The GOV.UK Design System is for everyone, with a strong community sitting behind it. It brings together the latest research, design and development from across government to make sure it’s representative and relevant for its users.
You can discuss the existing styles, components and patterns in the Design System, or ones being developed, by commenting on issues in the community backlog. Alternatively, you can email govuk-design-system-support@digital.cabinet-office.gov.uk.
For example, you can:
- ask questions about a style, component or pattern
- answer questions from other contributors
- share examples or demos of a component or pattern
- share research relating to a style, component or pattern
Anyone can propose a new component or pattern for the GOV.UK Design System.
To be successful, proposals need to show that the component or pattern being suggested would be useful and unique.
Follow 3 steps to propose a component or pattern for the Design System.
Check if someone else has already suggested your idea or something similar on the community backlog.
If your idea is on the backlog and marked as proposed, follow the link and comment on the issue. Say you need the component or pattern and share any examples or evidence you have to support the proposal.
If it’s marked to-do and you would like to work on it, read how to develop a components or pattern.
If your idea is not on the backlog, raise an issue using the template. A member of the Design System team will get in touch to discuss your proposal.
At this stage, you just need to present your idea and evidence of the user needs. You can include screenshots or links to versions of the component or pattern in use, but avoid spending time working on a specific design or writing code.
The Design System team will help you prepare your proposal and share it with the Design System working group to review.
When your proposal is ready, the Design System team will send it to the working group one week before their next monthly meeting.
At the meeting, the working group will review your proposal and decide if it is useful and unique. This review helps people avoid spending time and effort on something that’s not needed.
After the meeting, the Design System team will let you know the decision and recommendations, if there are any.
If the working group agrees your proposal is useful and unique, the Design System team will mark it as to-do on the community backlog.
At this point, you can either start to develop the component or pattern or leave it for someone else to work on.
After you’ve emailed them, a member of the Design System team will get in touch to arrange a kick-off meeting.
During the meeting, the team will help you to:
- agree the scope of your contribution
- plan what design, content, code and guidance needs working on
- agree timings
- discuss any support you might need
- identify a contact for you to work with in the Design System team
If you’re happy to go ahead, the team will assign you to the issue as a contributor.
While you’re working on your contribution, the Design System team will arrange a weekly catch up to find out how you’re getting on and if you need any help.
Find examples of the component or pattern already in use. The best way to do this is to ask the government design community. Use the Design Slack channel and the digital service designers mailing list.
Examples and research from government services are usually most relevant. But look at how other organisations solve the problem too.
Involve people from the government design community in any work you’re doing. This makes it less likely that you’ll spend time doing work or research that’s already been done.
By finding people who are working on similar solutions, you can benefit from progress they’ve made and relevant research they’ve done.
Once you have collected some examples and research findings, you should start designing a specific implementation of the component or pattern to research with.
Ideally you’ll research as part of an actual service, but it’s possible to test using prototypes as long as they are realistic. Work with your own team or find a team to work with through the design community.
Once you have researched the component or pattern and shown it works for users, the Design System working group will review it.
All components and patterns must meet the contribution criteria before they can be published. The Design System working group will use the criteria to review your contribution.
To arrange a review, tell the Design System team your contribution is ready. The team will check your work before letting the working group know it’s ready to review.
The working group will vote if it can be published:
- as it is with no recommendations
- as it is with some recommendations to consider when possible
- only after you have addressed certain recommendations
The Design System team will invite you to meet with them and discuss the decision.
During the meeting, you’ll be able to ask questions, hear recommendations and talk through any queries or concerns.
If the working group recommended some changes to make before publishing, the Design System team will help you work on them.
If the working group agree your contribution meets the criteria, the Design System team will help you get ready to publish. This includes organising any final checks or updates to the design, content, code and guidance.
Most new components and patterns will be published as experimental at first. The Design System team will remove the experimental status once research proves the component or pattern meets user needs. The research must be from different services and with different types of users.