How to Design A Full-Bleed Vs Limited-Width Email Layout Design

How do you achieve a full-bleed email layout design? How about if you want to instead limit the width of your layout for a more boxed appearance? These are two questions email designers get asked a ton. Let's take a look at a few examples — our inbox is full of emails with both types of designs!

Full-bleed versus limited-width layout explained

A full-bleed layout of your email has an edge-to-edge appearance and it extends to the full width of your screen, typically more noticeable on desktop and tablets. A full-bleed layout is sometimes also referred to as full-width or edge-to-edge. On the other hand, a limited-width layout has your content boxed in within your email message. Intuitively, we sometimes call this a boxed layout, since the width of your email remains fixed and doesn't stretch out.

Full-bleed email layout examples

Aperture, Holstee, and LitHub all use full-width email designs, with content stretching edge-to-edge across the message.

Limited-width email layout examples

By comparison, boxed emails use two contrasting colors, one color behind the content and one around the content. Light gray is a popular choice for background color. The boxed look narrows readers' eyes on the column of content, potentially improving focus and legibility. Crate & Barrel, Maple, and MOO are good examples of this limited-width approach.

Which email layout is better?

That's a trick question. Both can be effective, and the best way to find out if your audience responds more or less to a particular style is to run A/B tests on your email design. Whichever method you choose, your design should always be mobile responsive.

How to create a full-bleed email design

To create a full-bleed header, edit the row and content background color settings. The row background color is the color of the content structure from edge to edge, while the content background color is the background color behind the center column of email content. For the full-bleed look, select the row background color of your choice and leave the content background set to transparent. The row background color can also be changed from one part of your email to the next, and you can adjust your content area width and the background color for the entire email at any point as you design.

How to create a boxed email design

Changing your email from a full-bleed layout to a boxed one is simple. Select the header row, then change the content background from transparent to white. To complete the boxed look, update the header font color and match the background color in subsequent rows to the first. If you want to position a white logo against a dark background, create a new content row for just the logo and make the row background dark — this adds to the box-effect on the body of the content.

Design your next email design layout

So, what do you think? Do you prefer one layout to the other? The good news is that switching from one layout to the other couldn't be easier with a drag-and-drop email editor.