Help users toGet more details

Small overlays containing help content for complex interactions.

When to use this pattern

Only use contextual help to explain things like business processes. It shouldn't be relied upon to solve design problems - services should always be simple and intuitive. See the GOV.UK Service Standard. Contextual help is more suited to complex internal services.

How it works

Help should be easy to close, move and minimise until the user needs it.

If contextual help doesn’t answer a user’s question, links to more comprehensive help should be easy to find. GDS has guidance for help content .

Accessibility

If your service uses this pattern, let us know of any insights you have on accessibility considerations.

Research

This pattern is used by:

• Digital applications platform
• Entity search

Users find side-by-side guidance more helpful and easier to use. Small overlay windows offer the smallest interference with the user flow. This is a good article on contextual help from Nielsen Norman.

Help us improve this pattern

This pattern needs improving. We need evidence about:

• how to write for this pattern

To contribute, add your thoughts and research findings to our GitHub discussion, or follow our contribute guidance.