High-end book readers (e.g. Kindle Fire and the Nook equivalent)n as well as the latest iPhones have high-resolution screens; often around 240dpi. Traditional computers and laptops are usually 100dpi (or a little less). DPI means how many pixels are displayed per inch and 240dpi is in the ballpark of what you’d use for print. Translation: if the only thing that existed were tablets and high-end phones, you could use much higher resolution, much crisper images for sites. The difference between pictures in a magazine (oooh ahhh) and those on a website would be much lower.

That hasn’t mattered much until now. Yesterday Apple added the same type of high resolution screen to one of their laptops. Apple calls the high resolution screens ‘Retina Displays’ and the new laptop model (surprise) the Macbook Pro with Retina Display. If history is any guide, Apple will expand it across their product line over the next year or so and the PC market will follow. A few years out and most new computers will have the same high resolution screens as Apple’s new laptop.

My expectation is that over the next 6-12 months, our industry will develop a series of best practices on how to design websites around higher resolution images without leaving those with current displays behind. I suspect a lot of the industry will wait to adopt them: “hey, the guy paying my bills doesn’t have one yet, why should I do any extra work?” Which is exactly the wrong approach. It’s better to do it right now.