I remember I started blogging way back in 2001 and I didn’t have a clue on blog templates, design or content. I used to use blog templates from blogskins which were coded for Blogger version 1 (the one without the widgets) and all I knew was to choose designs that doesn’t hurt my eye.

Choosing a blog design is more complex than choosing a design that you like. If your content are photos aplenty, an awesome design might overshadow your photos and might even slow down the loading time of your blog. The key to choosing a blog design for your blog is to look into these factors :

1. Design for your content, not the other way around.
Content precedes over design in blogs. The design is merely there to make people REMEMBER your blog.

2. No matter how good your designer/blog design is, if you put in widgets and use fonts carelessly, your blog will end up looking bad in 2 weeks time.
Try to restrain from putting in every widget you come across and stop using the default colours that Blogger/Wordpress provides with funky bold/italic/underlines.

3. Be very choosy with widgets and advertisements.
Most widgets/advertisements are designed with a specific style that might or might not suit the design of your blog. The simpler the design, the more likely it’ll fit with the design of your blog. Same goes for the other way round; the simpler your blog design is, the easier it is for you to put just about anything in your blog without the whole design going rotten. If you find you need to customize every widget and plugin you place in your blog, the design you thought you initially wanted might not be what you need after all.

20 Beautiful Blog Designs
I have compiled a list of 20 beautiful blog designs in various styles to show an example of the limitations of each design when catered to your current blog.

Please bear in mind that every design comes with its own set of limitations, the best would be to find the closest one with the least limitations for your needs. Limitations are rules that you can break at the risk of making your blog design look bad.

iloveoclors

[1]ilovecolor.com.ar
Suitable for :
*Text content
*Graphic pictures
*Tabbed sidebar widgets

Not suitable for:
*Photography pictures
*Embedding advertisements of different styles
*More than 5 sidebar widgets
*Using funky font colours in the content area

[2]all-for-design.com
Suitable for :
*Text content
*Graphic pictures
*Placing mini icons of social links
*Tabbed sidebar widgets
*Using various font colours in the content body

Not suitable for:
*Photography pictures
*Long blog posts
*More than 5 sidebar widgets

[3]cosmicdiary.org
Suitable for :
*Text content
*Wide graphic & photography pictures
*Embedding advertisements of different styles
*Embedding links in the banner

Not suitable for:
*Long blog posts consisting of text only
*Using any font bigger than the post title font in the body text

[4]lordlikely.com
Suitable for :
*Long blog post consisting of text only
*Graphic and sepia photography pictures
*Text-based widgets
*Using various font styles or sizes for text

Not suitable for:
*Bright coloured photography pictures
*Embedding advertisements of different styles
*Icon/graphic based widgets
*Using any colour of the design colour scheme

[5]lewro.com
Suitable for :
*Short blog posts or blog post introductions with Read More.
*Graphic pictures
*Wide text or graphic widgets at the sidebar

Not suitable for:
*Embedding advertisements (they will appear below-the-fold)
*Using bigger/ more colourful fonts in comparison with the post title font in the body.
*Icon/graphic based widgets

[6]thedarlingtree.com
Suitable for :
*Long blog posts
*Graphic and photography pictures with a touch of brown
*Text or graphic widgets at the sidebars
*Pastel coloured advertisements

Not suitable for:
*Wide widgets
*Retro coloured advertisements
*Using colourful fonts for the blog body text as they are already being used in the sidebar and in graphics.
*Different heights of sidebars, meaning you have to control the quantity of your widgets so that your sidebars appear to be approximately of the same height.

[7]nataliejost.com
Suitable for :
*Long blog posts
*Graphic and photography pictures
*Text or graphic widgets at the sidebars
*Pastel coloured advertisements with lots of whites

Not suitable for:
*Thick slabs of colours in any content or widget
*Colourful fonts in the blog post
*Retro coloured advertisements

[8]scottboms.com
Suitable for :
*Long blog posts
*Huge graphic and photography pictures
*Minimal amount of widgets at the sidebar
*Icon size advertisements in the sidebar

Not suitable for:
*Thick slabs of colours in any content or widget
*More than 4 widgets at the sidebar
*Extremely long blog title as it is rotated 90 degrees

[9]amymahon.com/blog
Suitable for :
*Long blog posts
*Graphic and photography pictures
*Text widgets at the sidebars

Not suitable for:
*Thick slabs of colours in any content or widget
*Colourful fonts in the blog post
*Graphic widgets or advertisements at the sidebar


[10]crayonslife.com/my_blog
Suitable for :
*Short text blog posts
*Small sepia photography or similar graphic pictures

Not suitable for:
*Medium to big sized pictures
*Colourful fonts in the blog post
*Widgets at the sidebar
*Any font bigger than the post title in the blog post body


[11]rin-wendy.com
Suitable for :
*Short text blog posts or  text blog introductions with Read More..
*Text widgets at the sidebar
*Two authors blogging at the same domain

Not suitable for:
*Graphic widgets
*More than 5 widgets at the sidebar
*Starting a blog post with a picture


[12]owltastic.com
Suitable for :
*Medium length blog posts
*Graphic and photography pictures
*Text or graphic widgets at the sidebars

Not suitable for:
*Colourful fonts in the blog post


[13]indielabs.com
Suitable for :
*Blog introduction with Read More
*Graphic pictures
*Text widgets at the sidebars
*Icon sized advertisements
*Colourful fonts in the blog post

Not suitable for:
*Pictures of different sizes here and there


[14]jaredigital.com
Suitable for :
*Long blog posts
*Huge graphic and photography pictures
*Text or graphic widgets at the sidebars
*Pastel coloured advertisements with lots of whites


[15]slash7.com
Suitable for :
*Long blog posts
*Huge graphic and photography pictures
*Text or graphic widgets at the sidebars
*Fonts of any size in the blog post body.

Not suitable for:
*Highlighted fonts in the blog post


[16]blog.squarespace.com
Suitable for :
*Text blog posts
*Minimal graphic and photography pictures preferably in black & white
*Text widgets at the sidebars
*Various font styles in the blog content

Not suitable for:
*Fonts in colours other than yellow or black
*Colourful widgets at the sidebar


[17]freshapproachcoach.com
Suitable for :
*Long blog posts
*Graphic and photography pictures
*Text or graphic widgets at the sidebars

Not suitable for:
*Strong font colours in the blog post
*Strong colours in the sidebar widgets


[18]blog.raduceuca.com
Suitable for :
*Long blog posts
*Graphic and photography pictures
*Text or graphic widgets at the sidebars
*Fonts of any size in the blog post body.

Not suitable for:
*Fonts highlighted in strong colours at the blog post
*Readers who can’t read funky fonts


[19]artinmycoffee.com
Suitable for :
*Thumbnails blog with short description
*Frequently updated blog
*Different photography styles and colours

Not suitable for:
*Text longer than 4 sentences at the blog body content
*Sidebars with widgets


[20]bydreamtime.com
Suitable for :
*Long blog posts
*Graphic and photography pictures
*Text widgets at the sidebars
*Fonts of any size in the blog post body.

Thanks for reading ’til the end! By now, when you look at your blog you should be able to tell what are the limitations of your current blog design. If it’s such a hassle and pain to confine to them, it’s time to change for a better one.