A design system is a collection of reusable components, guides, and standards that establishes consistency across digital products or services including websites and apps.
The main elements of a design system include:
- Style Guide – Contains branding guidelines for visual design like colour palettes, typography, iconography, etc. Provides visual cohesion.
- Component Library – Houses a catalogue of approved, coded UI components like buttons, navigation bars, form elements, etc. These can be reused and customized.
- Pattern Library – Documents common design patterns like page layouts, user flows, usage guidelines, that can be replicated across platforms.
- Code Framework – Provides the technical scaffolding to develop, document, and distribute reusable components.
- Voice & Tone Guide – Outlines the brand voice, tone, messaging, and terminology to unify language used.
- Accessibility Guidelines – Standards and best practices for accessible UI design to support diverse users.
The goal of a design system is to streamline workflows, boost efficiency, maintain consistency, and provide a single source of truth for teams across product, design, and engineering. This ultimately leads to better user experiences. Maintaining the system as products evolve is key to realizing these benefits long-term.
Design systems are valuable for any organization that creates digital products and services, but are especially beneficial for:
- Large companies with many product teams – Design systems enable consistency, efficiency and communication at scale across large dispersed teams working on different products.
- Companies with diverse product portfolios – For companies with many different products and brands like Google, design systems unify experiences across the ecosystem.
- Fast-growing start-ups – As start-ups scale quickly, design systems help them maintain quality and accelerate growth without fragmentation.
- Tech companies – The iterative nature of software development makes reusable components and patterns efficient ways to build high-quality digital products.
- Multinational corporations – Design systems ensure branding and UX consistency across international markets with distributed teams.
- Media and publishing – Standardizing design and components for publishing large volumes of content is made easier with design systems.
- E-commerce companies – In e-commerce, UI consistency and performance directly impact conversions, making design systems highly effective.
Any company focused on digital presence and customer experience can benefit from the consistency, efficiency and future-proofing provided by design systems. For large organizations especially, it becomes a necessity rather than a luxury.
When correctly implemented the return on investment (ROI) provided by Design Systems make them a great choice.
The ROI of design systems is multi-faceted. Companies report major efficiency gains, cost savings, improved agility and accessibility, stronger branding, and overall better product experiences. The upfront investment pays dividends in both quantitative and qualitative terms.
- Increased development efficiency – Companies like IBM, Starbucks, and Mailchimp have reported 50-75% reductions in design and development time after implementing a design system. Streamlined workflows and reuse of components reduces redundant work.
- Improved quality and consistency – Design systems enable brands like AT&T, Uber, and Google to deliver consistent, high-quality UX across products and platforms. Adherence to guidelines and reusable elements prevents bugs and fragmentation.
- Enhanced collaboration – Centralized documentation and shared vocabulary fosters better cross-functional communication between designers, developers, and product managers. Workflows are streamlined.
- Lower costs – Reduction in design and development efforts means savings on personnel and resource costs. One company saved an estimated $30 million in its first year of using a design system.
- Increased accessibility – Following established guidelines and properly coded components ensures accessibility is accounted for by default.
- Boosted product agility – Faster iteration on new features and products due to readily available design assets and components.
- Improved brand recognition – Consistent visual language and UX patterns across touchpoints improves brand perception and customer retention.
The ROI comes in both quantitative time and money saved, and better overall user experiences.
