The usage of words like “excellent” and “awesome” has become so diluted, it is hard to separate the wheat from the chaff. Most of these examples are chaff. Granted, some might be pretty… but being pretty does not make it excellent.

IMHO, for a navigation system to be described as “excellent,” it needs to satisfy the following (and not necessarily in this order… but ALL of the following):

* it should be attractive
* it should be functional
* it should not leave the user guessing (mystery meat navigation)
* it should be accessible (I shudder to think what any of these look like on a screen reader or other device used to aid those that are disadvantaged in some way)
* it should not break the browser (the back button should be fully usable)
* it should be comprehensive (the user should not have to click more than 2 or 3 times to get where they are trying to go)

I’m sure there are more, but those are off the top of my head. Most of the sites fail at nearly all of these basic conditions.

(Note: While all of these sites may have “excellent” design, I am speaking strictly about their navigation.)

1.) Carrot: There is so much wrong with this site, I don’t even know where to start. Not accessible. Not bookmark-able. Breaks the browser. And the navigation system forces the user, who may be sitting in an Internet cafe in Thailand, to download the ENTIRE 11MB. Inexcusable. Their “director of user experience” should pick up a book or two about UX. In addition, their site does not do much for SEO at all.

2.) Grooveshark Widgets: Not sure what about the nav on this site is all that excellent. It looks fine, and accomplishes much of what it needs to. But the site itself is fairly small… three or four pages. Now, if you are talking about their FORM design (to create their widgets), that’s great. But the nav? It is perfectly capable and great looking, don’t get me wrong. For navigation to be called “excellent,” I would think it needs to solve a more complex navigational solution than 3 or 4 pages.

3.) Aviary – This is much better, but just misses the mark. It solves a complex navigation solution. Although the site requires JS to actually work, and the nav requires it to work fully, you are still able to navigate the site. the nav is designed to work well with any SEO optimizations. It needs some help as far as accessibility is concerned, however, so it misses the mark on “excellence.”

4.)WP Coder – Another site that forces the client to essentially load the entire site. Check out the source code. In addition, SEO goes right out the window. And certain links open new tabs in the browser without any indication that they do so… really annoying. The nav itself is not accessible.

5.) Dempsey – Not accessible. Not optimized for SEO. Can’t tell what links I’ve already visited. Can’t tell at a glance what section of the site I’m on. It’s a fine site, don’t get me wrong. But the navigation itself isn’t “excellent.”

6.) Bright Creative – Nice from a design perspective, not bad navigation, and a passing grade for accessibility. But not “excellent” navigation.

7.) Red Crown – Again, nice from a design perspective, but there really isn’t much to navigate here. It’s one page with a gallery. At least the gallery images load dynamically. But “excellent” navigation?

8.) MacHeist – Sorry, but I am completely missing the excellence in navigation here. Competent, for sure. It gets the job done. But the site itself is fairly simple… there isn’t much to navigate.

TL;DR – These sites may be pretty to look at. There may have been a lot of thought put into the look and feel. But none of them really qualify as “excellent” navigation if you /strictly/ look at their navigation.

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