We analyzed tens of thousands of websites generated with Design Arena from January through October 2026, and we were surprised to find that some familiar styles have gained favor since the start of the year while others have lost it. To get there, we used the same head-to-head votes behind our model leaderboards, but looked at which styles of website won rather than which models did. Here is what we found:
- Voter taste shifts over the year. The same website can score well with January's voters and poorly with October's, so where a design stands depends on when it is judged.
- Visual neighborhoods change together. Comparing October against January, near-black pages with a single saturated accent gained favor, while classic gold-and-serif luxury and the earthy beige “tasteful” default lost ground, suggesting that voters are moving away from looks many AI models still reach for.
