Sibling contract

AI Readiness

AI readiness is the 6th maturity axis (zeroheight 2026). A design system is AI-ready when it exposes machine-readable context that AI coding agents can consume — tokens, rules, discovery endpoints, and verification. This contract defines the checks that score it.

Version 0.1.0 · provisional · machine export

Source authority

Primary

zeroheight 2026 Design System Maturity Model — AI Readiness axis

Definition

Whether your design system is the default context that AI tools build from, or whether AI is silently working around it

How-to

DLS Lead — "I made my design system LLM-readable. Here's exactly how."

The six maturity axes

01FoundationsAre tokens, components, and patterns defined?

02DocumentationIs the system documented for humans AND machines?

03GovernanceWho owns and maintains the system?

04AdoptionIs the system actually used?

05MeasurementIs the system measured and improved?

06AI Readiness (new)Is the system the default context AI tools build from?

AI-readiness signals

Machine-readable token file (DTCG/JSON) exposed at a discoverable URL
llms.txt brief present at /.well-known or /llms.txt
agent.json discovery document at /.well-known/agent.json
MCP endpoint exposing tools/list for AI agents
DESIGN.md present (the @google/design.md standard)
Token documentation — tokens carry $description for agent context
Component contract — machine-readable component schema
Sitemap.xml present for crawlability
robots.txt permissive for agent crawlers
Open Graph + Twitter meta for social/share context

Verification

10 checks — 10 checks. PASS=1, WARN=0.5, FAIL=0. Score = (points/10) × 100. A≥90, B≥80, C≥70, D≥60, F<60.

01r01 · Machine-readable token file exposed (DTCG/JSON)PASS: Token file found at a discoverable URL · FAIL: No machine-readable token file detected · WARN: Token file found but not in DTCG format

02r02 · llms.txt presentPASS: /llms.txt returns agent-facing brief · FAIL: No /llms.txt found — agents have no orientation brief

03r03 · agent.json presentPASS: /.well-known/agent.json returns discovery document · FAIL: No /.well-known/agent.json — agents have no discovery endpoint

04r04 · MCP endpoint responds to tools/listPASS: MCP endpoint found and responds with tool list · FAIL: No MCP endpoint detected — agents cannot call tools · WARN: Endpoint exists but did not respond to tools/list

05r05 · DESIGN.md present (Google design.md standard)PASS: /DESIGN.md found — follows the @google/design.md standard · FAIL: No /DESIGN.md — missing the machine-readable design brief

06r06 · Token documentation — tokens carry $descriptionPASS: Tokens found with $description metadata · FAIL: Tokens found but no $description — agents lack context · WARN: Some tokens have $description, others do not

07r07 · Component contract (machine-readable schema)PASS: Machine-readable component schema detected · FAIL: No machine-readable component contract · WARN: Component documentation found but not machine-readable

08r08 · Sitemap.xml presentPASS: /sitemap.xml found — site is crawlable · FAIL: No /sitemap.xml — agents cannot discover pages

09r09 · robots.txt permissive for agentsPASS: /robots.txt found and allows agent crawling · FAIL: No /robots.txt — crawling rules undefined · WARN: robots.txt found but restricts some agents

10r10 · Open Graph + Twitter card meta tagsPASS: OG and Twitter card meta tags present · FAIL: No social meta tags — missing share context · WARN: Partial social meta (OG or Twitter, not both)

Validation: Designesy readiness engine — HTTP probing of machine-readable artifacts. Method: HEAD/GET requests against the target origin for each known artifact path. Browser-only checks: None — all 10 checks are HTTP probes, no browser needed.

Open questions

r01 (token file) probes common paths (/tokens.json, /design-tokens.json) — custom paths may be missed
r07 (component contract) is heuristic — no universal standard for machine-readable component schemas exists yet
r04 (MCP endpoint) probes /api/mcp — custom MCP paths may be missed
The score does not measure token quality — only presence. A badly structured token file still scores PASS on r01

Run it

Score any URL for AI readiness:

AI Readiness score →API endpoint

The AI Readiness contract is the first automated scorer for the 6th maturity axis — no questionnaire, just scan. Machine export.