A single, shared collection of reusable design pieces — colors, fonts, buttons, spacing rules and the guidelines for using them — that keeps everything a company makes looking and working the same way. It is the master rulebook and parts kit for building products and marketing.
Synonyms
- design language system
- product design system
Related terms
In plain words
- the shared rulebook and parts kit for how everything should look
- one place that defines all the buttons, colors and fonts
Usage example
The team built a design system so every app screen used the same buttons and colors without guessing.
Don't confuse with…
- style guideA style guide documents the rules; a design system also ships the actual working parts (code and components) you build with.
- component libraryA component library is just the reusable UI pieces; a design system wraps those pieces with tokens, guidelines and principles.
Categories
- Design systems