---
version: alpha
name: "Venmo"
description: "Venmo's site is built on a single chromatic decision: the unmistakable Venmo Blue `#3d95ce` painted onto a clean white canvas. Aktiv Grotesk Extended carries the wordmark and display, with a tighter Aktiv Grotesk for body — geometric sans-serifs descended from Helvetica that feel friendly without becoming playful. Where PayPal commits to dual-blue corporate trust, Venmo's younger sibling commits to a single mid-blue social-payment voice — friendlier, lighter, with emoji and feed-style transaction notes baked into the brand's personality. Pages alternate white sections with soft `#f5f8fa` elevation bands and occasional Venmo Blue full-bleed campaigns; depth is hairlines and surface tone, never decorative shadow. Type runs at modest weights, rounded-pill CTAs anchor every hero, and the iconic emoji-laden transaction note is the system's signature unit of content."
colors:
  bg: "#ffffff"
  bg-cool: "#f5f8fa"
  bg-blue: "#3d95ce"
  bg-deep: "#1f2e3a"
  surface: "#ffffff"
  surface-soft: "#f5f8fa"
  surface-strong: "#e8edf2"
  surface-blue-tint: "#eef6fb"
  surface-blue-elevated: "#5ba9da"
  text: "#1f2e3a"
  text-body: "#2f3e4a"
  text-muted: "#6b7785"
  text-subtle: "#9aa5b1"
  text-friend-name: "#3d95ce"
  brand: "#3d95ce"
  brand-hover: "#2c7eb5"
  brand-active: "#225f8c"
  brand-light: "#a8d3ec"
  brand-disabled: "#bcd4e4"
  on-brand: "#ffffff"
  on-deep: "#ffffff"
  on-deep-soft: "#9aa5b1"
  link: "#3d95ce"
  link-hover: "#225f8c"
  border: "#dbe2e8"
  border-strong: "#9aa5b1"
  border-soft: "#e8edf2"
  border-on-blue: "rgba(255,255,255,0.22)"
  semantic-success: "#2ea84f"
  semantic-warning: "#f5a623"
  semantic-danger: "#e02020"
  semantic-info: "#3d95ce"
  social-like: "#e02020"
  focus-ring: "rgba(61,149,206,0.40)"
  shadow-ambient: "rgba(31, 46, 58, 0.06)"
  shadow-soft: "rgba(31, 46, 58, 0.10)"
  shadow-hard: "rgba(31, 46, 58, 0.18)"
typography:
  display:
    fontFamily: "Aktiv Grotesk Extended"
    fontSize: "80px"
    lineHeight: 1.5
    letterSpacing: "-2px"
  body:
    fontFamily: "Aktiv Grotesk"
    fontSize: "16px"
    lineHeight: 1.5
  mono:
    fontFamily: "Aktiv Grotesk Mono"
rounded:
  button: "12px"
  card: "16px"
  pill: "9999px"
spacing:
  xs: "4px"
  sm: "8px"
  md: "16px"
  lg: "32px"
  xl: "64px"
---

## Overview

## Overview

Venmo's marketing surface is a single chromatic decision: the unmistakable **Venmo Blue `#3d95ce`** painted onto a clean white canvas. Where its parent PayPal commits to dual-blue corporate trust, Venmo commits to **one mid-blue social-payment voice** — friendlier, lighter, more conversational. The blue itself is the giveaway: not navy, not sky, but a warmer mid-cyan that sits closer to "summer pool" than to "bank prospectus". It is the colour of the iconic Venmo "V", and it is used everywhere — wordmark, primary CTA, hyperlink-blue friend names in the transaction feed, and the full-bleed campaign hero.

Type is **Aktiv Grotesk** — a Helvetica-descended geometric sans by Dalton Maag (the same foundry that designed PayPal Sans Big), but cut for warmth rather than corporate authority. The display tier uses **Aktiv Grotesk Extended** at weight 900 with hard negative tracking — those headline letterforms are wider than they are tall, giving the marketing a poster-bold quality that PayPal would never reach for. Body sits at the standard Aktiv Grotesk at 400/500/700 — warmer, rounder, more like a conversation than a contract.

Page rhythm is built around three ideas:
1. **White editorial sections** — the default. Hero, feature grids, app-store demos.
2. **Cool-grey elevation bands** (`#f5f8fa`) — subtle pause between dense feature blocks.
3. **Full-bleed Venmo Blue heroes** (`#3d95ce`) — campaign tops, "Get the App" closers, and the iconic transaction-feed mockup.

The system's signature content unit is the **transaction feed row**: friend's avatar, friend's name (in `#3d95ce` like a hyperlink), an emoji-laden note ("Pizza 🍕"), the amount in tabular mono, and the time. This row appears on the marketing site as the brand's most-shown component — payments rendered as a social feed, with emoji as first-class content. It is the visual gesture that distinguishes Venmo from every other fintech: money is **social**, not transactional.

Decorative shadows are absent. Cards stack with a 1px hairline (`#dbe2e8`) or a single surface-jump from white to `#f5f8fa`. Iconography is rounded-geometric, often paired with the brand's heart-and-emoji vocabulary. The footer is **deep blue-black** (`#1f2e3a`) — closing every page on a quiet, near-navy floor.

**Key Characteristics:**
- Single mid-blue voltage: Venmo Blue `#3d95ce` for everything actionable
- Canvas is pure white `#ffffff` — clean, social-feed neutral
- Aktiv Grotesk Extended at weight 900 for display — wide, poster-bold
- Aktiv Grotesk at 400–700 for body — warm geometric sans
- Pill-shaped CTAs (full radius) — friendly, app-native
- Transaction-feed row is the brand's signature content unit
- Friend names rendered hyperlink-blue (`#3d95ce`) — payments as social
- Emoji is first-class content — not decoration, but voice
- Tabular mono for amounts — `tnum + zero` ledger discipline
- Deep blue-black footer (`#1f2e3a`) — never pure black

## Colors

### Primary
- **Canvas** (`#ffffff`): Pure white default page floor.
- **Ink** (`#1f2e3a`, deep blue-black): Primary headline and strong body text. Like PayPal, *not pure black* — a deep blue tint colours every paragraph.
- **Brand** (`#3d95ce`, Venmo Blue): The single brand voltage. Wordmark, primary CTA, friend names, accent strokes.

### Brand & Dark
- **Venmo Blue** (`#3d95ce`): The canonical brand colour. Primary CTA, hyperlink, signature glyphs.
- **Brand Hover** (`#2c7eb5`): Mid-blue pressed state.
- **Brand Active** (`#225f8c`): Deeper pressed/active.
- **Brand Light** (`#a8d3ec`): Lifted brand voltage — used as a lighter accent surface.
- **Deep Blue-Black** (`#1f2e3a`): Footer ground; rare full-bleed dark band.

### Accent
Venmo deliberately commits to **a single brand colour**. Yellow, green, red exist only as semantic states. The single accent move is the **heart-red `#e02020`** used on the social-feed "like" icon — a literal heart, the only non-blue chromatic moment that's part of the brand voice (because liking a friend's payment is part of the product).

### Interactive
- **Link** = Brand `#3d95ce`, no underline at rest; underline appears on hover
- **Link Hover** — `#225f8c`, with underline
- **CTA Hover** — bg `#2c7eb5`, translateY(-1px), shadow blooms ambient → standard
- **CTA Active** — bg `#225f8c`, no lift
- **Disabled** — `#bcd4e4` background or `#9aa5b1` text
- **Selected** — pill chips use `#eef6fb` (Venmo Blue at 8%) bg with `#3d95ce` text

### Neutral Scale
Cool-grey ladder, slightly warmer than PayPal's:

`#ffffff` (Canvas) → `#f5f8fa` (Cool Band) → `#e8edf2` (Surface Strong) → `#dbe2e8` (Border) → `#9aa5b1` (Border Strong / Subtle text) → `#6b7785` (Muted) → `#2f3e4a` (Body) → `#1f2e3a` (Ink / Deep).

Bottom of the scale lands on **deep blue-black, not pure black** — every text moment carries a faint cool tint.

### Surface & Borders
- **Surface Soft** (`#f5f8fa`): Cool-grey elevation band.
- **Surface Strong** (`#e8edf2`): Disabled CTA background.
- **Surface Blue Tint** (`#eef6fb`): Venmo Blue at 8% — informational badge, selected pill bg.
- **Surface Blue Elevated** (`#5ba9da`): +1 step on a Venmo Blue hero — cards inside blue sections.
- **Border** (`#dbe2e8`): Default 1px hairline.
- **Border Strong** (`#9aa5b1`): Input border.
- **Border Soft** (`#e8edf2`): Softest divider.
- **Border on Blue** (`rgba(255,255,255,0.22)`): Hairline on Venmo Blue hero.

### Shadow Colors
Shadows are **deep blue-black tinted at low opacity** (`rgba(31, 46, 58, 0.06–0.18)`). Same logic as PayPal: every depth-step carries a faint brand voice. Most cards use no shadow at all — hairline + surface contrast does the work.

### Semantic
- **Success** (`#2ea84f`): "Completed" tag, payment-sent confirmation
- **Warning** (`#f5a623`): "Pending" amber
- **Danger** (`#e02020`): "Declined" red — also doubles as the social-like heart colour
- **Info** (`#3d95ce`): Brand-blue tint, used for informational toasts

## Typography

### Font Family

**Primary display: Aktiv Grotesk Extended** — the wide-cut variant of Aktiv Grotesk, designed by Dalton Maag in 2010 and adopted by Venmo for the wordmark and headline tier. The extended cut gives display sizes a poster-bold quality — "Send. Receive. Hangout." reads almost like a concert poster. Weights deployed: 500, 700, 900 (Black).

**Body: Aktiv Grotesk** — the standard width. Same skeleton, normal proportions, tuned for 12–18px running text. Weights: 400, 500, 700.

**Fallback chain**: `"Aktiv Grotesk", -apple-system, "Helvetica Neue", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif`. The chain keeps a system-ui escape (because Venmo's app-native ethos is comfortable with Apple's San Francisco when the brand font fails) but ends on Helvetica Neue.

**Mono: Aktiv Grotesk Mono** — the tabular companion for transaction amounts. Weights: 400, 500. OpenType `tnum` and `zero` (slashed zero) explicitly enabled.

**OpenType features**: `kern` always on; `ss01` used in the Venmo wordmark for the alternate single-storey 'a'.

### Hierarchy

| Role            | Font                  | Size | Weight | Line Height | Letter Spacing | OT Features  | Notes                                            |
|-----------------|------------------------|------|--------|-------------|----------------|--------------|--------------------------------------------------|
| display-hero    | Aktiv Grotesk Ext     | 80   | 900    | 1.00        | -2px           | kern         | Top-of-page hero — "Pay anyone."                |
| display-xl      | Aktiv Grotesk Ext     | 64   | 900    | 1.02        | -1.6px         | kern         | Secondary hero / campaign headline               |
| display-lg      | Aktiv Grotesk Ext     | 48   | 900    | 1.05        | -1.2px         | kern         | Section opener                                   |
| display-md      | Aktiv Grotesk Ext     | 36   | 700    | 1.10        | -0.6px         | kern         | Feature card title                               |
| display-sm      | Aktiv Grotesk Ext     | 28   | 700    | 1.20        | -0.3px         | —            | Subsection lead                                  |
| title-lg        | Aktiv Grotesk         | 24   | 700    | 1.25        | 0              | —            | Card title                                       |
| title-md        | Aktiv Grotesk         | 20   | 700    | 1.30        | 0              | —            | Card body title                                  |
| title-sm        | Aktiv Grotesk         | 16   | 700    | 1.35        | 0              | —            | List heading                                     |
| body-lg         | Aktiv Grotesk         | 18   | 400    | 1.55        | 0              | —            | Lead paragraph                                   |
| body-md         | Aktiv Grotesk         | 16   | 400    | 1.50        | 0              | —            | Default body                                     |
| body-strong     | Aktiv Grotesk         | 16   | 700    | 1.50        | 0              | —            | Inline emphasis                                  |
| body-sm         | Aktiv Grotesk         | 14   | 400    | 1.50        | 0              | —            | Secondary body                                   |
| caption         | Aktiv Grotesk         | 13   | 400    | 1.45        | 0              | —            | Metadata, timestamps                             |
| legal           | Aktiv Grotesk         | 12   | 400    | 1.50        | 0              | —            | Footer disclosure                                |
| eyebrow         | Aktiv Grotesk         | 12   | 700    | 1.20        | 1.6px (uppercase) | —         | Section eyebrow above display-lg                 |
| button          | Aktiv Grotesk         | 16   | 700    | 1.20        | 0              | —            | All CTA labels                                   |
| nav-link        | Aktiv Grotesk         | 14   | 500    | 1.40        | 0              | —            | Top navigation                                   |
| feed-name       | Aktiv Grotesk         | 16   | 700    | 1.40        | 0              | —            | Friend name in feed (rendered in Venmo Blue)     |
| feed-note       | Aktiv Grotesk         | 16   | 400    | 1.50        | 0              | —            | Transaction note (with emoji)                    |
| feed-amount     | Aktiv Grotesk Mono    | 16   | 700    | 1.40        | 0              | tnum, zero   | Dollar figure on feed row                        |
| feed-time       | Aktiv Grotesk         | 13   | 400    | 1.40        | 0              | —            | Timestamp                                        |
| code-micro      | Aktiv Grotesk Mono    | 12   | 400    | 1.40        | 0              | tnum         | Reference IDs                                    |

### Principles

- **Extended cut for display, normal cut for body**: Aktiv Grotesk Extended is wider than tall — the headline tier reads as poster-bold, the body tier reads as conversational.
- **Weight 900 is the brand's display voice**: Not 700 (PayPal) or 400 (Coinbase) — the heaviest cut is the right one for Venmo's loud, confident headlines.
- **Hard negative tracking on display, zero on body**: -1.2px to -2px on display sizes; 0 on body. The brand wants display to read as a single poster-block.
- **Tabular numerals on every amount**: `tnum + zero` is enabled on every dollar figure in the feed. Slashed zero distinguishes "$0" from "$O".
- **Deep blue-black ink, not pure black**: All primary text uses `#1f2e3a` — quietly cool-tinted.
- **Emoji is first-class type**: The transaction-note row treats emoji as content, not decoration. They render at body-text size, inline with words.
- **System-ui in the fallback**: Unlike PayPal, Venmo allows the system font to take over if Aktiv Grotesk fails — the brand is comfortable being a "good app" rather than a "good corporate".
- **Eyebrow is uppercase + 1.6px tracking**: Used to label sections ("FOR YOU", "WITH FRIENDS").

## Layout

### Spacing System
Base 4px. Scale: 4, 8, 12, 16, 20, 24, 32, 48, 80, 120. Section spacing 80px; hero 120px. Slightly tighter than PayPal — Venmo reads denser, more app-like.

### Grid & Container
- Page max-width 1200px, 24px / 32px gutters
- Prose width 720px
- Hero full-bleed with content constrained
- Feed-row mockups always anchor on the right side of hero blocks (left = headline + CTA, right = phone-shaped frame with feed rows visible)

### Whitespace Philosophy
Venmo balances **section breathing room** (80–120px) with **dense feed-row stacking** (16–20px gaps between rows). The feed itself is intentionally tight — like a chat list — while the marketing sections around it breathe.

### Section Cadence
White → cool-grey band → white → Venmo Blue hero → white → footer. The blue full-bleed appears once or twice per page, never adjacent to itself.

### Breakpoints
| Name    | Width  | Use                              |
|---------|--------|----------------------------------|
| mobile  | <640   | Stacked single-column            |
| tablet  | 640–1024 | 2-col grid                      |
| desktop | 1024–1280 | 3-col grid                     |
| wide    | ≥1280  | Full layout                     |

### Touch Targets
Minimum 44×44px. CTAs ship at 48px height; hero CTAs at 56px. Heart icon at 48px hit-target despite 24px glyph.

### Collapsing Strategy
- Top nav collapses to hamburger below 1024px
- Hero display-hero scales 80px → 56px → 40px desktop → tablet → mobile
- Feature grid 3-col → 2-col → 1-col
- Footer 5-col → 2-col → accordion

### Image Behavior
- Phone-frame mockups maintain aspect-ratio 9:19.5 (iPhone)
- Hero illustrations cover with `aspect-ratio: 16/9`
- `srcset` for retina; `loading="lazy"` for below-fold

### Container Queries
Feed-row cards use container queries: <320px → vertical stack (avatar above, name below); ≥320px → horizontal layout (avatar left, name + note centre, amount right).

## Elevation & Depth

| Level | Treatment                                                         | Use                                           |
|-------|-------------------------------------------------------------------|-----------------------------------------------|
| 0     | Flat                                                              | Hero text, body                               |
| 1     | 1px hairline `#dbe2e8`                                            | Default white card, feed row                  |
| 2     | Ambient shadow `rgba(31,46,58,0.06) 0 1px 2px`                    | Sticky nav post-scroll                        |
| 3     | Standard shadow `rgba(31,46,58,0.08) 0 4px 12px`                  | Card hover, CTA hover                         |
| 4     | Elevated shadow `rgba(31,46,58,0.12) 0 16px 32px -8px`            | Dropdown, mega-menu                           |
| 5     | Deep shadow `rgba(31,46,58,0.18) 0 30px 60px -20px`               | Modal dialog, phone-frame mockup              |

### Shadow Philosophy

Shadows are **deep-blue-tinted, not pure black**. The phone-frame mockup gets the deepest shadow — it floats off the page. Elsewhere the system stays flat. Like PayPal, Venmo prefers a hairline + surface-jump aesthetic over decorative depth.

## Shapes

| Tier        | Value | Use                                             |
|-------------|-------|-------------------------------------------------|
| None        | 0     | Banner promo bars, full-bleed edges             |
| Micro       | 2     | Status dots                                     |
| XS          | 4     | Tooltip arrows                                  |
| SM          | 8     | Inputs, dropdowns                               |
| MD          | 12    | Feed-row cards, mid-size cards                  |
| LG          | 16    | Feature cards, modals, app-mockup phone frame   |
| XL          | 24    | Hero cards, large image containers              |
| Pill        | 9999  | All CTAs, badges, friend chips                  |

Phone-frame mockups use a 32–40px radius (matching iPhone bezel) — the Venmo app screenshot is the marketing site's most-shown component, and rendering it at iOS-bezel radius is brand-correct.

## Components

### Buttons

**Primary CTA** ("Sign Up", "Get the App")
- Background: `#3d95ce` (Brand)
- Text: `#ffffff`, weight 700, 16px
- Padding: 14px / 28px
- Height: 48px
- Radius: pill (9999)
- Hover: bg `#2c7eb5`, translateY(-1px), shadow `rgba(31,46,58,0.10) 0 4px 12px`
- Active: bg `#225f8c`, no lift
- Use case: every primary action

**Hero CTA** (large)
- Same as primary but 18px / 36px padding, 56px height
- Use case: top-of-page CTA on campaign hero

**Secondary Outline** ("Learn More")
- Background: `#ffffff`
- Text: `#3d95ce`, weight 700
- Border: 2px solid `#3d95ce`
- Padding: 12px / 26px
- Height: 48px
- Radius: pill
- Hover: bg `#eef6fb` (Venmo Blue at 8%); border darkens to `#2c7eb5`
- Use case: secondary action

**Tertiary Text Link** ("View Activity")
- Background: transparent
- Text: `#3d95ce`, weight 700, with underline-on-hover
- Use case: in-text actions

**On-Blue CTA** ("Download")
- Background: `#ffffff`
- Text: `#3d95ce`, weight 700
- Same pill geometry
- Use case: primary CTA when sitting on a Venmo Blue hero

### Cards

**Feature Card**
- Background: `#f5f8fa`
- Border: 1px solid `#e8edf2`
- Radius: 16px
- Padding: 24px
- No default shadow; hover gains `rgba(31,46,58,0.10) 0 4px 12px`
- Use case: 3-up feature grid

**Feed Row Card** (the signature)
- Background: `#ffffff`
- Border: 1px solid `#e8edf2` (border-soft)
- Radius: 12px
- Padding: 16px / 20px
- Layout: avatar (48px) left, name + note centre, amount + time right
- Hover: bg shifts to `#f5f8fa`
- Use case: every transaction-feed example on the marketing site

**Product Card**
- Background: `#ffffff`
- Border: 1px solid `#dbe2e8`
- Radius: 16px
- Padding: 24px
- Shadow: ambient
- Use case: app-store comparison, feature deep-dive

### Badges, Tags, Pills

**Brand Badge**
- Background: `#eef6fb` (brand at 8%)
- Text: `#3d95ce`, weight 700, 12px
- Padding: 4px / 10px
- Radius: pill
- Use case: "New", "Popular", "Verified"

**Status Pill**
- Success: bg `rgba(46,168,79,0.12)`, text `#2ea84f`
- Warning: bg `rgba(245,166,35,0.14)`, text `#a96b00`
- Danger: bg `rgba(224,32,32,0.10)`, text `#e02020`

### Inputs / Forms

**Text Input**
- Background: `#ffffff`
- Border: 1px solid `#9aa5b1`
- Radius: 8px
- Height: 48px
- Padding: 12px / 16px
- Focus: border `#3d95ce` 2px, ring `0 0 0 3px rgba(61,149,206,0.40)`

**Amount Input (Large)** — the iconic Venmo "$0.00" input
- Background: `#ffffff`
- Border: none
- Padding: 8px 0
- Height: 96px
- Font: display-xl in Aktiv Grotesk Extended at weight 900, colour `#3d95ce`
- Centre-aligned, with `$` prefix in `text-muted`
- This is the brand's signature input — the "How much?" gesture

**Note Input** (the friend-message field)
- Same as text input but height 56px
- Placeholder: "What's it for?"
- Emoji picker button on the right (24px glyph)

### Navigation

**Top Nav**
- Height: 64px
- Background: `#ffffff`
- Border-bottom: 1px solid `#e8edf2`
- Logo left (Venmo wordmark in `#3d95ce`), nav links centre, "Sign In" + "Get Started" right
- Nav link: 14px / 500, colour `#1f2e3a`; hover: colour shifts to `#3d95ce`

**Footer**
- Background: `#1f2e3a` (deep blue-black)
- Text: `#9aa5b1` for links, `#ffffff` for category headers
- Padding: 64px vertical
- Bottom rule: `rgba(255,255,255,0.20)` 1px

### Selectors

**Friend Picker** (rare on marketing, but illustrated in mockups)
- Pill chip with avatar + name + remove-X
- Background: `#eef6fb`, text `#3d95ce`, padding 4px / 12px, radius pill

### Tabs

**Pill Tabs**
- Container: `#e8edf2` bg, pill radius, 4px inner padding
- Active: `#ffffff` bg, `#1f2e3a` text, weight 700, soft shadow
- Inactive: transparent bg, `#6b7785` text

### Tooltips

- Background: `#1f2e3a`
- Text: `#ffffff`, weight 500, 13px
- Padding: 8px / 12px
- Radius: 6px

### Toasts

- Success: bg `#ffffff`, left-border 4px `#2ea84f`
- Error: bg `#ffffff`, left-border 4px `#e02020`
- Info: bg `#ffffff`, left-border 4px `#3d95ce`
- 4-second auto-dismiss

### Modals

- Overlay: `rgba(31, 46, 58, 0.55)` (deep-blue-tinted)
- Dialog: bg `#ffffff`, radius 16px, max-width 480px, padding 32px
- Close glyph top-right, 24px, `#6b7785`

### Decorative

**Heart Icon** (the social-like)
- 24×24 SVG heart in `#e02020`
- Tap animation: bounce-scale from 1.0 → 1.4 → 1.0 over 480ms with `cubic-bezier(0.34, 1.56, 0.64, 1)`
- Reduced motion: instant fill

**Emoji Inline**
- Used at body-text size (16px) inline with words in feed notes
- Native emoji rendering — no custom set
- The brand's "🍕 Pizza" pattern is iconic

### Easing
- **Standard**: `cubic-bezier(0.4, 0, 0.2, 1)`
- **Emphasized**: `cubic-bezier(0.2, 0, 0, 1)`
- **Bounce**: `cubic-bezier(0.34, 1.56, 0.64, 1)` — heart-tap animation, like-pulse
- **Entrance**: `cubic-bezier(0, 0, 0.2, 1)`

### Durations
- **Fast**: 120ms — colour shifts, hover state
- **Standard**: 200ms — card hover, tab switch
- **Slow**: 320ms — modal entrance
- **Bounce**: 480ms — heart-tap, social-like animation

### Per-Component Recipes

- **Button hover**: translateY(-1px) over 200ms ease-standard; shadow blooms ambient → standard
- **Feed-row hover**: bg shifts white → `#f5f8fa` over 120ms
- **Heart-tap (like)**: scale 1.0 → 1.4 → 1.0 over 480ms ease-bounce with simultaneous fill colour transition
- **Phone-frame entrance** (in hero): translateY(48px) → 0 + opacity 0 → 1 over 480ms ease-emphasized
- **Modal entrance**: 320ms ease-emphasized; overlay fades in 200ms; dialog scales 0.96 → 1.0
- **Toast**: enter from translateY(16px) + fade 200ms; auto-exit at 4s

### Reduced Motion
Strictly respected. All translateY collapses to opacity-only. Heart-tap bounce becomes instant fill. Phone-frame entrance is instant.

### Contrast Pairs
- `#1f2e3a` text on `#ffffff` bg: **14.6:1** — AAA
- `#2f3e4a` body on `#ffffff` bg: **9.8:1** — AAA
- `#ffffff` on `#3d95ce` brand: **4.7:1** — AA at all sizes; Venmo bumps to weight 700 for additional legibility
- `#3d95ce` link on `#ffffff` bg: **4.5:1** — AA at body sizes
- `#6b7785` muted on `#ffffff`: **5.8:1** — AA at body sizes

### Focus Indicators
3px solid `rgba(61,149,206,0.40)` ring with 2px offset on every interactive element. Pill buttons get a fully pill-shaped ring.

### ARIA Patterns
- **Combobox**: friend/contact picker uses `role="combobox"` with `aria-expanded`
- **Listbox**: dropdowns use `role="listbox"`
- **Dialog**: modals use `role="dialog"`, `aria-modal="true"`, focus-trap
- **Live region**: payment-confirmation toast uses `aria-live="assertive"` (money has just moved — make sure it's announced)
- **Heart-icon button**: `aria-pressed="true|false"` to communicate liked-state to screen readers

### Keyboard Nav
- Tab order matches visual flow
- Heart icon togglable via Space/Enter
- Modal focus-trapped, Escape closes
- Amount input accepts numeric keypad on mobile; supports decimal, no scientific notation

### Screen Reader Hints
- Heart icon: "Like this transaction" / "Unlike this transaction"
- Avatar images: `alt="Profile picture of {name}"`
- Emoji in transaction notes: rely on native emoji descriptions
- Currency: visible "$" + numerals

### Reduced Motion
Honored across all animations; heart-tap bounce becomes instant fill; phone-frame entrance becomes instant.

### Tone
**Casual-friendly** — friendlier than PayPal, more app-native. Sentences are short, often single-word. The voice favours second person ("Pay your friends", "Split the bill") and uses contractions naturally ("It's free"). Display headlines are imperative ("Pay anyone." "Split it."). The brand sounds like a friend who happens to have your venue's password.

### Microcopy Patterns
- **Button verbs**: "Pay", "Request", "Send", "Get the App", "Sign Up", "Sign In"
- **Error message recipe**: short + actionable. "We couldn't process that. Try a different card."
- **Success confirmation**: "✓ Sent $50 to Alex" — checkmark glyph + amount + recipient. Always show the money figure.
- **Loading state**: "One sec…" rather than "Loading…"

### Empty States
- **No activity**: "No payments yet. Send some money to get started."
- **No friends**: "Find friends to start paying." + "Connect Contacts" CTA
- **No notifications**: "All caught up. 🎉" — emoji-laden, friendly

### CTA Verb Conventions
- **Acquisition**: "Sign Up", "Get the App", "Get Started"
- **Sign-in**: "Sign In" (not "Log In" — Venmo prefers the friendlier verb)
- **Payment**: "Pay", "Request", "Send" — never "Submit"
- **Exploration**: "Learn More", "See How"
- **Confirmation**: "Pay $50" — always include the amount in the confirm CTA

The brand never uses "Submit" or "Continue" alone — Venmo always pairs verbs with values ("Pay $50", "Request $25", "Send to Alex").

The Venmo iOS app ships a dedicated dark mode that the marketing site occasionally illustrates inside phone-frame mockups. The marketing site itself remains light-only.

If extending to true dark theme:

```yaml
colors-dark:
  bg: '#0a1620'                # near-black with cool-blue tint
  bg-elevated: '#1a2a36'
  bg-cool: '#1a2a36'
  surface: '#1f2e3a'
  surface-soft: '#28394a'
  surface-strong: '#324654'
  text: '#ffffff'
  text-body: '#e8edf2'
  text-muted: '#9aa5b1'
  text-subtle: '#6b7785'
  brand: '#5badd6'             # lifted Venmo Blue — `#3d95ce` doesn't read as bright on dark
  brand-hover: '#7ec1e2'
  on-brand: '#0a1620'
  border: 'rgba(255,255,255,0.10)'
  border-strong: 'rgba(255,255,255,0.20)'
  link: '#5badd6'
```

The dark-mode brand voltage **lifts** Venmo Blue from `#3d95ce` to `#5badd6` — the lower-luminance original doesn't have enough contrast against a dark surface to read as "active".

Venmo's visual lineage runs through three streams:

**Helvetica humanism via Aktiv Grotesk.** Aktiv Grotesk is a 21st-century Helvetica reinterpretation by Dalton Maag, designed to fix Helvetica's optical inconsistencies while preserving its neutrality. The Extended cut at weight 900 is what gives Venmo its poster-bold display voice — closer to a 1970s pop-rock concert poster than to a fintech wordmark.

**Twitter / Instagram social-feed UX.** The transaction feed is the brand's signature unit, and it borrows directly from social-media feed conventions: avatar + name (hyperlink-blue) + content + timestamp + reactions. Venmo was the first fintech to commit to "money as social", and the feed-row component is the visual artefact of that thesis.

**iOS-native button geometry.** Pill-shaped CTAs were standard on iOS apps long before they were common on the web. Venmo's marketing pages adopt the iOS button shape unaltered — which makes the web brand feel like an extension of the app, not a separate surface.

What it rejects: **PayPal-style corporate-finance posture** (Venmo is the rebellious sibling), **crypto-native maximalism** (no gradients, no neon), and **Stripe-style developer-tool minimalism** (Venmo wants to feel like a friend, not a tool).

**Influences:**
- **PayPal** ([paypal.com](https://www.paypal.com)) — Parent company; Venmo defines itself by what PayPal isn't (less corporate, more social)
- **Aktiv Grotesk / Dalton Maag** — Type foundry; the Extended cut at 900 is the brand's display signature
- **Twitter / Instagram** — Feed-row UX as core content unit
- **iOS Human Interface Guidelines** — Pill button geometry, app-native interaction patterns

## Do's and Don'ts

**Do:**
- Use Venmo Blue `#3d95ce` for everything actionable — it's the single brand voltage
- Render friend names hyperlink-blue (`#3d95ce`) in transaction-feed rows
- Use Aktiv Grotesk Extended at weight 900 for display, normal cut at 400–700 for body
- Treat emoji as first-class type in transaction notes — inline, body-size, native rendering
- Pill all CTAs (radius 9999) — it's the brand's button shape
- Show the transaction-feed row prominently — it's the brand's most distinctive component
- Use deep blue-black `#1f2e3a` for ink and footer ground; never pure black
- Apply tabular numerals + slashed zero on every dollar figure
- Tint shadows deep-blue (`rgba(31, 46, 58, ...)`) — quietly brand-coloured depth
- Pair payment CTAs with the amount ("Pay $50", not "Pay") — confirmation discipline

**Don't:**
- Don't introduce a second brand colour — Venmo is mono-blue, not dual-blue like PayPal
- Don't use the standard cut of Aktiv Grotesk for display — the Extended cut is the brand
- Don't square CTA corners — pills are non-negotiable
- Don't use pure black ink — `#1f2e3a` carries a faint cool tint
- Don't use proportional figures for amounts — tabular mono with `tnum + zero`
- Don't render emoji as decoration — they're first-class content
- Don't use formal CTA verbs ("Submit", "Confirm") — pair with action and amount
- Don't apply heavy decorative shadows — depth is hairlines and surface contrast
- Don't use warm-grey neutrals — Venmo is cool-toned, slightly warmer than PayPal
- Don't replace the heart-like with a thumbs-up — the heart is the social vocabulary

### Quick Color Reference

```
Brand:        #3d95ce  (Venmo Blue)
Brand Hover:  #2c7eb5
Ink:          #1f2e3a
Canvas:       #ffffff
Cool Band:    #f5f8fa
Body:         #2f3e4a
Muted:        #6b7785
Border:       #dbe2e8
Brand Tint:   #eef6fb
Heart Red:    #e02020
Success:      #2ea84f
```

### Example Component Prompts

1. *"Create a Venmo-style hero: pure white background, 80px Aktiv Grotesk Extended headline at weight 900 in `#1f2e3a` with -2px tracking — text 'Pay anyone. Anywhere.'. Below, a 18px body in `#2f3e4a`. Two pill CTAs: primary in Venmo Blue (`#3d95ce`) labelled 'Get the App', secondary outline in `#3d95ce` labelled 'Sign In'. Right side: a phone-frame mockup at 32px iPhone-bezel radius showing a transaction feed."*

2. *"Design a Venmo transaction-feed row: white card, 12px radius, 1px border `#e8edf2`, 16px / 20px padding. Left: 48px circle avatar. Centre: friend name in `#3d95ce` weight 700 + transaction note in `#1f2e3a` weight 400 ('Pizza 🍕'). Right: amount in Aktiv Grotesk Mono with `tnum + zero` ('+ $25.00') in `#2ea84f`, time below in `#6b7785` 13px. On hover, bg shifts white → `#f5f8fa`."*

3. *"Build the iconic Venmo amount input: pure white background, no border. 96px Aktiv Grotesk Extended at weight 900 in `#3d95ce` reading '$0.00'. Centre-aligned. Below, a 56px-tall note input with placeholder 'What's it for?' and an emoji-picker glyph on the right edge."*

4. *"Compose a Venmo Blue hero band: full-bleed `#3d95ce` background, white 64px display-xl headline ('Money Moves'), white 18px subheadline at 80% opacity. White pill CTA at 56px height, with `#3d95ce` text labelled 'Get the App'. Hairline divider at `rgba(255,255,255,0.22)`."*

5. *"Design a Venmo social-like interaction: 24px heart icon. Default state: outline only, `#9aa5b1`. On tap: fills to `#e02020` and bounces scale 1.0 → 1.4 → 1.0 over 480ms with `cubic-bezier(0.34, 1.56, 0.64, 1)`. Below the heart, render a comment count in `#6b7785` 13px. Reduced-motion users get instant fill, no bounce."*

6. *"Create a Venmo feature card: `#f5f8fa` background, 16px radius, 1px border `#e8edf2`, 24px padding. Title 24px Aktiv Grotesk weight 700 in `#1f2e3a`. Body 16px weight 400 in `#2f3e4a`. Bottom-right: a small Venmo Blue arrow glyph indicating 'Learn more'. On hover, lift translateY(-2px), shadow blooms to `rgba(31,46,58,0.10) 0 4px 12px`."*

### Iteration Guide

1. **Commit to the single blue**: if you have two blues, you have PayPal. Venmo is mono-`#3d95ce` for everything actionable.
2. **Switch display to Aktiv Grotesk Extended at 900**: this is the single biggest move — the wide-cut at 900 is what makes a page feel "Venmo".
3. **Render friend names hyperlink-blue**: in feed rows, names use `#3d95ce` weight 700. This is non-negotiable.
4. **Add emoji to transaction notes**: a Venmo feed without emoji isn't Venmo. Use native emoji at body-text size, inline.
5. **Pill every CTA**: radius 9999. The pill is the brand's button shape.
6. **Replace black ink with `#1f2e3a`**: deep blue-black, not pure. Subtle but it cool-tints every paragraph.
7. **Tabular mono for every amount**: `tnum + zero`. Money figures must be ledger-discipline.
8. **Show the phone-frame mockup**: marketing pages without a phone-shaped feed mockup don't read as Venmo. Render at iOS-bezel radius (32–40px).