2025 marks a turning point for government web projects: now all sites of state institutions and services must comply with the Design System of the French State (DSFR). Established for several years, this repository aims to harmonize the state's digital portals and projects, ensuring: optimal user experience, accessibility according to RGAA 4 standards and unified graphic identity.
At Be API, we were confronted with this evolution when the Army Health Service asked us to re-think their website factory. A key issue was ensuring compliance with the FRSD. Then the following problem arose: how to simplify the redesign while scrupulously respecting the standards of the reference, and adapt these constraints to the WordPress universe?
An opportunity that our experts have turned into an open source project, giving rise to the WP-DSFR : an open source WordPress theme, 100% compliant with DSFR, free and accessible, designed to effectively meet the requirements of the public sector. No need to start from scratch: everything is already integrated and optimized. All you have to do is focus on the content!
A collaboration at the beginning of the reflection
When the Army Health Service asked us, we first explored the ecosystem to see if there was already a suitable solution. But none seemed to fully meet the needs of the project.
So we rolled up the sleeves to create a new theme, thought from the start to meet the standards of the DSFR while fully exploiting the advantages of WordPress.
Driven by our open source culture, we wanted to make it an open and accessible resource, designed for public project promoters submitted to the DSFR. Ministries, agencies, prefectures or platforms such as service-public.fr or impots.gouv.fr : so many actors who could now rely on a common foundation.
With WP-DSFR, the aim is to provide public institutions with a reliable and evolving framework for their digital projects.
(This is not a first for us: we had already adopted this approach with Johannes, our UX kit for Gutenberg, which we use daily and which is available in open source on Figma.)
This time, the ambition was to propose a standardized and accessible solution for all public institutions using WordPress. Because with its flexibility and ease of use, WordPress is an ideal platform to meet the digital needs of the state – as much as fully exploit!
WP-DSFR: the challenge of integrating the DSFR on WordPress
A standardised and consistent theme
So far, each WordPress project involved a manual integration work of the DSFR, a source of complexity and additional delays. Unlike Drupal, which already had solutions aligned with the repository, WordPress required custom adaptation.
To address this need, WP-DSFR directly integrates all the graphical and functional requirements defined by the reference, in navigation, typography and colours.
- Native blocks under Gutenberg, ensuring a consistent layout as soon as the content is created,
- A true integration with the Figma documents of the DSFR, ensuring precise graphic correspondence,
- UX writing optimized, facilitating the daily use of State teams.
The objective is to lay the foundations for an open and evolving tool, accessible to all public sector web project promoters.
Align WordPress and DSFR: a balance to find
One of the main challenges was to reconcile WordPress flexibility with the rigour of the DSFR. The stake was to respect the constraints of the DSFR without compromising the experience of the contributors, ensuring a visual harmony while preserving the simplicity of use that makes the strength of WordPress
To achieve this, several optimizations have been implemented:
- Specific native blocks (FAQ, tiles, alerts...), directly integrating the requirements of the DSFR,
- Predefined templatesfacilitating rapid and standardized production,
- Optimization of components, for intuitive manipulation in WordPress while respecting DSFR standards,
- Minimizing custom styles, facilitating the management of updates and ensuring sustainable compliance.
What's at stake? Provide project teams with a consistent and intuitive tool, allowing them to use the theme without making their work more complex.
Project teams now have a compliant and user-friendly tool. Even without advanced skills, they can adjust their content independently, while ensuring compliance with the DSFR.
WP-DSFR: a collaborative and evolving solution for the institutions
The WP-DSFR is more than just a WordPress theme This is a real toolbox, a turnkey solution to simplify the management of public sites while ensuring their compliance with DSFR standards.
- 22 blocks of native content adapted to System Design standards – FAQs, alerts, tiles, highlights...
- An intuitive customization interface via Gutenbergallowing teams to modify and adjust their content without technical expertise,
- Optimized navigation and predefined templates, accelerating production without compromising compliance.
Accessibility is at the heart of the project: each component automatically meets the RGAA 4 standards, guaranteeing an inclusive user experience. A clear/shadow mode has also been integrated to improve ergonomics, in line with current trends in digital design.
| WP-DSFR has been designed to be accessible to all public institutions, with the desire to encourage continuous improvement and collective innovation. And an open source project really only comes alive through its community. This is why we invite project promoters and developers to join WP-DSFR on GitHub, share their feedback, propose improvements, or enrich existing features. Each contribution makes it possible to adapt the WP-DSFR to the realities of digital projects and encourage its adoption on a large scale! |
Conclusion
With the WP-DSFR, the idea was simple: to facilitate the lives of the teams by offering them a turnkey tool, while keeping the flexibility and ergonomics of WordPress. This project was a great adventure, nourished by our work with the Army Health Service, which allowed us to transform a problem into a concrete and accessible solution. We are really proud of what was created and to see today the WP-DSFR take life on real projects!
We look forward to seeing how it will be adopted, enriched and used by other institutions. !
📥 Curious to see what he can bring you? Download it, test it and join the community on GitHub !
