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Benefits of using the Design System

The MoJ Design System helps teams to design, build and launch digital services that are accessible, consistent and user-led.

Overview

The Design System is an ecosystem of components, patterns and pages. These building blocks are the reusable, repeatable parts of a service.

The site also hosts common standards and principles. These include the content style guide and guidance on designing ethical services.

There are 4 main benefits of using the MoJ Design System:

1. Get updates to services and prototypes

MoJ Design System building blocks are centrally managed and updated. This means that when you apply the latest version of the Design System, every instance of a building block (in Figma, a coded prototype or live service) is updated.

Changes to the MoJ and GOV.UK Design Systems are made to:

  • 3 Figma Kits, which then update the attached components in Figma prototypes
  • MoJ Frontend, which then update coded prototypes and live services

Read more about how Figma prototypes are updated and about setting up coded prototypes.

2. Make services more consistent

When services are consistent it makes them easier to use. This is particularly useful for staff using multiple services each day.

The components, patterns and pages in the MoJ Design System offer a consistent and tested user experience. The content style guide also helps with this, by ensuring that terminology is the same across different services.

3. Improve efficiency

Using the MoJ Design System can reduce the amount of time teams spend building services. Building blocks help with common tasks, such as:

  • entering data
  • displaying notifications
  • searching and filtering
  • showing the status of something

This can lead to faster design ideation, prototyping, collaboration and development. It can also reduce the time you spend:

  • accessibility testing
  • user testing
  • explaining your choices in service assessments
  • fixing design and technical debt

This frees up teams to focus on unique and complex problems.

4. Get multidisciplinary input

A building block with an ‘official’ status has been worked on by a central, multidisciplinary team. This is a content designer, interaction designer, frontend developer and accessibility specialist.

You can expect the building blocks to be thoroughly and clearly documented, with the consistent visual style of GOV.UK, an interaction standard and code semantics.

How to help develop the Design System

The MoJ Design System is built on input from the community of users in the MoJ. You can help it grow by: