TermCraft conventionFoundational
Design Debt
The mess that builds up when design decisions are rushed or never revisited.
Definition
Accumulated inconsistency and unresolved design decisions that make future design work slower and the product less coherent.
Craft convention. True because the industry converged on it. Breaking it costs familiarity, not correctness.
In plain language
The mess that builds up when design decisions are rushed or never revisited.
Example
Five button styles, three date formats and two words for the same object.
Continue from here
Each link says what the connection is, so you can tell a principle from an alternative from a thing people mix this up with.
Deeper reading
The full entry behind this definition.
- Design System AdoptionDesign system
- Consistency and StandardsHeuristic
Nearby in the Atlas
Adjacent territory, found through shared tags rather than a stated link.