Case study · Docusign · 2021–2026
A11ykit
Docusign’s accessibility annotation library for Figma: a shared language that helps product designers, content designers, and engineers make accessibility decisions together, before code.
- 200,000+accessibility fixes, before code
- 24teams using A11ykit
- 498annotations added by Docusign designers each week
- 20+Ink component accessibility specs
Data from one year of use, 2025–2026. In use since 2021.
Overview
Accessibility decisions used to get lost between design and engineering.
The problem
Designers weren’t sure what to specify. Engineers were left guessing at reading order, focus, and accessible names, and every team solved it a different way.
The goal
Give every team the same starting point. A11ykit favors progress over perfection: a shared language and a clear process that make accessibility part of everyday design work, long before code.
Impact
In one year, more than 200,000 A11ykit annotations shipped in Docusign products.
The numbers here cover just one year of a library that has been growing for more than five. Every one of those annotations was handed off to engineers through Figma, and teams across Docusign weave A11ykit deeply into how they work.
- 61% of all usage comes from one product team, the deepest adopter.
- 68,912 distinct places use Focus Order, the most-used annotation.
A11ykit gave product designers, content designers, and engineers a shared language and a clear process for accessibility decision-making across Docusign’s products.
A walkthrough in Figma
Video description
The video has no sound. It starts on A11ykit’s Getting Started page, with separate paths for designers and developers, then moves through the annotation library: landmarks and page titles, focus order, buttons, and ARIA. It picks the Inline Message component, opens its Component Annotation Blueprint, places numbered annotation markers on the design, and fills in ARIA and keyboard navigation details before zooming out to the fully annotated screen beside its blueprint.
What’s inside
A11ykit in Figma
14 annotation categories
ARIA, keyboard shortcuts, buttons, links, landmarks, page titles, focus order, headings, text alternatives, reading order, tables, fields, groupings, and notes.
14 component blueprints
Pre-annotated Ink design system components, like modals, comboboxes, tabs, sliders, and tooltips, so designers start from accessible patterns.
9 checklists
Control contrast, text contrast, focus order, reflow, semantics and structure, tables, navigation, forms, input interaction, and names, roles, states, and properties.
2 guide cards
Getting Started, and an accessibility project tracker that helps teams review annotations and track what’s left to do.
Releases
A11ykit 1.0 2021
A11ykit began at a Design for Inclusion Guild workshop. Out of dozens of project ideas, it was chosen as the one with the most impact that we could actually build, and the Design Systems team made it a real initiative.
Two Systems Designers built the first version: 12 annotations and nothing else. Then they handed it to me and other designers to maintain and grow. It felt like getting a gift. We piloted it with the Mobile team, where the first designer to use it was an intern, who championed it before it spread to other teams.
A11ykit 1.1 2022
An XD Designer found a gap: forms needed field and grouping annotations. They designed both on a branch as a guest contributor, and we published them in 1.1, bringing A11ykit to 14 annotations.
A11ykit 1.2 2023
I designed the kit’s first rebrand. We also researched where designers were getting stuck, then added checklists, project planners, and guides, so A11ykit became more than an annotation library.
A11ykit 1.3 May 2025
Built to make annotating Ink 1.5 components easier, with the Accessibility Team and the Ink team.
- 6 component blueprints: pre-annotated Modals, Inline Message, Slider, Table, Tabs, and Toast Message, launched with the Ink 1.5 documentation.
- A deeper rebrand: a new logo and brand colors.
- A reorganized library: annotations in their own focused menu, with blueprints, checklists, and guides in another.
A11ykit 1.4 October 2025
An update to streamline and simplify annotation for XD and engineering.
- 14 pre-annotated blueprints to start from.
- 7 streamlined annotation types, with selectable roles, states, and properties.
- 8 new components in the accessibility documentation for Ink on zeroheight.
The Accessibility and Design Systems teams worked together to automate key decisions through templates, tools, and documentation. That fall, A11ykit was featured in the Inclusive Design 24 talk Accessibility Annotations Around the World.
A11ykit 1.5 September 2026
1.5 added support for the A11ykit Annotation Wizard, a Figma plugin that guides designers through annotating step by step.
- 11 of 14 annotations improved: smarter defaults, richer properties, clearer guidance, and more flexible settings, including improved ARIA, new focus management, better buttons, new note types, and simpler table and field annotations.
- All 14 blueprints updated with the new annotations.