How to cite the Style Manual

This style guidance is for Australian Government writers following the manual’s referencing and attribution rules. Those outside the Australian Government might follow other rules.

You don’t need to cite the Style Manual when you use its guidance to create content.

Use referencing style for mentions of the Style Manual

A long-held convention is that titles mentioned in body text follow their equivalent referencing style. We recommend that Australian Government writers follow the styles shown in either of the Author–date and Documentary–note systems.

Training and professional development

The Style Manual team does not run training. Australian Public Service employees can access training through the Australian Public Service Academy (APS Academy). People working in Australian, state or local government can join the Digital Profession to connect with others.

APS Academy training

The APS Academy provides training in writing and editing for Australian Public Service employees. This training is based on the content in the Style Manual.

The APS Academy is responsible for developing APS Craft – the essential skills that public servants need in order to deliver good policy and services.

About the Style Manual

Use the Style Manual when creating Australian Government content.

The Australian Government Style Manual (Style Manual) is the definitive resource for Australian Government content.

It helps you put people’s needs at the centre of the content you create. It’s the toolkit for making information easy to read, accessible and inclusive.

The Style Manual is produced and published by the Australian Public Service Commission.

The need for an Australian Government style manual

People interact with government through content. This includes text on webpages, forms, videos or images.

PDF (Portable Document Format)

Only create PDFs if your research shows there are specific needs for this format. Make PDF content accessible to everyone who needs it.

Create webpages by default

Create content in HTML pages instead of PDFs.

You can configure HTML pages for printing and sharing.

Usability problems with PDFs

PDFs often create problems for users, including:

Agency responsibilities and commitments

Accessibility is a mandatory standard for government agencies. Test your content against the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) success criteria. Agencies should commit to improving their performance against the standard.

Use WCAG to guide your agency about accessibility

‘WCAG’ stands for Web Content Accessibility Guidelines. WCAG 2.2 is the current version. The Worldwide Web Consortium (W3C) released version 2.2 in October 2023.

WCAG is a stable standard to meet specific needs of people with disability. The standard acknowledges its limitations in meeting needs for people with cognitive and learning disabilities.

The standard is integrated with Style Manual guidance to help you create inclusive content.

Apply accessibility principles

User needs are at the heart of the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG). When you take user needs into account, applying accessibility principles becomes simpler, though not necessarily easier.

Use WCAG principles to meet user needs

The Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.2 guidelines can be expressed as user needs. These needs feature throughout the Style Manual. The following lists group user needs (guidelines) under WCAG principles.

Principle: content is perceivable

Any user can perceive the content.

User needs:

Design for accessibility and inclusion

How we design has a direct influence on what we design. Inclusive design means that the products and services we create work for everyone.

Design for all

The idea of ‘design for all’ has its roots in human-computer interaction studies. This body of knowledge offers practical methods to improve people’s experience of digital content.

The Style Manual promotes some of these methods, in line with the Digital Service Standard, such as:

Make content accessible

People can experience ongoing, temporary or situational barriers to access information they need. Help them by designing accessible and inclusive content.

Make content accessible

Accessibility is about inclusion.

Government services and products need to be available to everyone. This means creating inclusive content.

Inclusive content recognises:

  • Australia’s diversity
  • the diversity of technology Australians use to engage online.

For example, inclusive content accommodates:

How to use the Style Manual

How to find what you need in the Style Manual.

Style Manual basics

Use the Style Manual to learn how to apply government style to all kinds of content formats. It tells you how to write and edit user-focused content.

Guidance on each page helps you understand how to:

  • create content for government
  • use rules and conventions to create consistent content.

You can use the manual for services and products that are designed for end-users (external-facing content). It’s equally applicable to content for government users (internal-to-government content).

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