Nuxt Design Tokens

Nuxt Design Tokens

Token-driven design with Tailwind 4 @theme static + Nuxt UI semantic classes. The point: brand and dark-mode behaviour live in CSS variables, not Tailwind utility classes. Templates stay semantic; the variables do the work.

When to use this skill

• Registering custom type scales (display sizes, fluid sizes)
• Adding motion curves, brand palettes, or font stacks as tokens
• Building dark-mode-correct surfaces without raw palette classes
• Adding contextual CSS overrides (e.g. an elevated tone within a section)
• Wiring View Transitions for theme toggles
• Configuring component-wide defaults via app.config.ts

Core rules

1. No raw palette classes in templates. Use text-default, bg-elevated, border-muted. Never text-gray-800 or bg-stone-50. Dark mode flips the semantic class via Nuxt UI; raw classes don't flip.
2. Tokens live in @theme static, not inline. Custom type sizes, motion curves, font stacks belong in main.css. Tailwind picks them up as utilities (text-display-xl, ease-out-expo).
3. Brand palette lives in app.config.ts. Override primary and neutral on the Nuxt UI palette; never hand-set the colour token unless you need a non-Tailwind hue.
4. Arbitrary values are a sharp tool. Prefer the scale even at ±1-2 px. Reserve [clamp(...)], [52ch], [var(--foo)] for things the scale genuinely cannot express.
5. One contextual CSS rule beats five utility overrides. When a container needs to shift the palette of its children, write a single html.dark .my-context { --ui-bg: ... } rule.

Reference files

• tokens.md — @theme static registration, fluid type scales with paired weight/tracking/line-height, motion curves, font stacks
• semantic-colors.md — Nuxt UI semantic class catalogue, dark-mode auto-flip, brand palette via app.config.ts, component default variants
• contextual-overrides.md — when to rebind --ui-* vars in a section, the .section-dark pattern, scoping rules
• view-transitions.md — theme-toggle radial wipe via View Transitions API, fallback handling, ClientOnly wrapper pattern
• fonts.md — @nuxt/fonts self-hosting, weight subsetting, fallback metrics to avoid FOUT, preload strategy, variable fonts, font-display choice per role

Quick decision table

Anti-patterns

• ❌ text-gray-500 / bg-stone-100 in templates — breaks dark mode
• ❌ Defining --ui-primary-500 directly in CSS — use app.config.ts instead so Nuxt UI computes the full scale
• ❌ One-off text-[15px] everywhere — register a token if you use it twice
• ❌ Putting brand colour decisions in nuxt.config.ts — wrong file
• ❌ Tailwind plugins for custom utilities — Tailwind 4 expects tokens via CSS, not JS config

Related skills

• nuxt-ui — component API, the ui prop, slot overrides
• nuxt-components — tailwind-variants for component-level variant APIs; consumes the tokens defined here
• nuxt-config — app.config.ts placement