Updated: February 1, 2022

Consent Forms

Intro

The Consent Form pattern is generally used in onboarding scenarios. It stores a digital record of the user’s understanding and permission of the terms of an event, activity, or service that will be performed by the application.

Consent form in compact width (left) and regular width (right)
Consent form in compact width (left) and regular width (right)

Anatomy

A: Navigation Bar

The Navigation Bar contains the consent form action buttons (like Cancel, Back or Next). 

B: Body Title

The Body Title should be a concise label that describes the consent form topic.

C: Body Text

The Body Text should detail how the consent form topic pertains to the app and why it is important for the user to agree to the form.

D: Learn More Link (Optional)

The Learn More Link lets users learn more about the consent form topic.

E: Toolbar with Actions

The Toolbar is used for the primary consent form actions.

Consent form anatomy
Consent form anatomy

Behavior and Interaction

Scroll

By default, the navigation bar (or header) has the same background color as the screen background. However, when scrolling is enabled, the navigation bar will transition to having a shadow effect on the bottom. This scrolling behavior is applicable to all compact and regular widths as well as any onboarding screen that has a navigation bar that matches colors with the screen view background.

Information
Triggering a consent form will have the form modal slide up from the bottom of the screen. On dismissal the modal will slide down.
Consent form that has not been scrolled (left) and consent form that has been scrolled (right)
Consent form that has not been scrolled (left) and consent form that has been scrolled (right)

Alerts

The alerts for the consent forms use the standard two-button iOS alert.

Cancel

Optional and Mandatory scenarios: if the user taps Cancel they will trigger an alert asking if they want to quit the onboarding process. Choosing No will dismiss the alert and continue with the onboarding process.

Deny

Mandatory scenario: if the user taps on Deny on a screen that requires consent then they will trigger an alert that says the user must give consent in order to continue with the onboarding process.

Cancel alert (left) and deny alert (right)
Cancel alert (left) and deny alert (right)

Sequential

The first step of the sequential form will always have Cancel in the navigation bar. The first step will be a modal that slides up from the bottom of the screen. From step 1, the user must tap Next to continue with the next steps.

All subsequent steps will have <Back to (Screen Title). They can go back to the previous step by tapping the Back navigation in the navigation bar. The following steps will be a push. The final step will have the toolbar with actions Not Now or Deny and Allow. When the last step is complete, the modal will dismiss and slide down.

Fist step of the sequential form (left), second step (middle) and last step (right)
Fist step of the sequential form (left), second step (middle) and last step (right)

Variations

Form Conditions

Optional

If the user taps on Not Now or Allow, there is no alert. It will simply dismiss the consent form and take the user to the next step of the onboarding process.

Mandatory

If the user taps on Deny they will get an alert saying they must give consent to continue. Tapping Allow will dismiss the modal and take them to the next step in the onboarding process.

Optional consent form (left) and mandatory consent form (right)
Optional consent form (left) and mandatory consent form (right)

Form Arrangements

Single and sequential forms can be either mandatory or optional. If there are a mix of single and sequential consent forms, the single consent form will be a separate modal and the sequential forms will be presented in a separate modal.

Single

If there are multiple single consent forms, they will all be presented as separate modals (should not be bundled in one modal). There are no titles on the single consent screens.

Sequential

For sequential forms, the navigation bar shows the current and total numbers of the form pages. The action bar doesn’t appear until the user reaches the last page in the form.

Single consent form (left) and sequential consent forms (middle and right)
Single consent form (left) and sequential consent forms (middle and right)

Specifications

Compact

When the text wraps and pushes the Learn more… link down, and the lower 64px padding reaches below the end of the screen, scrolling should be enabled. This is the same whether or not the toolbar is present.

Information
Padding is the same for single and sequential consent forms.
Consent form specification with toolbar (left) and without toolbar (right)
Consent form specification with toolbar (left) and without toolbar (right)

Regular

Regular width has the same behavior as compact width: scrolling should be enabled when the text wraps and pushes the Learn more… link down, and the lower 64px padding reaches below the end of the screen (regardless of whether the toolbar is present). 

The padding is the same for all regular sizes, the only changes are the default layout margins for each screen size (252 px for landscape and 48 px for portrait).

Consent form specification for regular width
Consent form specification for regular width

Resources

Related Component: Navigation Bar

Development: Onboarding patterns