This live demo contains only a preview of functionality and styles available for this component. View the full demo on Storybook for additional information such as its version, controls, and API documentation.
Overview
The accordion component delivers large amounts of content in a small space through progressive disclosure. The header title gives the user a high level overview of the content allowing the user to decide which sections to read.
Accordions can make information processing and discovering more effective. However, it does hide content from users and it’s important to account for a user not noticing or reading all of the included content.
To organize related information.
To shorten pages and reduce scrolling when content is not crucial to read in full.
When space is at a premium and long content cannot be displayed all at once, like on a mobile interface or in a side panel.
- When organizing large amounts of information that can be nested, consider using tree view instead.
- If a user is likely to read all of the content, then don't use an accordion as it adds the burden of an extra click; instead use a full scrolling page with normal headers.
Header: contains the section title and is control for revealing the panel.
Icon: indicates if the panel is open or closed.
Panel: the section of content associated with an accordion header.
Flush alignment places the row title and chevron icons with 0px padding, keeping them flush to the rule dividers. For hover and focus interactive states, the left and right padding receives an additional 16px padding.
Icon alignment
By default the chevron icon is placed on the end side of the header. This allows for the title on the start side to align with other type elements in the layout, which is the preferred alignment scenario.
However, in some rare scenarios, the accordion may be modified to place the icon in start front of the title to function more like a tree. Most instances should use the default end alignment, especially for any pure content or documentation purposes. Icon placement in accordions should be consistent throughout your page and should not alternate.
In most cases, use the default end icon alignment to keep accordion text aligned with other content on the page.
In rare cases, you can place icons on the start side for tree like functionality.
Grid placement
When placing an accordion on the 2x Grid with its default alignment, the indented title and content align to the grid columns, and the top and bottom borders hang into the gutter. However, the accordion can be modified to have a flush alignment where the titles and content are instead flush aligned with the top and bottom borders having 0px padding.
Title
- The title should be as brief as possible while still being clear and descriptive.
- Each title should be wrapped in a role heading (h1-h6) that is appropriate for the information architecture of the page.
Further guidance
For further content guidance, see Carbon’s content guidelines.
States
The accordion component has two main states: collapsed and expanded. The chevron icon at the end of the accordion indicates which state the accordion is in. The chevron points down to indicate collapsed and up to indicate expanded.
Accordions begin by default in the collapsed state with all content panels closed. Starting in a collapsed state gives the user a high level overview of the available information.
A user can then independently expand each section of the accordion allowing for multiple sections to be open at once.
In addition to the collapsed and expanded states, accordions also have interactive states for focus, hover, and disabled. See the specification tab for more details.
Keyboard
Users can navigate between accordion headers by pressing Tab or Shift-Tab. Users can trigger a state change by pressing Enter or Space while the header area has focus. For additional keyboard interactions, see the accessibility tab.
The following components are additional ways to organize content. Consider the type and length of content you are working with when choosing a content container. Longer form content may benefit from tabs or a content switcher while very short content might do better in a structured list.
- Content switchers allow users to toggle between two or more content sections within the same space on the screen.
- Progress indicators guide users through any linear, multistep task by showing the user their completed, current, and future steps.
- Structured lists group content that is similar or related, such as terms and definitions.
- Tabs organize related content by allowing the user to navigate between groups of information that appear within the same context.
- Tree view is a hierarchical structure that provides nested levels of navigation.
- Hoa Loranger, Accordions Are Not Always the Answer for Complex Content on Desktops (Nielsen Norman Group, 2014)
Feedback
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