5 intranet design best practices (with real intranet examples)

HR, communications, and marketing professionals who double as intranet managers know that the brand expression, look, and feel of an intranet play a huge role in its success. Great intranet design stems from key design decisions made before a single page is built.

A well-designed intranet can leave a lasting impact and help overcome common challenges, including:

• Low adoption. If employees don’t feel connected to the intranet, they won’t feel compelled to use it
• Low engagement. Poorly designed intranets can make it challenging for staff to navigate the intranet and know how to get involved
• Compliance and training fatigue. Staff tune out reminders that feel like system notifications rather than genuine communication
• Brand confusion. Without a deliberate brand decision, intranets default to looking like a corporate website, signalling to employees it wasn’t built for them
• Stale intranet content. Intranets that never change make staff question if they’re active or the content is reliable
• Getting information to frontline staff. Employees in the field or on mobile can’t access an intranet that’s designed only for desktop. Offer accessibility and IP-restriction-free access to solve for this

This year’s Best Intranet Awards design category finalists show that award-winning design comes down to being intentional. Whether you’re launching a brand new intranet or redesigning an existing one, there’s something to be learned from these award-winning examples of beautifully designed, functional intranets. Keep reading for our top intranet design best practices.

1. Get staff involved in the design of your intranet

When employees have input into key intranet branding aspects, like the name or mascot concepts, something shifts. The intranet stops feeling like a top-down IT project and starts feeling like the community’s.

Here’s how

• Run a naming contest to encourage employee buy-in. Crowd-sourcing from staff will likely lead to some fun and creative ideas you may have never thought of!
• Invite creative contributions. Create a form and ask for input on mascot designs, logo concepts, and even color preferences. You’ll be surprised what people submit when they’re genuinely asked.
• Frame the intranet branding project as a collective effort from day one. That sense of ownership is very hard to create after launch. Build it in from the start.

How it looks in practice

New York State Office of Cannabis Management received 80+ name submissions from across the agency. Staff voted and STASH won by a landslide. Employees also designed the mascot concepts that became their infamous Sprout McScout.

Winnipeg Airports Authority ran a company-wide intranet naming vote. “The Flight Deck” won, and the entire brand elements, like aviation, birds, and skyscapes, flowed naturally from that one decision.

2. Create an intranet mascot and give it a real personality with a job to do

Thinking of your mascot as just decoration is seriously limiting its potential. The best intranet mascots have a name, an iconic backstory, and actual responsibilities. They earn their keep by making the intranet feel less like a system and more like a living, breathing gathering place.

Here’s how

• Give your mascot a real role. Not just a spot in the header image. They can author posts, send reminders, and even nudge employees on tasks.
• Build seasonal updates into your content calendar. A mascot that changes with the seasons stays visible and fresh without requiring a full redesign.
• Don’t overthink it. Consistency matters more than complexity. A simple recognizable character creates familiarity over time.
• Let the mascot do the hard asks. Things like compliance and overdue training reminders, and policy updates land better with a friendly face attached.

How it looks in practice

Winnipeg Airports Authority’s mascot, Stevie M. Merlebleu, has an official job title (Inflight Navigation Support Specialist), and seasonal costumes. Stevie authors posts, appears across the site, and has been effective at nudging employees to complete mandatory training. 

New York State’s Office of Cannabis Management’s mascot, Sprout McScout, sends reminder emails, posts STASH Tips, starts forum discussions, and appears in seasonal updates throughout the year. Sprout makes the intranet feel like a supportive teammate, not a tool.

Harris County Department of Education’s mascot, Uni the Unicorn, complements the other-worldly space theme and appears as a unifying visual element across every section of The Portal, bringing an element of fun to a government organization.

3. Ensure your brand sets the tone

Brand elements, like color palette, typography, imagery, and your logo, aren’t finishing touches. They’re the first thing employees experience every time they log in. They contribute to the fleeting and important first impression of your intranet.

You don’t need to be a designer to build a strong intranet brand. You just need to make a few clear decisions and note them down.

Organizations often ask how closely an intranet should follow corporate brand guidelines. There’s no single right answer. Intranets sit on a spectrum from fully brand-aligned to deliberately self-contained. HCDE chose the latter on purpose.

“Instead of sticking with HCDE’s main color palette, we created a purposeful sub-brand using teal and gold — colors that feel modern and energetic while still connecting to the organization’s visual identity. This deliberate distinction shows employees that The Portal is its own space — a dedicated hub for them, not just a digital filing cabinet.”

— Oliver Dyke, Harris County Department of Education

Here’s how

Color

• Limit your palette to 2 to 3 primary colors and 3 to 4 secondary colors. Include black and greyscale
• You don’t necessarily have to use your organization’s existing colors for your intranet brand. A distinct sub-brand can make the space feel like it belongs to employees, not just the corporate identity
• Always check contrast ratios as color that’s hard to read undermines everything else
• Color-code sections so staff develop an instinctive sense of where they are on the site

Logo

• Your intranet can share your organization’s logo, use a spin-off version, or have something entirely its own
• What matters is that it’s intentional and applied consistently
• Even something as simple as a wordmark can give the intranet its own identity without a large design investment

Typography

• Most organizations default to their existing typeface, which works fine. Making sure it’s readable is the only real rule
• Make sure your font includes multiple weights so you can create visual hierarchy without relying on color alone
• Keep in mind, sans-serif fonts are generally a better fit for digital products

Imagery: icons, graphics, photos

• Consistent imagery makes navigation easier and the brand more memorable
• Color-code graphic backgrounds by section, so employees build a spatial sense of the site
• Establish a clear style rule for news thumbnails and banners and stick to it. For example, ensure it’s always illustrated, always photography, or always a specific subject
• Choose imagery contributors can replicate. Simple, subject-specific photography is easier to maintain at scale than custom illustrations. The harder your visual system is to replicate, the faster it falls apart

What it looks like in in practice

New York State’s Office of Cannabis Management chose calm, intentional colors specifically so staff would feel good the moment they logged in. Color was a deliberate emotional decision, not an afterthought.

Harris County Department of Education created a purposeful teal-and-gold sub-brand entirely distinct from their org’s main colors, giving The Portal its own identity and signalling to employees that it was a space built just for them.

Winnipeg Airports Authority color-coded every navigation section with its own distinct thumbnail style, so employees always know at a glance where they are on the site.

4. Maintain the core design system, but keep the experience fresh

There’s a fine balance between consistency and keeping things interesting on your intranet. The design system, which includes your HEX codes, templates, and layout rules, should never change without a deliberate decision. The surface, for example your homepage header, mascot’s seasonal costume, or the photo in your banner, should change regularly to keep things interesting.

Here’s how

Maintain the design system over time

• Build templated graphics for your most common image asset types, including news thumbnails, section banners, announcement graphics. Canva works well for most teams
• Document your exact HEX codes, approved fonts, and icon specs and host that reference guide on the intranet itself so contributors can always find it
• Set auto-fill thumbnails on news posts, so contributors can’t accidentally leave them blank or reach for random stock images

Keep your intranet feeling fun and relevant

• Plan small, low-effort updates into your content calendar, like seasonal backgrounds, logo swaps, or mascot costume changes
• Rotate real staff photos into the homepage so the site feels like a community, not a corporate publication
• Make your intranet seasonal. A homepage that looks different in December than it did in August tells employees the intranet is alive

How it looks in practice

Harris County Department of Education’s The Portal is a strong example of the deliberate end of that spectrum: a fully self-contained sub-brand with its own color palette, space theme, and mascot. None of which appear in HCDE’s corporate identity. The result is an intranet that employees immediately recognize as theirs.

Winnipeg Airports Authority change the site logo several times a month, update the homepage background seasonally, and rotate “Stevie’s Polaroid”, a real staff photo in the header, to keep the site feeling alive.

New York State Office of Cannabis Management built a design training resource inside STASH with exact HEX codes, icon specs, and layout rules for every page type. A dedicated admin team reviews every new page before it goes live. Seasonal updates to their mascot, Sprout McScout, are planned throughout the year to keep employees engaged.

5. Treat accessibility as a design non-negotiable

Intranet accessibility isn’t a checklist you run at the end of a project. It’s a set of structural decisions that determine whether your design actually works for everyone, including employees using mobile devices, employees in the field, and employees with visual or cognitive differences.

Build these in from the start. Retrofitting accessibility is significantly harder than designing with it in mind upfront.

Here’s how

• Check contrast ratios on all text and background color combinations before finalizing your palette
• Use descriptive link text throughout. Never just “click here.” Every link should tell employees where it leads
• Open external links in new tabs and add help-text to buttons where the destination isn’t obvious
• Design for mobile from day one, especially if you have frontline or field-based employees. Mobile responsiveness should be a core requirement, not a later optimization
• Build accessibility expectations into page owner training so standards are maintained as the site grows
• Remove IP address restrictions where possible so employees can access the intranet from any device or location

How it looks in practice

Harris County Department of Education proactively optimized for mobile after logging 72,000+ mobile page views from frontline teams in a single year. Font sizes, contrast ratios, and whitespace are all deliberately calibrated for clarity across screen types. Large, clearly labelled cards replaced dense text blocks, reducing reading effort for employees.

New York State Office of Cannabis Management uses descriptive links throughout the site, with help-text on every button explaining where it leads. Accessibility training is built into onboarding for all page owners, making it a practice, not a policy.

Winnipeg Airports Authority treated mobile responsiveness and IP-restriction-free access as core requirements from day one, given a distributed workforce spread across six campus areas and a remote site in Iqaluit. Accessible design training is embedded in the Communications team’s standard practice.

Putting it all together

These five design best practices aren’t sequential steps, they’re a set of decisions that reinforce great intranet design.

When employees help name and brand the intranet, they feel ownership. When a mascot shows up consistently, the intranet has personality. When the brand is clearly defined, contributors can maintain it without needing design skills. When the system is locked down and the surface is kept fresh, the intranet stays trustworthy and engaging. And when accessibility is built in from the start, all of that works for everyone.

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The intranets featured in this guide were all winners or finalists in the 2026 ThoughtFarmer Best Intranet Awards, Design category: New York State Office of Cannabis Management (STASH), Harris County Department of Education (The Portal), and Winnipeg Airports Authority (The Flight Deck).

To learn more about the winners, download our ebook: 2026 Award Winning Intranets

Frequently asked questions about intranet design

What is intranet design best practice? 

The most important intranet design best practices are: 

• Involve employees in the naming and branding process, define a clear brand system (colors, fonts, imagery)
• Use a mascot to give the intranet personality
• Keep the design system consistent while refreshing surface-level elements seasonally
• Build accessibility in from the start rather than as an afterthought.

Does my intranet have to match my company’s brand colors? 

No. Intranets sit on a spectrum from fully brand-aligned to deliberately self-contained, and none is automatically right. 

How do I get employee buy-in for a new intranet? 

The most effective approach is co-creation. Involve employees in naming the intranet, contribute to mascot concepts, and vote on design directions before launch. That sense of shared ownership is very hard to create after launch, so build it in from the start.

What is an intranet mascot and does it actually help?

An intranet mascot is a named character that serves as the voice and personality of the intranet. Done well, mascots do real work: they author posts, front mandatory training reminders, appear in seasonal updates, and make the intranet feel like a community rather than a system.