Design, UI, UX, Inspiration, Website Examples
23 Retro Website Examples To Get You Feeling Nostalgic
A collection of retro websites in the wild for a healthy amount of nostalgia
Retro websites are exciting digital time machines, transporting us back to the early internet era. Their popularity stems from a yearning for simpler times and a desire to revisit the charm of vintage aesthetics in the modern and often depressing digital landscape. These websites tap into our fond memories and give us a familiar yet refreshing online experience.
Enter the modern retro websites. As a fusion of old-school charm and modern design elements, they’re easily recognizable. Classic shapes like rounded edges or geometric forms, vivid color schemes, and typography reminiscent of old posters or 8-bit platforms. Pretty easy to spot, right?
Now, get ready to dive into a curated collection of 20+ retro websites captured in the wild. Each website embraces a distinct retro style. The collection includes modern retro websites, retro-futuristic, retro OS style, and authentic true retro websites. All these retro gems offer a delightful trip down memory lane. Let’s go there together!
Modern Retro Websites
Modern retro mixes old-style vibes with today’s design. It uses old-fashioned looks, like vintage fonts or colors, in a new way. It merges the best of both worlds, appealing to those who appreciate the charm of the past but still crave modern functionality. Here are some amazing examples of modern websites with a retro twist. Or retro websites with a modern twist.
1. Frauke Schnoor Photographer Portfolio Site
Frauke Schnoor’s photography portfolio brings a modern twist to the retro websites of the early 2000s. This one-page site flaunts a blend of retro and brutalist styles, featuring large fonts spread across the page. The intriguing twist? Hovering over a photo’s name reveals the image, adding an element of surprise and engagement.
Notably, the social links sport retro gradient backgrounds, making them stand out while indicating their clickable nature. Despite its simplicity, this website captivates with its mesmerizing design, seamlessly merging nostalgia with contemporary flair.
Visit Website2. Devran Dogaroglu Retro Portfolio Site
Devran Dogaroglu’s portfolio website is a captivating journey bridging the past, present, and future while defying the oversaturation of modern design. Built on Webflow, this interactive site seamlessly melds modernity with a retro touch. It stands out with intriguing page transitions and compelling storytelling elements. A standout feature, “Breathe In Breathe Out,” offers visitors a quirky animated page, adding an engaging twist.
The website’s predominantly white backdrop hosts a text-based design highlighted by neon glow accents, creating a visually striking and memorable online experience. It’s a fusion of nostalgia and innovation, beckoning visitors into a world that feels both familiar and refreshingly new.
Visit Website3. Compra Vicio Crowdfunding Campaign Site
Vicio is a burger restaurant nestled in Italy. This website, however, isn’t about food but something else: investment packs for enthusiasts. Under the compelling concept, “A brand that you have made big has to be yours,” VICIO initiates a crowdfunding campaign. This innovative approach invites burger lovers to become part-owners of the company they adore. The website adopts a bold, hot-red hue reminiscent of an old newspaper layout, immediately capturing attention.
It’s an interactive, one-page platform adorned with scrolling animations, transitions, and retro-style illustrations, creating an immersive and engaging journey for potential investors. This distinctive blend of nostalgia and modernity invites visitors to savor the burgers and own a slice of the Vicio story.
Visit Website4. Retro 30s Disney Cartoon Website
Retro Cartoons 30s pays homage to the timeless artistry of Walt Disney. This dedicated project meticulously recreates the magic of retro Disney cartoons from the 1930s, aiming to preserve their spirit and character for generations to come while igniting creativity. The entire website design immerses visitors in the iconic retro Disney style.
Legendary characters come to life, animatedly flying planes and engaging in various activities throughout the site as users scroll, creating an enchanting experience. With a blend of music, sound effects, overlaid elements, and a clever mix of vertical and horizontal scrolling, this single-page modern website elegantly intertwines contemporary design with nostalgic retro elements, inviting a new audience to embrace the charm and legacy of Disney’s golden era.
Visit Website5. Greg Roque Filmmaker Comedian Interactive Site
Greg Roque’s promotional website is a vibrant fusion of ’90s culture, satire, and the audacious spirit of early web antics, offering a glimpse into the world of this comedian and filmmaker. The site adds a contemporary spin to retro aesthetics, blending fun clutter, animated elements, and GIFs that hark back to the era. It’s a multimedia-rich platform boasting various features, including a clickable calendar for booking Greg’s appearances.
What sets this site apart is the interactive element where Greg himself reacts in the background as you browse, adding a personalized and entertaining touch. It’s a playful homage to the wild and irreverent attitude of the ’90s web while offering an engaging and immersive experience for visitors keen on exploring Greg’s comedic universe.
Visit Website6. Sea Harvest Market Visible Lines Vintage Site
Sea Harvest’s website ingeniously merges modernity with a nostalgic retro vibe, reminiscent of a traditional fish shop, all crafted on the WordPress platform. Dressed in a captivating black-and-white palette, the site exudes a classic newspaper layout, complete with visible column and section borders that evoke a sense of familiarity. Retro ink illustrations beautifully showcase the variety of seafood available at the shop, enhancing the vintage aesthetic.
Bold titles resemble those from a newspaper, along with typewriter-style body fonts. Each homepage item or article playfully teases with the timeless phrase “more on page XX,” a clever nod to the format of front-page newspapers. Combining the charm of yesteryears with contemporary digital accessibility, this website invites visitors to experience the nostalgia of a traditional fish shop in a modern online setting.
Visit Website7. Jonas Pelzer Retro Typefaces Promotional Website
Jonas Pelzer’s typeface promotional website is a clever blend of minimalism and retro flair, doubling as a portfolio and eCommerce hub for showcasing and selling fonts. This sleek platform, built with a flat design aesthetic, embodies simplicity, presenting a clean white backdrop with text-based design.
Purposefully devoid of images, the website focuses solely on the designer’s various typefaces. This deliberate choice ensures a distraction-free environment, allowing visitors to appreciate and explore the nuances of each font without any flashy distractions.
Visit Website8. Sans Sheriff Typeface Retro Website
Sans Sheriff’s typeface-dedicated website boldly embraces a modern-retro vibe, particularly focusing on showcasing the versatility of three optical sizes with a presentation and a fun little game for visitors. As a one-page presentation, the site bursts with neon and vivid colors spanning from striking reds and blues to vibrant greens and yellows.
Unlike its understated counterparts, this design revels in its flashiness, catching the eye with its bold color palette. The deliberate use of intense and vivid colors adds an electric energy to the typeface showcase, creating a visually dynamic and captivating experience for visitors. This website’s unapologetic embrace of vibrant hues perfectly complements the essence of the Sans Sheriff typeface, offering a contemporary twist on retro aesthetics that’s impossible to overlook.
Visit WebsiteRetro Futuristic Websites
We can’t talk about retro websites without even thinking about how we imagined the future a few decades ago. Retro-futurism is a mix of old ideas about the future with a vintage look. It’s captivating for those intrigued by the contrast between past imaginings of tomorrow and our present reality.
9. Phaetus 10th Anniversary Event Futuristic Website
BCdesign’s creation for Phaetus’ 10th Anniversary Event is a captivating blend of retro-futuristic aesthetics, crafted with precision and creativity. The website, designed and developed for this milestone celebration, boasts a striking dark mode complemented by pixel art and fonts that transport visitors to a nostalgic yet futuristic realm. Featuring an irresistible neon green hue that exudes an unmistakable allure, the site offers an interactive experience with scroll-triggered animations.
Despite the intricate artwork and animations, the seamless design ensures a smooth user experience without compromising loading speed. The use of the classic retro font, Prbitron, adds a touch of authenticity to this single-page website, resembling the layout and feel of a cutting-edge app.
Visit Website10. Match Pairs Memory Game Retro Site
Hand Agency introduces a captivating retro-futuristic memory game that transports users back to the vibrant ’80s. This unique match pairs game, designed by the agency, offers a nostalgic twist by representing each pair with a month. Players uncover cards displaying famous personalities from the ’80s, providing a brief glimpse before the cards flip back and rearrange, challenging memory and quick recall.
The game not only entertains but also offers a delightful trip down memory lane with iconic figures from that era.
Visit Website11. Piet Dewijngaert Retro-Futuristic Portfolio Site
Piet Dewijngaert’s website, Sector 32 2023, serves as a showcase for his expertise as a creative front-end developer specializing in interactive animations and real-time 3D graphics on the web. The standout feature of this site is the hero section, offering a unique and experimental functionality. Visitors can engage with a movable bar that retro-fies the graphics, transporting them visually back to the 1970s.
This ingenious design idea not only demonstrates Piet’s technical prowess but also serves as an exceptional starting point for aspiring developers looking for portfolio inspiration. It’s an immersive and interactive experience that effectively highlights Piet Dewijngaert’s skills while offering visitors a playful glimpse into the evolution of web graphics through a nostalgic lens.
Visit Website12. Plastic Words Digital Humanities Site
Plastic Words is a small digital humanities company with a minimalist and creative website. Their About Us page has a cool mix of futuristic and old-style vibes. It’s all black with fonts that look like old computer writing. Each team member has a bright neon-colored picture, making it stand out and look fun. This style shows who they are uniquely and interestingly.
Visit WebsiteRetro Operating System Style Websites
Retro OS style looks and acts like older computer systems from the ’80s or ’90s. It uses blocky fonts and old graphics. The appeal is rooted in nostalgia, offering a sense of familiarity for those who used those systems while also intriguing younger audiences fascinated by the vintage tech aesthetic.
13. Erik Bernacchi Retro OS Portfolio Website
When you visit Erik Bernacchi’s Portfolio, get ready for a wild ride. It’s packed with grumpy cat bots, quirky synthesizers, meme generators, and even statues you can mess with. It’s a blast to explore! The website rocks a retro OS style, making it feel like a trip back in time. It’s super fun, filled with personality tests, hidden surprises, and all sorts of unexpected goodies to discover.
Visit Website14. Yahya J. Aifit’s Old OS Style Portfolio
Yahya J. Aifit’s Portfolio is a cool nod to desktop operating systems, both in looks and how it works. Built using Vue.js and following the atomic design approach, it’s broken down into smaller parts that fit together like building blocks. What’s neat is that it’s not just for computers—this site runs smoothly on mobile devices too! All the “desktop icons” are neatly packed into a bottom navigation bar, giving it that familiar desktop feel no matter where you access it from.
Visit Website15. Yannick Gregoire Retro Console Portfolio Site
This portfolio website takes its design cues from the grid layout of early computers. It’s a unique setup where you can use your keyboard to explore and reveal different sections like biography, projects, services, and contacts. It’s quite unconventional—it blends a retro console style with modern animations, creating a distinct visual experience. Instead of clicking around, you navigate this one-page site using your keys. Each key corresponds to a specific section, instantly opening it up for you on the same page.
Visit Website16. Sergio Disch Portfolio Site
Barcelona-based front-end developer and designer Sergio Disch is bringing some serious funk to his work. Using Webflow and some impressive APIs, he’s giving a new spin to the classic Mac OS style. It’s a blend of old-school vibes with a fresh, modern twist. What’s even cooler? The mobile version is just as impressive, showcasing his knack for design across different platforms.
Visit Website17. Poolside FM Retro Radio App Website
Poolside FM is a music website that screams summer vibes, taking a cue from ’90s operating systems. As you load the site, you’re greeted with a nostalgic preloader featuring code-style animations and even a cool helicopter drawing, all made with code! The site itself features a retro FM live player that feels straight out of the past, enhancing the overall nostalgic experience. Plus, there’s a launcher app for mixtapes, allowing you to pick and load your preferred MP3s.
And if that’s not enough, there are FM app downloads and icons neatly guiding you to external links. It’s a fun, retro-inspired music hub that’s packed with creative touches and a seriously cool vibe.
Visit WebsiteTrue Retro Style Website Examples
True retro faithfully replicates web design from the 80s and 90s, often embracing the style, limitations, and technology of that time. It features elements like bright colors, animated GIFs, simple layouts, and outdated fonts. It appeals to those seeking a genuine blast from the past in their online experiences.
18. Captain Marvel 90s Website
“Captain Marvel” breaks away from the usual Marvel film style by throwing it back to the ’90s. Embracing that era completely, the movie’s website goes all out with a Geocities-inspired design. It’s a total blast from the past with flashy bling, animated GIFs, embossed buttons, classic underlined blue links, and deliberately cheesy magic-wand-cut graphics.
It’s a beautiful homage to the web design of that era, capturing the nostalgic charm in all its quirky, eye-catching glory.
Visit Website19. Kultika Fortuneteller’s Vintage Website
Kul Ticka’s website is a delightful throwback to the postcard style that was all the rage in the late ’90s and early ’00s. The design brings in elements like yellow images, reminiscent of that era’s aesthetics. Alongside these, you’ll find nostalgic nods to old phones, classic books, and captivating images of beautiful women from the ’70s and ’80s. It’s a charming mix that aims to captivate users with a touch of vintage allure, evoking a sense of nostalgia and style from our favorite decades.
Visit Website20. Cameron’s World 1994 to 2009 Time Capsule
Cameron’s World is like a digital time capsule, gathering text and images from old GeoCities pages, spanning from 1994 to 2009. It’s a collage that brings together graphics and text from archived GeoCities, giving you a glimpse into the web of that time.
With background 8-bit music setting the tone, the site is a colorful mess of flashy graphics, GIFs, and effects—a true blast from the past. As you scroll through this retro wonderland, you might even forget you’re using a modern browser, getting lost in the nostalgic charm of the old internet era.
Visit Website21. Radio New York Moon Vintage Website
The New York Moon is an online radio station that brings back a vintage feel using old fonts and images reminiscent of classic radio devices. These retro elements grab users’ attention and create a nostalgic atmosphere. One cool feature is the Moon Radio module, which lets users access the entire Moon broadcast through Adobe Flash Player. It’s a way to dive into the station’s world and enjoy the retro vibe while listening to the New York Moon.
Visit Website22. Basement Chronicles Retro Game Website
Basement Studio introduces a browser-based throwback called Basement Chronicles, reminiscent of classic point-and-click games. This pixelated adventure takes you back in time with its 8-bit design, featuring captivating aesthetics inspired by a zombie apocalypse.
With old console fonts and stunning pixel graphics, it’s a nostalgic journey through the world of gaming, capturing the charm of retro gaming while offering an engaging and immersive experience.
Visit Website23. Devin Smith’s Official One-Page Retro Portfolio
Devin Smith’s one-page retro website takes us back to the early web days. It’s simple, no scrolling, just a name, an 8-bit animated picture, and details about Devin, the Director of Technology Innovation and co-founder. Everything’s in the classic Comic Sans font, giving it that nostalgic feel. It’s a charming way to appreciate how far web design has come while celebrating the past.
Visit WebsiteAlrighty, folks, that’s a wrap!
To sum up, retro websites continue to captivate audiences with their nostalgic vibes and fun experiences. They bridge the gap between past aesthetics and modern functionality, appealing to those seeking a touch of vintage charm. From modern retro blends to retro-futuristic visions, or 80s and 90s OS styles to true-to-era designs, these websites prove that good design never gets old.
Hey, before you go, don’t forget to check out our other awesome articles on UI/UX design! We’ve got loads of tips and inspiration to help you create stunning designs that will blow your mind.