UI Copy Style
Guidance for user interface (UI) copy which includes all user-facing text in an interface, such as buttons, titles, error messages, and notifications.
Guidance for user interface (UI) copy which includes all user-facing text in an interface, such as buttons, titles, error messages, and notifications.
User interface (UI) copy is all the user-facing text in an interface, such as buttons, titles, error messages, and notifications.
User interfaces speak to users through UI copy, and UI copy allows users to speak back by guiding them to the desired action.
For example, in a confirmation dialog, the question “Download package?” asks the user if they want to move forward with an action. This question would be followed by a button, “Download package,” that allows the user to confirm the action.
When a person interacts with a UI, they’re in conversation with it. This conversation influences the person’s feelings about the UI. If UI copy is useful, easily scanned, and action-oriented, users can more easily navigate, explore, and troubleshoot, and they’ll feel better about using the product.
Without UI copy, users wouldn't be able to use or interact with applications. But writing UI copy without considering the user-facing impact of each word is almost as bad as having no UI copy at all.
Because words are the most familiar aspect of a UI, users look to them first for guidance. UI copy that is clear, consistent, and concise results in a product that feels helpful and earns trust. UI copy that is confusing, unpredictable, and text-heavy leaves users feeling lost and frustrated.
The purpose of these guidelines is to promote best practices for UI copy in the Unity Editor and to drive for alignment between the UX writers and technical writers who write UI copy at Unity.
UI copy is not easy to write: it involves very few words that must convey complex concepts at a glance. Clear guidelines make writing UI copy easier and more efficient and increase the quality of our UI for our users.
Each line of UI copy contributes to the overall voice of the Unity Editor. The characteristics of a product’s voice impact how users feel when using the product. A clear, consistent, and delightful product voice is a powerful differentiator.
All UI copy must be:
Quality Check
To ensure that your UI copy has these qualities, read your UI copy and ask yourself the following questions:
Clickable controls that initiate an action or change a condition need clear and actionable copy.
For readability, limit buttons to 1 or 2 words, maximum 3.
When pairing a button with a single-action instruction, match the button's wording to the title. This parallelism adds clarity.
For example:
Use consistent capitalization to make Editor UI labels easy to scan and understand.
Title case is a capitalization style commonly used for titles, headings, and subheadings. In title case, the first and last words of the title are capitalized, along with major words (nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs, pronouns, and some conjunctions). Minor words, such as articles (a, an, the) and short prepositions (to, with, for, at), are usually lowercase unless they appear at the beginning or end of the title.
Use title case for most UI text and proper names.
Use title case for elements such as labels, titles, buttons and menu items.
For example:
Sentence case is a capitalization style in which only the first word of a sentence, heading, or title is capitalized, along with any proper nouns. This style is commonly used for body content.
Use sentence case for messages and instructions that use complete sentences, such as tooltips, dialog text and help boxes messages.
When using sentence case, capitalize only the first word, proper nouns, trademarked brand names, standalone product names, and official Unity feature or platform names.
Most software features are common nouns and should remain lowercase unless they are official proper nouns. For example, use Editor when referring to the Unity Editor as a standalone product or platform, but use splines when referring to the general feature or concept.
For example:
Camel case is a way of writing phrases without spaces, where the first letter of each word is capitalized, except for the first letter of the entire compound word, which may be either upper or lower case.
Avoid camel case in user-facing Editor UI copy, unless it appears in code, API names, file names, package identifiers, or other technical references that must match exactly.
Camel case can be difficult to scan in UI labels and messages. Prefer title case or sentence case instead, depending on the UI element.
For example:
All caps means writing or typing every letter in uppercase (capital letters) rather than using small (lowercase) letters.
Avoid using all caps for emphasis, except where required by an acronym, or technical term.
Why avoid all caps:
Examples of all caps usage:
Incorrect and correct examples:
Example UI copy for empty states:
