How to Use Claude Opus 5.5 for Website Design

Claude Opus 5.5, released September 22, 2026, is Anthropic’s flagship model for coding and complex work. On website design, Claude can:

• Turn a brief into structure and copy
• Build interactive prototypes
• Write production-ready front-end code
• Set up a consistent design system
• Review layouts from screenshots
• Raise accessibility and performance
• Revise from your feedback in minutes

Claude designs quickly. Your taste and your brief decide whether the result is good.

Claude Design

Prompt-to-prototype design, launched April 17, 2026, and added to Claude chat in September 2026.

Artifacts

Interactive web pages and apps you build and preview inside Claude.

Claude Code

Builds and edits the real site inside your project folder.

frontend-design skill

Anthropic’s skill for distinctive, production-grade interfaces.

• Who the site serves
• What visitors should do next
• Which pages you need
• Brand colors, fonts, and logo
• Tone and personality
• Sites you admire, and why
• Content you already have
• Must-have features
• Accessibility and performance targets

A site without a brief turns into a template. A brief makes it yours.

Prompt:

From this brief, propose a sitemap, the order of sections on each page, the main call to action, and the job of each section. Do not design anything yet.

Settle structure before visuals. Most redesigns fail on structure, not on color.

Have Claude draft headlines, section copy, and calls to action from your brief. Then rework them in your own voice.

• One clear message in each section
• Benefits ahead of features
• Only specific, verifiable claims
• Short sentences under scannable headings

Real copy leads to better design than placeholder text.

Describe the page and let Claude build a prototype. Then refine it with precise feedback:

• “Make the hero headline the obvious focus.”
• “Add more space between sections.”
• “Use our brand blue for buttons and links only.”
• “Show me a version with more white space.”

Ask for two or three directions before you commit to one.

Ask Claude to write the rules that every page follows:

• Color tokens with exact hex values
• Type scale and font weights
• Spacing scale
• Border radius and shadows
• Button and link styles
• Form styles
• Icon style

Consistency is what makes a site look designed instead of assembled.

Claude Design can package a design into a handoff bundle for Claude Code, which turns it into working code.

For complex builds in Claude Code, run Opus 5.5 at high effort:

claude --model opus --effort high

Store the design system and project rules in CLAUDE.md so every session sticks to them.

Anthropic’s frontend-design skill steers Claude toward distinctive interfaces and away from a generic look. Install Anthropic’s skills in Claude Code with:

/plugin marketplace add anthropics/skills

• Lay out the phone view first
• Keep tap targets generous
• Prevent horizontal scrolling
• Readable text size on small screens
• Test tablet and desktop afterward

Ask Claude to screenshot every breakpoint and review the images for issues.

• Contrast of at least 4.5:1 for normal text (WCAG AA)
• Proper headings in a logical order
• Alt text on meaningful images
• Visible focus states for keyboard navigation
• Labels on every form field
• Support for reduced-motion settings

An accessible site is a better site for every visitor.

• Images compressed and sized correctly
• Modern image formats
• Only the fonts you actually use
• No unnecessary JavaScript
• Lazy-loading for images below the fold
• Lighthouse for measuring results

• A unique title and description on every page
• One clear H1 on every page
• Descriptive URLs
• A sitemap
• Fast loading on phones
• Helpful, original content

Have Claude critique the finished design:

Review this page as a senior web designer would. List the ten biggest problems with hierarchy, spacing, consistency, accessibility, and conversion, ranked by impact.

Then choose which changes are worth making.

• Test each link and form
• Check on real phones
• Proofread every line of copy
• Confirm analytics and privacy notices, if you use them
• Set up redirects from old URLs
• Back up the previous site

• Structure proposals
• Copy drafts
• Prototypes and variations
• Code
• Design system rules
• Accessibility and performance checks

• The brief
• Taste and final direction
• Brand approval
• Accuracy of claims
• Testing with real people
• Launch decisions

Act as my senior web designer and front-end developer. Using this brief: [brief], propose a sitemap and section plan first, then wait for my approval. Next, create two distinct design directions, each with a design system: colors, type scale, spacing, and components. Build the approved direction mobile first, accessible to WCAG AA, and quick to load. Screenshot every breakpoint, review the images for problems, and fix them. Finally, list anything that needs my decision.