The U.S. Web Design System (USWDS) is a toolkit of principles, guidance, and code that makes it easier to build accessible, mobile-friendly, legally compliant government websites.
There are many ways to build a website or service. USWDS has been designed to deliver unique benefits to government teams, such as compliance from the start, proven design solutions that users expect, team alignment and common goals, mission focus, a cross-functional design system community, and effective stewardship of public resources.
A broader view is primarily described on the USWDS About page, which contains the USWDS mission, vision, polestar, and a brief history. See also USWDS key benefits, product values, design principles, and engineering values.
USWDS governance supports and strengthens these core principles, code, and guidance.
Community principles and processes can be found in our COMMUNITY.md file in this repository
See COMMUNITY.md
Accessibility standards will follow the guidelines from USWDS: https://designsystem.digital.gov/ and adhere to specifications from GSA: https://www.gsa.gov/website-information/accessibility-statement. Currently, that means meeting WCAG 2.1 AA at a minimum, accurately publishing our accessibility tests on each component page, and compiling all component status tests. This encompasses:
- Section 508 compliance
- 21st Century Integrated Digital Experience Act (IDEA) compliance
As with other Tier3 Open Source Community Projects, USWDS uses a 'co-planning' approach of community-informed roadmapping.
The COMMUNITY.md file outlines how USWDS Contributor (committer) and USWDS Maintainer privileges are distributed and managed.
CONTRIBUTING.md defines the context, conditions, and processes by which contributions to the project are made.
Bug reports should be made through GitHub Issues using the bug report issue template.
Feature requests should be made through GitHub Issues using the feature request issue template.
You can provide feedback through uswds@gsa.gov or GitHub Issues.
Active work can be tracked by the public through the USWDS product roadmap) and repo project boards. <--! The project page will communicate planned milestones and labels on GitHub issues.-->