Craiggers: Unofficially Improving the User Interface Design of Craigslist

One of the hallmarks of Craigslist, the classifieds website, has been its almost unchanging and unwavering user interface design. Due to its very un-Web 2.0 user interface design the website looks like it’s a dinosaur from the World Wide Web’s earlier days. Craigslist, however, is a survivor and remains popular with 20 billion monthly page views. Even though the old adage goes “if it ain’t broken don’t fix it”, the user interface design has moved on. Surely there are a number of things Craigslist could do to improve the usability of its user interface design without alienating its user base. Navigation and search, in particular, are areas that could do with a makeover. However if Craigslist is planning a change to its user interface design they aren’t letting Joe Public know.

In the meantime those looking forward to an updated Craigslist user interface design will have to settle for Craiggers. What Craiggers does is to simply present Craigslist data in modern user interface design using the 3taps API. Navigating the user interface design is made easier by a three-column interface design with a search bar and utilities at the very top. The left column is used for the main navigation using collapsible lists of Craigslist categories.  The center and right columns of the user interface design are used to display the content of the classified ads. The center column shows a detailed list while the right column displays the ad in full. This way you no longer have to hit the back and forth buttons, or open ads in another tab. Searches can be saved so that you can return to them to, for example, see if there are new job postings. Users can also sign into Craiggers with their Facebook, Twitter or Google accounts. The only downer, at least for me,  was that Craiggers was only compatible with classifieds from the USA.