Big news: SWC 1.0 is here!

[najikahalsema]

Happy Diwali 🪔! Happy Halloween 🎃! Happy SWC 1.0 🌈!

We are thrilled to announce the release of Spectrum Web Components (SWC) 1.0! This is a major milestone for the library that is already widely used in many Adobe products.

With the 1.0 release, we are introducing some key process changes designed to increase transparency and predictability. SWC 1.0 also includes a pre-release of the new spectrum-two theme, alongside the spectrum and express themes your teams already use.

Many people contributed to this huge achievement over the last year. Please take a moment to celebrate the work put in by the following members of the Spectrum Engineering teams!

SWC Team: @blunteshwar, @caseyisonit, @jnjosh, @najikahalsema, @Rajdeepc, @nikkimk, @rubencarvalho, @TarunAdobe
CSS Team and Sparkboxers: @castastrophe, @jawinn, @marissahuysenstruyt,@pfulton, @rise-erpelding
Spectrum Tooling: @GarthDB, @karstens
Special thanks: @Westbrook @hunterloftis

What should I expect from SWC 1.0?

CHANGELOG.md | 1.0.0 Migration guide

SWC has of course been production-ready (and used in production) for some time, so the 1.0 designation is long overdue. By making it official, we can now use the full expressiveness of semantic versioning to clearly differentiate minor and patch releases, improving transparency and predictability.

To further improve predictability, we’re also introducing automated beta releases. Going forward, beta versions of the SWC packages will automatically be released every time a pull request lands on our main branch. You can use SWC beta releases for early verification of key features and fixes you’re tracking, or to assess the potential impact on your code base of updating to the next version of SWC.

These changes reflect a continuous effort on our part to improve the processes we use to maintain the project and support you. To take advantage of them, please prioritize updating to 1.0—and let us know if there are other improvements you’d like to see!

What should I expect from the spectrum-two theme?

The spectrum-two theme included in SWC 1.0 represents something we’re calling Spectrum 2 Foundations: it updates colors, corner-rounding and icons to match the Spectrum 2 spec, but doesn’t yet include new features or other changes.You can learn more about Spectrum 2 on its website. The purpose of S2 Foundations is to let you quickly adopt the basic Spectrum 2 look and feel with minimal disruption to your existing layouts and UI code, then move toward full Spectrum 2 adoption over the coming months, as we release further updates and as your product plans allow.

In the SWC 1.0 release, the spectrum-two theme should be considered a pre-release—it is ready to test, and we encourage you to do so. Once we’ve gotten enough feedback and addressed any initial issues, we’ll drop the pre-release designation, indicating that spectrum-two is ready for use in production as you see fit.

As we move into 2025, we’ll continue iterating on Spectrum 2 in a series of SWC 1.X releases. The 1.X releases will include updates to drop shadows and illustrations, as well as new Spectrum 2 features and changes that we can implement without breaking layouts or compatibility with the legacy spectrum and express themes.

This process will culminate in a future SWC 2.0 release that fully realizes Spectrum 2 and removes the legacy themes. SWC 2.0 will inevitably include breaking changes but, as always, we’ll strive to make your migration path as smooth as possible—please stay tuned for more information on the path from SWC 1.0 to 2.0.

Did you find a bug?

While we have aimed to make adopting spectrum-two as seamless as possible, you could still encounter issues. These could come from customizations to components, or from gaps in use cases that the Spectrum team didn’t predict. We want your feedback as you adopt it so that we continue releasing minor version updates and help your team move forward in adopting Spectrum 2.

Providing feedback

If you encounter any issues while using the Spectrum 2 theme, please file a bug report in Github using the Spectrum 2 issue template. Refer to our bug reporting guidelines in our Contributor documentation for more guidance.

Before you file your issue, please check the list of existing Spectrum 2 issues to make sure you’re not filing a duplicate issue. If you have more information that could be added to an existing ticket, please leave a comment there instead! Issues will be triaged during our weekly backlog review.

Thank you!