Design systems are all the rage these days, and for a good reason. They empower teams to create and maintain large-scale projects efficiently, enabling faster development, greater consistency, and improved collaboration. However, design systems aren’t one-size-fits-all. Instead, they can be tailored to suit the different needs of various projects, teams, and organizations. Understanding the components and tools of design systems can help you get started, customize your approach, and navigate your system as time passes. One of the most common challenges teams face when developing a design system is distinguishing it from a style guide. Both share similarities and can even coexist within a project. They have different functions, and solving for them can alleviate confusion when starting your design system.  This article will help you understand the key differences between a design system and a style guide. You'll find that even though they differ, a design system and a style guide are valuable assets for any project, and design system tools can help you create both efficiently.

One important asset to consider is Ion’s design-to-code tool. These valuable design system tools helps teams automatically convert their design files into code, helping them achieve their objectives faster and with greater accuracy. It's a great place to start if you want to create a customized, easy-to-navigate design system.

What is a Design System?

A design system is a set of standards to manage and scale design. It includes reusable components, design principles, and guidelines to achieve consistency and efficiency across a company's digital products.

Design systems streamline workflow, enhance collaboration, and maintain brand identity. Design teams create them for scalable and cohesive digital experiences. Design systems provide consistent styling and interaction guidelines for teams. For example, a design system might have:

• Standard elements to use in interfaces. It includes input boxes, dropdown lists, and menu structures. A list of approved brand colors and fonts. It also guides us on when to use them. Standard buttons and other interactive affordances. 
• Interaction guidelines. The system includes decisions like using a slide-out panel. It also determines if expanding or pinching should resize images. A flexible grid system lays out screens consistently. It comprises things like the styling of cards or content separators.
• Rules about the placement of particular objects. For example, always keep the login/log out and profile icons in the top-right corner of the desktop.
• Lists of icons and what they mean. Content guidelines that specify how and when to use content. For example, decide if all menu items should be verbs or nouns. Or determine if the company refers to the user in the first or second person.
• Rules about when to use icons and when to use text as labels.
• Visual guidelines for where certain types of call-to-action buttons should be.
• Rules about using things like auto-save vs explicit save/cancel buttons. 

There are many other guidelines that a design system might have. Google's Material Design is an example of a consistent design system. It consists of different types of elements and guidance on when and how to use each element. 

The Versatility and Evolution of Design Systems

Design systems extend beyond visually driven tools; they apply to voice-controlled systems, too. These systems focus on content and behavior. They provide different but equally valuable features. Effective design systems evolve with time. They adapt as the needs of a product or product suite change.

Ideally, elements of a design system are code pieces developers can use in interfaces. This helps build features or prototypes faster. In other cases, they are design elements in prototyping tools for designers to reuse.

What is a Style Guide?

A style guide is a document that contains design guidelines for each repeatedly used design element, such as visual identity elements, icons, interface components, and their states, headings, etc. 

Style guides are often developed after the high-fidelity wireframes phase so that you can see what elements you’ll need, design them, and then refactor them into a style guide and later into a design system. If you want to learn more about the phases, check out this page on our design process.

Style Guides vs. Design Systems: What’s the Difference?

As mentioned before, a style guide is a part of the design system or its early version. In layman’s terms, style guides are a compilation of all design elements, while a design system is built on top of the style guide by describing the relationships among the elements and their use cases.

When Should You Create a Style Guide?

There are different approaches to when you should create a style guide. Atomic design suggests that you should create all elements first and then build your products from these blocks. 

You could ignore unifying the design elements if you aim to validate the product or design idea.

The Goal of a Brand Style Guide

A brand style guide makes it easier for your brand to be consistent and recognizable, regardless of whether the content creation occurs internally or externally. You can share your brand style guide with external:

• Partners
• Press
• Agencies

They know how you want to be represented in the market. The best brand guidelines are short, to the point, and readily accessible via your press page on your company’s website so that changes can be made in real-time.

What to Include in a Brand Style Guide

The main goal of a brand style guide is to be shared with others. Taking time to create one means ensuring your brand image stays consistent– even when handled by external parties.A brand style guide should be a concise, easy-to-read digital document. It begins with the brand's mission statement and defines the brand's look and feel as well as its tone of voice. A brand style guide usually includes the following: 

• The tone of voice: How the brand uses language and emotion, including:some text
  • Grammar
  • Abbreviations
  • Acronyms

• Typography: Font styles, sizes, and spacing 
• Logos: Full-resolution logos, secondary logos, and icons for download 
• Color palette: Primary and secondary colors with HEX, RGB, CMYK, and Pantone codes 
• Imagery: Photos, illustrations, and artwork 

Usage examples

An example of a well-known brand with an excellent brand style guide is Starbucks. They extend their brand style guide further than just core elements, including how seasonality affects the look and feel of their brand. 

Ion: Bridging Design and Development with Seamless Design-to-Code Integration

Ion transforms your Figma designs into production-ready code perfectly aligned with your existing codebase and business needs. Our platform bridges the gap between design and development by automatically generating functional code that matches your: 

• Specific component
• Styles
• Design system

We've created a unique solution that empowers non-technical team members to implement visual changes without engineering intervention. Our tool understands your CI/CD pipelines, testing requirements, and component architecture, ensuring that generated code fits seamlessly into your workflow. 

Whether you're updating design elements or creating new features, Ion helps unlock engineering resources by letting designers and product teams contribute directly to the codebase in a safe, controlled way. Start building your application for free today with our design-to-code tool.

Related Reading

• Design System Documentation
• Design Handoff

Design System vs Style Guide, What's The Key Differences?

A style guide is like the instruction manual for your brand’s personality. It helps anyone creating content or materials for your brand, whether internal team members or external collaborators understand the dos and don’ts of representing your brand identity.

Here’s what a style guide typically covers:

• The tone of Voice: How your brand “speaks.” Are you formal, playful, conversational, or authoritative? It outlines your language and the vibe you want your messaging to convey.
• Visual Identity: Details like your color palette (including specific HEX codes), typography (what fonts to use and when), and logo usage (placement, size, and variations).
• Guidelines for Content Creators: Examples of what to do and avoid when designing, writing, or crafting anything for your brand.
  

The beauty of a style guide is how it supports a wide range of creatives. Here are some examples:

• Content Writers: Need to know whether your brand uses American or British spelling? How formal or casual should the tone be? The style guide has the answers.
• Designers: Wondering which shade of blue to use for an ad campaign? Or how much space should surround your logo? The style guide spells it out.
• Influencers and Partners: Working on social media posts or sponsored content? The guide ensures their visuals and messaging align with your brand’s standards.
  

A clear, concise style guide saves time and reduces back-and-forth because it answers the most common questions upfront. It ensures consistency, crucial for building trust and recognition with your audience.

Design Systems: The Engine for Digital Experiences

While a style guide is about what your brand looks and sounds like, a design system takes it further. It’s about how your brand functions, particularly in the digital space. Design systems are built for UX/UI designers and developers, providing them with the tools and resources to create consistent, user-friendly digital experiences.

Here’s what makes a design system tick:

• Reusable Components: These are the building blocks of digital design, like buttons, navigation bars, or input fields. Developers can use these pre-made components to save time and ensure consistency.
• Code Snippets: Instead of reinventing the wheel, developers can grab ready-to-use code that aligns with the design system, speeding up the development process.
• Interaction Guidelines: These rules cover how elements behave—for example, what happens when you hover over a button or how animations should flow.
• Design Principles: High-level concepts like accessibility standards, usability, and overall user experience philosophy. 

A design system is the ultimate resource for ensuring your website, app, or other digital product feels cohesive. For instance:

• Web Developers: Can quickly pull from the system to add features like drop-down menus or buttons, knowing they’ll match the rest of the site.
• App Designers: Use the system to ensure their new app screens align with the brand’s established look and feel.
• UX Teams: Reference the design system for guidelines on creating intuitive and consistent user experiences across platforms. 

The Overlap: How They Complement Each Other

A design system often includes the style guide as one of its components. While the style guide provides the visual and branding rules, the design system builds on that foundation to address the technical and functional aspects of bringing those rules to life.

A style guide is your brand’s recipe book. It tells you the ingredients (brand colors, fonts, tone of voice) and the method (how to use them to stay on-brand). A design system is your fully stocked kitchen. It’s where those ingredients are stored, prepped, and ready to be used in creative ways to build cohesive, functional designs. When these two resources work together, you get the best of both worlds: 

• Consistency Across Channels: From social media posts to app interfaces, your brand looks and feels cohesive. 
• Faster Workflows: Designers and developers spend less time asking questions and more time creating, thanks to clear guidelines and reusable assets. 
• Scalability: As your brand grows, a solid style guide and design system ensures that new projects and teams stay aligned with your core identity. 

Evolution and Maintenance

Design systems are designed to evolve organically, adapting to the changing needs of projects and products. They require ongoing maintenance and iteration to remain relevant and effective. While essential for maintaining visual consistency, style guides are relatively static documents requiring less frequent updates and revisions. 

Why You May Need Both

You might wonder, “Do I need a style guide and a design system?” The answer is yes, especially if you want your brand to thrive across different platforms and mediums.

A style guide ensures your brand messaging is on point and visually consistent. It’s ideal for writers, designers, and external partners who need a quick reference. A design system, on the other hand, supports your digital product teams by providing the resources and frameworks needed to build functional, user-friendly designs.

The style guide defines your brand’s personality, while the design system ensures that personality shines through every digital interaction. They’re the secret to a strong, consistent, and scalable brand identity.

Related Reading

• Design System Governance
  
• What is a Design System
• Design System vs Component Library

When to Create a Design System vs Style Guide

Building a design system can give your digital team a clear roadmap for creating and maintaining a consistent visual language for your brand’s assets. The design system will help reduce miscommunication, misinterpretation, and mistakes. It will also make designing and updating visual interfaces easier and faster.

It’s important to note that design systems take much work to build and maintain. Before developing one for your brand, consider whether it’s worthwhile. If you’re designing a website for a personal project, for a small business, or with static content that likely won’t change or expand much, then a design system likely won’t benefit you. 

Why You Should Create a Style Guide Right Away 

Unless you’re building a small, personal, and non-commercial website, there’s no good reason not to create a style guide. It lets you document the most critical design decisions about your brand’s visual identity. Even if you work alone, you’ll find it valuable to have all of that information in one place.

A style guide is a great resource to develop and share with clients. Whether or not you continue working for them after launching their website or app, the style guide can ensure that your initial design decisions are upheld. When changes need to be made, the document can be updated so that everyone who uses it in the future remains on the same page. 

Related Reading

• Benefits of a Design System
• Best Design Systems
• How to Create a Design System

Start Building Your Application for Free Today

Ion is a design system tool automatically converts Figma designs into production-ready code. The tool generates functional code that matches your specific:

• Components
• Styles
• Design system

This unique solution empowers non-technical team members to implement visual changes without engineering intervention, allowing designers to update design elements and create new features safely and efficiently. 

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