24 ways

What 24 ways does

24 ways is a free annual online publication that operates as an advent calendar for web designers, frontend developers, and web standards practitioners. Since 2005, it has published 24 daily in-depth tutorial articles each December covering topics organized under Code, Design, UX, Content, Business, and Process categories. The publication is founded and operated by Drew McLellan from Bristol, England, with articles contributed by a rotating roster of industry practitioners — including recognized web standards figures such as Eric Meyer, Rachel Andrew, Andy Clarke, and Chris Mills — who are credited as named authors on each piece.

The site runs on a standard web publishing stack: Perch Runway CMS (a platform for which McLellan himself is the lead developer), HTML, CSS, and JavaScript, with a Puppeteer-based pipeline that programmatically generates social sharing images by rendering CMS pages and optimizing them with imagemin and pngquant. Content is delivered exclusively through the website at 24ways.org, with no registration or paywall, and is distributed organically via an established Twitter account (@24ways), an RSS feed (Feedburner), a GitHub repository, and per-author amplification across personal networks and blogs.

24 ways operates as a personal, community-driven project with no disclosed institutional investment, no formal headcount beyond the founder-operator, and no commercial sales motion. Revenue, if any, is derived from sponsorships and advertising — primarily Perch-related promotions embedded within article pages. The site's reach spans 24+ countries with global English-speaking audiences. In 2019, McLellan indicated on the closing article that 2019 might be the final season, though the site has continued to operate with copyright extending to 2026.

Name

24 ways

Legal name

24 ways

Website

https://24ways.org

Company type

Private

Founded year

2005

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

51–100 employees

Short description

24 ways is a free annual web publication that publishes 24 daily articles on web design and development each December. Founded in 2005 and run from Bristol by Drew McLellan, it serves web designers, frontend developers, and web standards professionals globally.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

GTM type

B2C

Offering type

Digital Commerce or Content

Cost components

Personnel, Technology or R&D, Marketing or Sales, Operations

Revenue model

1. Free Content Publication: The site publishes all content freely without a paywall or subscription model. Revenue is not explicitly disclosed but appears to be supported through sponsorships and advertising from related industry tools and services.

Go-to-market motion1 record

Distribution channels1 record

Marketing channels4 records

Core offering

24 ways is an annual online advent calendar that publishes 24 free web design and development articles each December, written by guest expert contributors for the web professional community. The site maintains a searchable cumulative archive of every article published since its inception, spanning topics from HTML and CSS to JavaScript, accessibility, performance, typography, and design workflows.

Product overview

24 ways is a free annual educational publication for web design and development professionals. It operates as a seasonal advent calendar, publishing one in-depth tutorial article per day for 24 days each December. The content covers diverse web development topics organized under categories including Code, Design, UX, Content, Business, and Process. Articles are authored by industry experts and cover practical techniques, best practices, and emerging web technologies.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Products and services

• 24 Ways Annual Advent Calendar

Segments1 record

Ideal customer profiles1 record

Technology focussed No

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

Feature2 records

Scale indicators2 records

Recent moves4 records

Expansion highlights2 records

Direct peers

• Smashing Magazine: Long-running web design and development publication offering articles, tutorials, books, and conferences for the same web professional audience. Operates a much larger commercial model including paid books, conferences, and membership, but serves the same reader base with overlapping editorial categories (CSS, UX, accessibility).
• Codrops: Web design and development tutorial publication focused on creative CSS, JavaScript, and UI techniques. Targets the same web designer and developer audience with tutorial-style articles covering modern frontend techniques.
• CSS-Tricks: Web design and frontend development publication covering CSS, JavaScript, and frontend techniques for the same practitioner audience. Now part of the DigitalOcean family, but historically operated as a similar community-driven, ad-supported content model.
• Web Designer Depot: Web design and development blog publishing articles, tutorials, and resources for designers and developers. Comparable audience, format, and free-content distribution model, though operated as a more commercially structured publication.
• A List Apart: Foundational web design and development publication with a similar standards-focused editorial voice and contributor-driven model. Highly comparable in subject matter, audience (web designers/developers), and essay-style long-form format.
• CSS Weekly: Curated weekly newsletter and resource hub for CSS and frontend web professionals. Serves the same audience with a complementary email-based format rather than seasonal long-form articles.

Broad incumbents

• SitePoint: Larger, commercially operated web development education platform offering articles, books, and courses. Covers similar topics to 24 ways (HTML, CSS, JavaScript, design) but operates at significantly greater scale with paid products alongside free content.
• Tuts+ (Envato Tuts+): Large-scale tutorial and course platform covering web design, development, and adjacent creative skills. Operates a paid-membership model with broader scope and higher publishing cadence than 24 ways.

Emerging players

• frontendmasters.com: Frontend engineering education platform offering video courses from recognized industry experts — many of whom overlap with 24 ways' contributor roster. Adjacent rather than directly competing, but addresses the same 'staying current with web standards' pain point through a paid video format.

Others

• Perch CMS: Content management system developed by 24 ways founder Drew McLellan. Not a content peer, but a strategic relationship — Perch Runway powers 24 ways, is promoted within articles as a sponsor, and reflects the founder's overlapping commercial interests.

Market position

Strengths3 records

Weaknesses4 records

Competitive moat4 records

Key risks5 records

Key highlights6 records

Customer concentration

• Xx.com/24ways
• GitHubgithub.com/24ways
• Facebookfacebook.com/24ways

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Profiles1 record

Funding overview

Funding rounds

Investors

Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

M&A

Investments

M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

Frequently asked questions about 24 ways