Introducing Docusaurus Preset Nova

Documentation sites need more than a color palette when they are expected to feel like a finished product.

Docusaurus Preset Nova 0.15.0 launched as a coordinated design, content, search, and authoring layer for Docusaurus.

Four Starting Identities

The initial release shipped four complete visual presets:

• Envoy — A polished, approachable system for public-facing product documentation.
• Foundry — A denser technical system suited to tools and engineering projects.
• Sentinel — A high-contrast identity for security and infrastructure products.
• Signal — A vivid system for products that need a more expressive voice.

A site selects its starting point in the Docusaurus configuration:

const config = {
  presets: [
    [
      '@cbnventures/docusaurus-preset-nova',
      {
        preset: 'envoy',
      },
    ],
  ],
};

The choice is larger than a theme name. Each preset coordinates colors, typography, shapes, spacing, navigation, footer treatment, code presentation, and motion.

A System with Deliberate Axes

Version 0.15.0 made the visual system adjustable without requiring a fork.

• Navbar variants included Bridge, Canopy, Monolith, and Compass.
• Footer variants included Commons, Embassy, Ledger, and Launchpad.
• Shape could move from sharp to rounded to pill.
• Density could move from compact to comfortable to spacious.
• Depth could render cards as flat, elevated, or glass surfaces and code blocks as flat, bordered, or elevated surfaces.
• Motion ranged from none to expressive, with coordinated reveal timing.

These axes let a site change character while preserving the relationships that make the design coherent.

Content Tools Belong in the Same Package

The release also included reusable blocks for Hero, Features, Blog Preview, Install Strip, App Market downloads, Spotlight, Stats, Terminology, and Typewriter content.

Authors could add Mermaid diagrams, Shiki-highlighted code, and Sandpack playgrounds without assembling a separate plugin stack. RTL handling, sitemap output, Google Tag Manager integration, and page-transition progress completed the initial authoring surface.

Client-side search used Lunr indexing, a Web Worker, and CJK-aware processing. Search therefore arrived as part of the preset experience rather than a separate hosted service decision.

Why a Preset Instead of a Theme

A Docusaurus theme controls presentation, but a preset can coordinate the plugins and content systems around it. That wider boundary is what makes the package useful as a site foundation.

The goal is not to hide Docusaurus. It is to provide a known-good composition so a new documentation site starts with consistent navigation, search, diagrams, code, internationalization support, analytics hooks, and design tokens.

The preset has continued to grow since this launch. See the current manual setup guide and preset reference for today’s options.