A prototype is a draft version of a Web site. Prototypes allow you to explore your ideas before investing time and money into development.

A prototype can be anything from:

• A series of drawings on paper (called a low-fidelity prototype)
• A few images or pages that a user can click through
• A fully functioning Web site (called a high-fidelity prototype)

Prototypes can be built at any time but you should create them as early as possible.

You can start with a prototype of the home page and a few navigation pages to find out if the information architecture you planned will work for your site’s users. To learn more, see the article on how to define information architecture. You may also want to base your prototypes on the designs that you are creating by using Parallel Design.