ihlamury

intercom-ui-skills

Intercom's UI design system. Use when building interfaces inspired by Intercom's aesthetic - light mode, Inter font, 4px grid.

ihlamury 84 12 Updated 7mo ago

Resources

1
GitHub

Install

npx skillscat add ihlamury/design-skills/intercom-ui-skills

Install via the SkillsCat registry.

About this skill

We need to produce a 2-3 sentence plain-text summary, objective, factual, no marketing language, no superlatives, no calls to action. Must be natural prose, no bullet points, no headings, no markdown formatting. At most 60 words. Must not wrap answer in quotes. Provide only the summary text. We need to explain what the skill does, what problem it solves, when to use it. From description: Intercom's UI design system. Use when building interfaces inspired by Intercom's aesthetic - light mode, Inter font, 4px grid.

SKILL.md

Intercom UI Skills

Opinionated constraints for building Intercom-style interfaces with AI agents.

When to Apply

Reference these guidelines when:

  • Building light-mode interfaces
  • Creating Intercom-inspired design systems
  • Implementing UIs with Inter font and 4px grid

Colors

  • SHOULD use light backgrounds for primary surfaces
  • MUST use #FEFEFE as page background (surface-base)
  • MUST use #4F3FE6 for primary actions and focus states (accent)
  • SHOULD reduce color palette (currently 19 colors detected)
  • MUST maintain text contrast ratio of at least 4.5:1 for accessibility

Semantic Tokens

Token HEX RGB Usage
surface-base #FEFEFE rgb(254,254,254) Page background
surface-raised #110D0C rgb(17,13,12) Cards, modals, raised surfaces
surface-overlay #4F3FE6 rgb(79,63,230) Overlays, tooltips, dropdowns
text-primary #8492A8 rgb(132,146,168) Headings, body text
text-secondary #ABAAAB rgb(171,170,171) Secondary, muted text
text-tertiary #939393 rgb(147,147,147) Additional text
border-default #EAEBE7 rgb(234,235,231) Subtle borders, dividers
accent #4F3FE6 rgb(79,63,230) Primary actions, links, focus
success #278019 rgb(39,128,25) Success states, confirmations

Typography

  • MUST use Inter as primary font family
  • SHOULD use single font family for consistency
  • MUST use 46px / extra_bold for primary headings
  • MUST use 14px / 400 for body text
  • SHOULD reduce font weights (currently 6 detected)
  • MUST use text-balance for headings and text-pretty for body text
  • SHOULD use tabular-nums for numeric data
  • NEVER modify letter-spacing unless explicitly requested

Text Styles

Style Font Size Weight Color Count
heading-1 Inter 46px extra_bold #E1E0DF 1
text-26px Inter 26px semi_bold #DFE0E2 1
text-24px Inter 24px semi_bold #E7E6E5 1
text-18px Inter 18px 400 #848A92 1
text-16px Inter 16px 400 #A29E9D 1
text-16px Inter 16px 400 #827F7F 1
text-15px Inter 15px 400 #BABDC3 1
text-15px Inter 15px 400 #9B9BA1 1
text-15px Inter 15px 400 #818181 1
text-15px Inter 15px 400 #8F87E8 1

Typography Reference

Font Families:

  • Inter (used 72x)

Font Sizes: 6px, 7px, 8px, 9px, 10px, 11px, 12px, 13px, 14px, 15px, 16px, 18px, 24px, 26px, 46px

Spacing

  • MUST use 4px grid for spacing
  • SHOULD use spacing from scale: 1px, 2px, 3px, 4px, 5px, 6px, 7px, 8px
  • SHOULD use 5px as default gap between elements
  • NEVER use arbitrary spacing values (use design scale)
  • SHOULD maintain consistent padding within containers

Borders

  • MUST use border-radius from scale: 3px, 4px, 6px, 7px, 9px, 10px, 13px, 15px, 16px, 18px, 19px
  • SHOULD limit border widths to: 1px, 2px, 3px
  • SHOULD use 6px as default border-radius
  • NEVER use arbitrary border-radius values (use design scale)
  • SHOULD use subtle borders (1px) for element separation

Border Radius Reference

Scale: 3px, 4px, 6px, 7px, 9px, 10px, 13px, 15px, 16px, 18px, 19px

Layout

  • MUST design for 1920px base viewport width
  • SHOULD use consistent element widths: 9px, 8px, 6px, 4px, 20px
  • SHOULD maintain text-heavy layout with clear hierarchy
  • NEVER use h-screen, use h-dvh for full viewport height
  • MUST respect safe-area-inset for fixed elements
  • SHOULD use size-* for square elements instead of w-* + h-*

Detected Layout Patterns

  • Header: height: 42px
  • Header: height: 88px
  • Header: height: 53px

Components

Buttons

Variant Background Text Border Height Radius
Ghost transparent #8492A8 none - -

Interactive States

Focus

  • MUST use 2px outline with accent color (#4F3FE6)
  • MUST use 2px outline-offset
  • NEVER remove focus indicators

Hover

  • Buttons (primary): lighten background by 10%
  • Buttons (secondary): use #110D0C background
  • List items: use #110D0C background

Disabled

  • MUST use opacity: 0.5
  • MUST use cursor: not-allowed

Interaction

  • MUST use an AlertDialog for destructive or irreversible actions
  • SHOULD use structural skeletons for loading states
  • MUST show errors next to where the action happens
  • NEVER block paste in input or textarea elements
  • MUST add an aria-label to icon-only buttons

Animation

  • NEVER add animation unless it is explicitly requested
  • MUST animate only compositor props (transform, opacity)
  • NEVER animate layout properties (width, height, top, left, margin, padding)
  • SHOULD use ease-out on entrance animations
  • NEVER exceed 200ms for interaction feedback
  • SHOULD respect prefers-reduced-motion

Performance

  • NEVER animate large blur() or backdrop-filter surfaces
  • NEVER apply will-change outside an active animation
  • NEVER use useEffect for anything that can be expressed as render logic