GOV.UK is getting a "brand refresh" on 25 June, with updates to the logo, header bar (changing from black to blue) and footer (a black crown added to the top)

The GOV.UK Design System website shows the old header by default, but there's a link near the top of https://design-system.service.gov.uk/components/header/ to see the new version.

I've put up an example of how full pages will look here: https://govuk-vue.github.io/govuk-vue-minimal-example/

https://i.redd.it/nptb7il9yb7f1.png

Posted by matteason

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44 Comments

  1. John_Williams_1977 on

    I couldn’t care less.

    Oh wait, money went to a consultant for this. Boo!

  2. Kryptonite_Pyro on

    Wouldn’t this be considered showing some political bias? Conservative blue and all that…

  3. I wonder how many millions those minor changes cost and which politician’s friend’s company got the cash?

  4. 2point4children on

    Note to the government. Changing your logo will not make the public like you

  5. Photolunatic on

    `Yep. We moved the dot. That was a great deal at 3 zylion. Kudos to our wonderful tax payers. Please do not mind that this contract was allocated to a friend company that we just set up for this gig.`

  6. I must say. The website has improved so much over the years. You can tell care has gone into every decision made.

  7. One_Possibility9574 on

    Gov.uk will have a team of ux designers who would have designed something similar but no the senior leaders would have gone to a contractor at one of the big four to do a ‘better’ job

  8. FlabbyShabby on

    I am waiting for their Self-Service portal with the url – GO.VUK/YOURSELF

  9. FatYorkshireLad on

    I approve of more interpunct use, that’s true British patriotism. I sneak them in at work, the alt code is alt+0183.

  10. AndAnotherThingHere on

    I really get annoyed when organisations get conned by consultants, or sometimes a new management team, to replace a perfectly acceptable logo. What a waste of our money.

  11. Why do they need a new logo?

    This will just look like a scam to the millions that don’t know it’s the new logo

    Yeah money well spent again.

  12. SeaSaltSprayer on

    I like it. I suspect it’s getting ready for a digital ID / wallet branding consistency

  13. For those asking about consultants, cost etc:

    The contract was awarded to an agency called M+C Saatchi. It’s being implemented on GOV.UK by GDS (part of the government) but the agency were responsible for the design. Total contract value at least £300k

    https://www.contractsfinder.service.gov.uk/notice/a37d9540-e59c-41b0-8a6b-383e4e1aa442?origin=SearchResults&p=1

    https://www.contractsfinder.service.gov.uk/notice/da59e9bc-bbb6-4316-ab97-cf83ddc3276d?origin=SearchResults&p=1

  14. Dependent-Loss-4080 on

    Apparently nobody realised that the dot is meant to be the . in [gov.uk](http://gov.uk), and that it’s meant to look like a full stop as you type it in a website not a circle

  15. SojournerInThisVale on

    I wonder how much was paid for this?

    I remember when the local council I worked at did this. They went from one generic logo to another despite having a beautiful coat of arms which they could have freely used

  16. So, we’ve moved the . To the middle for some weird reason •, and made it cyan. Someone got paid far too much to mess around without something that was completely fine?

  17. HungryMuffin64 on

    Personal opinion, but I prefer it as it currently is. Why even do a redesign in the first place? It was already looking professional and correct, but of course more money has to be wasted on something irrelevant.

  18. Lumpy-Valuable-8050 on

    Disgusting. The black style made it look more serious idk i am just waffling tbh

  19. £300k and no one knows how to optically align curved letters on the base or ascender line?!

  20. ChickenPijja on

    Are there not still some elements of the old direct.gov.uk site that still exist if you go to certain functionality? I’m sure that there’s something like paying for car tax/declaring sorn or something like that, isn’t it more important to get all services up to the 2010’s standard before tweaking the current logo & theme?

  21. Bravil_Breadless on

    Government web design is so absolutely terrible that they really need this

  22. gov.uk is a great set of sites, literally used as a template by other countries and by business … but this is still a waste of taxpayer money, it wasn’t looking dated or past its best and didn’t need a rebrand.

  23. Who-Goes-When on

    Ahh, excellent, very Tory, seems fitting given we’ve had Tory rule none stop since 2010.

  24. DevilsAdvocate1662 on

    Urgh, as someone with a fuck ton of marketing experience, This rages me, I bet some ad agency got paid thousands for this

  25. ThoseThingsAreWeird on

    Oh nice, they use Vue! Is that new for the brand refresh, or have they always used it?

  26. Routine-Aerie-6361 on

    I don’t care what they do, gov.uk is beautiful and can do no wrong in my eyes.

  27. Greedy-Mechanic-4932 on

    I don’t get it.

    The whole point of the logo was to demonstrate it was [gov.uk](http://gov.uk) not gov·uk – which looks more like a shitly made hyphen.

    And lets overlook the fact that said dot doesn’t meet accessibility standards, eh?

    They’d have been better keeping the black, and using a single coloured line underneath it dependent on the department you’d landed on. They could have still increased the logo size by… *checks notes*… 10 pixels…

  28. From just a design practicality POV, i liked that the old logo read “gov dot uk” ie the name of the website

  29. The green dot makes me think of the microphone/video indicator on iOS

    Ie the message is the government is always watching ….

  30. LordOfHamy000 on

    What an excellent waste of X many millions, just to confuse everyone for a couple of years as people use a pointlessly changed service.

  31. Livid-Indication-793 on

    I want to get paid whatever the guy who did this got paid to move the dot back when they realised it looks ridiculous

  32. I love it. The fact that the UK has a federal design system is awesome, but the old one with the desaturated blue was effective, but I think a bit lifeless – changing times, a bolder, more dynamic front would be good. I love the punchy blue while maintaining most of its old useability and UX, important to keep things familiar if you are serving everyone.

    Overall, great!

  33. BritanniaGlory on

    Terrible logo. Why put the dot there? It’s confusing for non tech savvy people, looks like a divider.

  34. Can’t even post a logo on this sub without people finding infinite things to moan about lmao