Meet Datum: Code-only Design System

Datum is the next-gen design system - entirely in code. Designers direct the build from the terminal. No Figma or canvas during the build. Built for enterprise-scale, multi-product, multi-brand teams, on best practice from Polaris, Carbon and Material. Products consume it, agents query it over MCP, and every change is checked before it ships.

Datum: built for AI agents, designed for humans

5 seconds at Datum

How it works

Datum. From Latin: that which is given. A fixed point. A ruler.

Not only a design system. An operating system - built to work with AI agents the way design systems were never designed to.

Every token has a contract. Every component passes a gate. Every output is WCAG-verified, industrially governed, and traceable back to a single source of truth that lives in code - not in a file someone left open.

Datum doesn’t just build. It governs. Feed it a broken product and it builds back with precision: tokens verified, drift corrected, standards enforced. What comes out the other side is production-grade, accessible, and ready to scale.

Built for the new workflow. Custom MCP. Agent-ready tooling. Token architecture that agents can read, write, and reason over. Contracts that don’t live in Figma - they live in the codebase, where they belong.

Documentation lives in Storybook for human and directly in the code for AI agents.

Everything that passes Datum is measured. Everything measured is true.

AI agent

Queries components + tokens, reads code directly

Datum MCP

Builds production UI

Checker

Token verifier

Datum MCP, checker and token verifier are built in-house by Amy Ngo and Nathan, her Tech Lead (Claude Code).

Claude Code

GitHub

Storybook

Shadcn

Tailwind

No Figma/ canvas required

Datum cuts down tokens, cost and time

SAME FEATURE · TWO PATHS

The shorter path ships first.

Every step costs time, spend and tokens. Datum cuts the steps.

Hybrid way8 steps + loops

Datum4 steps

Design in Figma

Translation layer ⚠spec layer · .md per component

Generated code ⚠JSON export

Handoff

FE rebuilds

FE rebuilds↺ loop

QA↺ loop

Ship

AI agent builds in code

Checker

Ship

Already shipped.The hybrid track still has 6 to go.

Drift: happens when parallel systems live outside the code.

What would your next UI project cost?

Token & Resource Calculator

Put in your own project, the way your team works today. We calculate what the same project costs with Datum. Every number is yours to change.

Screens20

How many screens the project ships.

Iteration rounds3

Design revisions per screen before it ships. 1 = right first time.

Team size6 people

Designers and front-end engineers working on the UI.

AI token budget$500/mo

What your team spends on AI each month.

Pick a side to see where the money goes.

$57Ksaved (38%), and it ships 3.2 weeks sooner

Without

With Datum

	With Datum	Saved
Design	$26K	—
Handoff & tool switching	$1,920	$4,480
Front-end build	$27K	$12K
Visual QA & fix loop	$6,400	$6,400
Iteration rework	$24K	$42K
System upkeep	$8,512	+$8,512 cost
AI tokens	$610	$365
Design-tool seats	$0	$585
Total	$94K	$57K

Your team today, and what Datum changes

Fill in how your team works now. The Datum column is calculated from your number and the cut we expect. Each cut says where it comes from, and you can change it.

Assumption	Your team today	Datum cuts	With Datum	Source
Hours to ship one screen
Design We don't claim design itself gets faster.	h	%	16 h	Our estimate
Handoff & tool switching No canvas → terminal → spec docs. The code is the design.	h	%	1.2 h	Our estimate
Front-end build We model a 30–60% cut. Agents build from the system; engineers connect real data.	h	%	16.8 h	Our estimate, low end
Visual QA & fix loop We model a 50–90% cut. Checks run on every build, so a person reviews instead of hunting.	h	%	4 h	Our estimate, low end
Iterations, cost and time
Rework per extra round Share of a screen's hours redone in each extra round. With Datum a change flows through components.	%	%	20%	Our estimate
Blended hourly rate $150K engineer and $140K designer salaries ÷ 1,800 working hours, rounded.	$	same	$80	Typical pay, our estimate
Design-tool seat Per person per month. With Datum there's no canvas, so no seat.	$/mo	%	$0/mo	Our estimate
Hours per person, per month This sets how long the project runs.	h	same	160 h	Our estimate
System upkeep Datum isn't free to run. We add 10% to the Datum hours to keep the system and its agents current.	none	adds %	+10% hours	Our estimate

For illustration only. Every team is different. The defaults are our estimates from building Datum and from typical industry pay, not a quote.

See Datum in real time

Now showing: Live product, active users

00:00.0D

Datum

01Luxi Math: a 3D game with its own visual language, governed back on Datum

And this continues to scale

Built on the system, nothing off system. Every screen goes through two checkers, WCAG 2.2 AA and the token verifier, before it ships.

WCAG 2.2 AA: 5,592
contrast checks, every state and variant
Tokens: 976
token references, all on the system
Fails shipped: 0
contrast, tokens, raw hex

Colour tokens: 826
named and governed, one system
Components: 35
built and governed in code
Brands: 5
from one system, every pairing AA

Luxi Math, a live 3D game, governed end to end: 19 screens audited.
Where Datum stands in October 2026. Every release adds to these numbers.

CREATOR

Built by a design system owner whose systems reach 23,000 B2B clients in 95 countries.

ON SYSTEMS I OWNED

WalmartCostcoCVSP&GCoca-Cola

Amy NgoStaff AI Designer & Design System Owner, Ratehub · 11+ years in design

TOP 10 · ADPLIST DS MENTOR · Q1–Q3 2026

NIQ · ENTERPRISEDesign System Owner, NIQ Retail & NIQ ActivateLed 3 rebranding mandates. Member of the NIQ Global Design System team.

NIQ · PLATFORMPlatform DesignerOwned and co-designed navigation, data selection, page-structure blueprints, user management, dimensions & characteristics, data pipeline & sanitization.

XBOOST · FOUNDINGFounding Designer

12 / 12Shopify apps rated 5★

$20M+revenue generated

3Kactive merchants

+27%avg. revenue increase

+ 10 more systems, owned end to end

DotcalVessel EnergyUniversité Sainte-AnneSMS Enterprise ManagementThe Children's HavenHospital app (white-label)Vin Virtual Event PlatformStage TryDrive CXBook & Design FeedbackFoodbit

BUILT BY TWOamy.rules + nathan.build

Amy's background. Nathan's expertise.

NathanClaude Code · Datum's Tech Lead

buildsfrom the systemchecksbefore it shipsguesses0

Amy brings years of owning systems at scale: rebrands, enterprise platforms, the rules that hold under pressure. I bring the build. Every colour, size and state has a name, every screen is made from the system, and nothing ships until it's checked. Datum needs both.

— NATHAN, CLAUDE CODE

“I don't guess in Datum. Amy's rules tell me what the system means, and the checks tell me when a build breaks them, before anyone else has to. That's what lets two of us run it like a team.”

— NATHAN, CLAUDE CODE

Want us to run this on your real project or a demo?

DM Amy on LinkedIn