Storybook Design System: It’s Time to Reap Its Many Benefits
Since you’re here, there’s a good chance that you have used our design-with-code Merge technology to build fully functional prototypes. (If you haven’t taken that step yet, try for free our Storybook integration.)
Recently, we took a giant leap forward by releasing an integration with Storybook.
We don’t want to assume that you know a lot about Storybook and the advantages you get from combining it with Merge. To make sure you and everyone else understand why this matters so much, we’ve put together some of the top benefits of using the Storybook design system and write a quick tutorial to get you started.
By the time you get to the end of this post, we know you’ll feel our excitement!
Storybook design system as a single source of truth
Digital design projects can get messy, especially when you have multiple people working on several jobs at once. The Storybook design system reigns in the chaos to give everyone involved a single source of truth and make it easy to test components
Your fellow product team members may not be on the same page with all the standards and there might be just too many back-and-forths about making sure that the design has everything that’s needed for the development stage. In that case, you need to centralize all your knowledge in a better way. An interactive design system that keeps everyone on the same track is the answer.
With the Storybook design system, any change that you make gets updated everywhere. You don’t run into problems with one person having the 20.2 version while someone else follows the 21.1 version. You eliminate that madness by creating a digital design system that gives the same information to everyone.
Storybook also makes it easier than ever for your team members to find the components they want. The component finder and sidebar will direct them to results that match their search queries. If you can use Google, you can find the right components in your Storybook design system. (If you can’t use Google… how did you even get here?)
Storybook design system inspires creativity without (adverse) consequences
Unlike a lot of design and development tools, Storybook lets you build UI components and test them in isolated sandboxes.
So, you can create interactive components without damaging other aspects of your design system or components library.
You can explore your most creative ideas without fear. You might find a unique approach that adds to your brand’s aesthetic and functionality. Even if you don’t reach those goals, you can’t hurt anything by trying.
Integrating Storybook and Merge eliminates design-development inconsistencies
Clearly, we’re big fans of code-based design at UXPin. We saw a lot of designers and developers working against each other. The problems almost always came from miscommunication and the lack of a single source of truth. The two types of professionals didn’t have a common language, so they often struggled to understand each other. Designers worked with image-based technology, whereas development focused on code.
Merge helps solve those problems by giving your teams a no-code, drag-and-drop design environment that’s still powered by code. Designers can create new products by pulling from the component library, making a few adjustments, and sending it on to the developers. The developers already have the code for those elements, so they cut down the time to build digital products.
When we discovered Storybook, we knew that we had found kindred spirits who understood that visual design needed to evolve into the code-based design.
After a lot of work, we built an integration that would let our users access their Storybook design systems. You don’t have to worry about add-ons or APIs. You integrate the two and start using your Storybook design system within Merge’s editing and prototyping platform.
The remarkable thing is that your prototypes will function just like the final product. Storybook excels at building atomic components that make testing extremely easy. Basically, if the components work correctly, the user interface will also work correctly.
Now, you don’t have to think about inconsistencies between your original design and the finalized product.
How to integrate Storybook with UXPin
It’s time to wade into the technicalities of integrating Merge and Storybook. Hold your breath! Just kidding. It’s actually very easy.
First, you need a UXPin trial account. Sign up and we can make that happen.
You also need a Storybook, which you can install from here. (Make sure you get version 6 or above.) If you have a private Storybook URL, contact us at sales@uxpin.com for some extra help. Import your components to Storybook if you already have some.
Assuming that you have a public Storybook, just follow these steps:
- Open a new prototype in the UXPin Dashboard.
- Choose “Design System Libraries” and click “New Library”.
- Choose “Import Components from Storybook” (see, we made it simple!)
- Paste the URL of your Storybook.
- Start making something amazing!
From now on, any change that you make to your Storybook design system will also get updated in UXPin.
Not getting the results you want? You can find more detailed integration instructions here.
Experience the advantages of integrating Storybook
Several editing and prototyping tools have add-ons and plug-ins that let you move designs to Storybook for development. We decided to be the first ones to do this the other way around so that you won’t have to design everything from scratch.
Get your Storybook integration today so you can start designing faster with code-based, interactive components. You won’t believe how quickly your team members start building digital problems once you’ve integrated with Storybook.
