The upcoming release of the new user experience and homepage includes the option to either use a new, optimized theme or a customizable theme that incorporates your brand colors.
Both themes work with the updated experience.
Regardless of which theme you choose, you and your participants will still be upgraded to the improved user experience consisting of updates to important pages like the user Home page. Some user experience improvements for both themes are:
A modern layout with more space that focuses on simplicity and clarity
A cleaner experience that emphasizes the essential elements on a page
An improved mobile experience
Improved fonts and icons improve usability and readability
So, what's the difference between themes?
The primary difference is your ability to use brand colors in the customizable theme. This allows for more flexibility in the design and the opportunity to brand the program experience for participants. However, depending on your brand colors, you may lose some usability and accessibility.
Here's a comparison of the main differences between the themes👇
| New, Optimized Theme | Customizable Theme |
Theme Description | Designed to apply a blue color scheme with accessibility and the user's experience in mind. Elements that call out required actions, such as banners, are emphasized through intentional color contrast (see example of the user Home page banner below). | Designed to include custom brand colors with the new user experience. Elements in the design that require action, such as banners or announcements, do not have as much color contrast and, therefore, are not as prominent (see example of the user Home page banner below). |
Theme Visual |
| |
System Usability Score (SUS) | A+, 92.1 | Depends on customer color choices (2). |
508 & WCAG Accessibility Compliant | Yes. The optimized theme is designed for accessibility and is fully 508 and WCAG compliant. | Depends on customer color choices. |
Custom Brand Colors | No | Yes. The customizable theme allows you to use your custom colors in certain elements of the platform design. |
Colors optimized for contrast and experience | Yes. The optimized theme uses color to make items that need attention more prominent and to guide the user through their experience. | Depends on customer color choices. |
Color theory applied | Yes. The optimized theme incorporates colors that have been scientifically shown to evoke feelings of gratitude, creativity, and inspiration. | Depends on customer color choices. |
Design Theme FAQs
Q: What is the System Usability Score?
A: The System Usability Scale (SUS) is the most widely used tool for measuring perceptions of usability in software. According to digital.gov, "... the System Usability Scale he created asks users their opinion on how easy something is to use by agreeing or disagreeing with 10 statements. Users take the survey immediately after completing a usability test..." (Digital.gov).
Q: What is 508 Accessibility compliance?
A: Section 508 is a Federal accessibility standard that ensures "digitally accessible content is information or data that can be accessed and used by individuals with disabilities" (EDP.gov).
Q: What is WCAG Accessibility compliance?
A: According to the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), "Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.1 defines how to make Web content more accessible to people with disabilities. Accessibility involves a wide range of disabilities, including visual, auditory, physical, speech, cognitive, language, learning, and neurological disabilities" (W3.org).
Q: How is the new, optimized theme more accessible to people with disabilities?
A: The new, optimized theme uses color contrast to make reading and using the Chronus platform easier.
Selecting your theme
If you currently use custom brand colors, the customizable theme is used by default for your programs. If you would like to switch to the optimized theme, please contact your Customer Success Manager or email [email protected].