Forms.gov
Designing the first U.S. government form builder
Overview
Problem
Federal agencies face a massive backlog of inaccessible PDFs and struggle to meet the 21st Century IDEA Act’s mandate for digital, user-friendly forms. Lacking a secure, government-owned, form-creation tool, many agencies rely on tools like Google Forms to handle sensitive data.
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Approach
I joined mid-project as the first designer, working closely with engineers to translate legal forms into intuitive designs. I created the first mobile-friendly form builder designs, structured the system for building pages and fields, and developed a research plan to identify how form builders wanted to create forms.
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Impact
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Forms.gov is the first U.S. government form builder tool. It is a secure, no-code tool that empowers agencies to create accessible, compliant web forms or convert legacy PDFs into public-ready digital experiences.
Role
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Researcher,
product designer
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Team
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2 Product designers
3 engineers
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Agencies
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10x Federal Incubator
Department of Justice
Skills
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Figma,
UserTesting
Background
Different Types of Forms
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People interpret the word “form” in many ways. Forms can be digital or on paper, and their accessibility can vary widely. Here are a few common types:
Paper Forms
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Fillable .PDFs
Non-Fillable .PDFs
WebForms
Discovery
Understanding
The Forms Landscape
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Working alongside another design researcher, I conducted a heuristic review of popular form tools (Google Forms, Typeform, Jotform) and government form builders in Canada, France, and Singapore. We also interviewed experts and form managers across courts, DOJ, legal aid orgs, and nonprofits.​
​Key Insights​​
​Accessibility is an afterthought
for many commercial tools.
Form builders have
poor integration
into case management systems.
​Low code,
not no code
bespoke software development is often required.
Form builders can't
ingest .PDFS
or convert them to webforms.
Takeaway
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There is a need, and a space on the market, for a U.S. Government Forms builder.
Users
Identifying
The Initial Target Audience
Starting with Forms in the Legal Justice Space
Poor legal form design has large repercussions
Accessing the justice system without a lawyer requires filling very complex, high-stakes forms, often designed to be filled out by people with legal training. The inaccessibility of these forms makes it more difficult for the public to understand their rights.
People want to make better forms, but lack the tools
Court jurisdictions and pro bono experts were interested in a platform to help people correctly assemble the documents they need in order to advocate for themselves within the justice system. We focused on serving this community.​
Our product had to serve two groups: the Form Builders, who used the tool to create forms and the Form Fillers, who filled out the forms produced by the tool.
Design
Developing Basics Functions
In order to develop a minimal viable product, we needed to identify and design the most crucial features. Using the United States Web Design System, we created mockups of CRUD features (Create, Read, Update, Delete).
Explorations on Editing
Pop up editing
Sidebar editing
Mobile editing
Structuring a Form Question
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I identified that .Pdfs often have multiple fields associated with one question. Therefore, I spent time designing the most intuitive way to allow a form builder to create multiple fields for a question.
Form title: easy recognition of form
Page title: break up form "sections"
Question title: question context
Question and answer
Question with multiple answers (Ex. what is your name - first, middle, last)
V.1 Form Fields
V.2 Form Fields
Mobile Version
Concept
Testing
Legal Aids Aid Us
A product designer and I conducted 6 in-depth interviews with legal fellows, interns, and admins to test concepts for how people in the legal space would like to build forms.
Concept test 1: Form View​​​
Concept test 2: .PDF View​​​
Concept test 3: Table View​​​
The winning design is a hybrid of all three concepts
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We heard from legal aids:​
“I am very comfortable with Google products.”
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From this information we realized that basing our designs off Google-styles might bridge the learning gap most easily for a new product, similar to concept 1.
We also heard:​
"I need a preview of the original document to orient myself."
From this, we interpreted that visuals of the original pdfs being converted was essential for comfort with the process and a form preview was important as well, similar to concept 2.
Start From Scratch Vs. Import A .PDF
We also learned from these tests that users want multiple points of entry for form creation. I advocated to engineers to offer two form creation options at the beginning of the product:
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Start from scratch: Best for simple forms.
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Import PDF: Ingests existing forms, auto-converts structure into editable fields.
Impact
A Better Future For Government Forms
Forms.gov is designed to:
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Enable non-technical users to build and publish forms
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Drastically reduce costs and time for courts and government programs
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Support PDF ingestion to reduce duplication of work
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Align with M-23-22 accessibility standards
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Provide a template-driven future for scale
“Getting a single form online used to cost tens of thousands. With this builder, we’re democratizing access—for both form creators and the public.”
Next Steps
Growing The
U.S. Forms Builder
Now that we've proven interest and usefulness of the Forms Builder MVP, the next step is scaling the product and gaining federal costumers. Our next steps include:
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Expanding our partnership with the Department Of Justice's Office of Pardon to test out one of their forms with our form builder.
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Prioritize and build out shared features like logic branching, multi-form grouping, login and preview functionalities.
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Develop an outreach plan for other customers.
Reflection
Parting Thoughts
Importance of immediate action with roadmap research​
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Balancing long-term planning with immediate, actionable input is key—especially when building a research roadmap while supporting short-term product needs.
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Prototyping helps users imagine​
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Even if users struggle to imagine an entirely new product, research and concept testing can still yield valuable insights.