Web Directions Year round learning for product, design and engineering professionals

Front-end development has long been about much more than just aesthetics, though the engineering aspects of the front end are still often undervalued. But as we know, front end development has evolved into a critical engineering discipline essential to performance, security, scalability, and of course user outcomes.

Web Directions Code 2025 is your team’s once-a-year opportunity to explore the sophisticated, complex, and essential role of the modern front end, to gain a sense of perspective on the current state of play of key technologies and practices, and hone the intuitions essential to your professional development. Whatever framework and stack you use, Code focuses on the core enabling technologies and practices they are all built on top of.

For two decades Web Directions has had a laser-like focus on what we believe are the critical trends in technology and practice front end teams need to be across. Once again in 2025, we’ve curated a lineup that we’re really proud of and excited about, that tackles the vital themes defining front-end engineering today:

Robust, Sustainable Architecture

• Fershad Irani (Green Web Foundation) explores grid-aware websites aligning dynamically with renewable energy, saving organisations money and reducing their environmental impact.
• Kritiketan Sharma (Shine Solutions) introduces the increasingly popular local-first architecture, for seamless offline and online collaboration, that also reduces costs and complexity, improves performance, brings privacy benefits for users, and more.

Advanced JavaScript & CSS Engineering

• Julian Burr (Askable) demystifies signals and their transformative role in JavaScript reactivity.
• Mandy Michael (Octopus Deploy) addresses performance optimization through CSS and font loading techniques.
• Zach Jensz explores the latest additions to JavaScript’s Map and Set objects, designed to simplify data manipulation and enhance developer productivity.
• Stephanie Eckles (Adobe) bridges modern CSS techniques with web component architectures.

AI and the Future of Front-End Development

• Ryan Seddon (Culture Amp) examines browser-based LLMs and machine learning and the future of AI-driven web applications.
• Yas Adel Mehraban outlines how generative AI can enhance code quality, security, and testing practices.
• Maia Miller investigates how AI-driven approaches can advance digital accessibility.
• Geoffrey Huntley observes we’re now entering a new phase: programming with large language models and considers how to navigate the emotional and professional turbulence that follows.
  

Security, Observability, and Quality Assurance

• David Bell shares best practices in observability with OpenTelemetry, making sense of complex production issues.
• Janna Malikova provides insights on integrating security seamlessly into your development workflow.
• Erin Zimmer (Atlassian) demonstrates practical, scalable solutions to embedding accessibility in large-scale applications.

Modern HTML and Progressive Enhancement

• Harrison Broadbent (HotDoc) showcases powerful interactive experiences achievable without JavaScript dependencies.
• Siobhan Willoughby (Josephmark) provocatively challenges the dominance of React, advocating for progressive enhancement in modern front-end practices.

Performance Optimisation and Scalability

• David Johnston (Coles) helps us understand the intricacies of browser behaviors in loading resources like HTML, CSS, and JS, highlighting common pitfalls like cache invalidation cascades.
• Jake Lane (Atlassian) demonstrates conditional bundling techniques to optimize performance, reduce unnecessary code execution, and enhance observability in codebase management.
• Sarath Sai Raju Galavalli (EasyGo) explores best practices in scaling large codebases through efficient monorepo strategies without compromising maintainability.

As I hope you can agree, this is a broad, deep, grown-up program that will deliver incredible value for everyone who attends.

So join us in Melbourne, June 12–13, for a unique software engineering conference designed explicitly with the modern front-end engineer in mind. It’s your chance to learn, network, and shape the future of your career.

View the full program and register now