence, this example becomes a pick for the beginner developers out there.
Let’s skip to the best part.
He has added a resume section on his website, mostly to fill the gaps (maybe). This is an intelligent choice, especially if you’re a beginner. He has also described his skill in paragraphs, where the content is mostly conversational.
Follow and connect with these developers (and more) on social media to learn more about their work and how they have used their years of experience to build their portfolios. You could also research how their portfolio helps them gain clients.
Browse through our collection of blogs focussing on various portfolios:
Moving Ahead
Now that you have gone through several developer portfolios, there are certain elements you must have observed. A web developer portfolio should focus on
- Web design
- User experience
- Interactive experience
- UI design
- Minimal (only necessary) content
Learn something new and unique from every portfolio example you go through. Steal their ideas and create them with your own customizations.
When you’re done building your portfolio, show it off everywhere! Use social media extensively to publish what you’ve built. Ping your friends and past and present colleagues with the link and ask them for feedback.
Invest some time and effort into curating your best work and letting it shine because, as they say, "Your portfolio is your silent salesman. Let it do the talking". Remember that a great portfolio will help you build your personal brand to market yourself.
Happy creating!
This article has been written by Pansy Thakuria. She works as a Content Marketing Specialist at Vantage Lens. Her areas of interest include marketing, mental well-being, travel, and digital tech. When she’s not writing, she’s usually planning trips to remote locations and stalking animals on social media.