Here is a breakdown of the new features, visual updates, and under-the-hood changes you'll see from the 2026Q3 release.
A complete slider refactor
We've completely overhauled how users interact with and navigate sliders. To simplify the user experience, navigation controls (Next/Previous) are now anchored to the bottom-right corner of the slider component, while pagination sits neatly in the bottom-left.
The slider now has the ability to add a grid layout with the option to display multiple rows as well as columns.
To keep things clean on smaller screens, pagination is now hidden on mobile devices. We’ve also implemented better container queries, ensuring the slider's responsive behavior adapts beautifully across all screen widths with available view modes.
To top it off, the accessibility module is now enabled on the slider component, allowing Swiper to announce slide changes and properly label its own controls.
Richer page banners
The banner region is one area that needs close attention as it performs multiple duties across simple pages (articles) and more demanding ones such as campaigns. The structure and functionality of the banner has been substantially uplifted, allowing for more presentational options and editor creative control.
- Animated page banners: Editors can now bring page banners to life with a full-width background image and an optional slow "pan & zoom" motion effect (featuring 36 presets like zoom in/out and various focal points). Note: Visitors with "reduce motion" enabled will see a static image to remain accessibility compliant.
- Banner side image: We've added new decorative edge shapes (slants, curves, waves, arrows, rounded corners).
- Banner utility buttons: Print and Listen buttons have been added directly to the banner region, giving users immediate control over how they want to share or consume page content.
Footer redesign
The footer region has been entirely redesigned. It now serves as a dedicated home for site logos, personalisation (audience) filtering, and a "Provide feedback" link. Overall the footer is not more functional and can comfortably handle standard requirements for government sites.
Related region
The page template has been updated to support a new, standardized "related" region for content.
Smarter video & media controls
The handling of media has also been uplifted.
- Accessible video backgrounds: Video backgrounds now feature a visible pause/play button. If a visitor's browser requests reduced motion, the video will start paused and display a fallback image automatically.
- Clickable image comparisons: The image comparison slider is no longer restricted to drag-only interactions. A full-width range input allows the divider to respond to a single click, a tap, or keyboard arrow keys.
- Immediate logo updates: Logos are now rendered through Drupal's image field pipeline. This introduces automatic cache-busting, meaning when you replace a logo file, the site updates immediately rather than waiting for a browser cache to clear.
- Uncropped media defaults: Images in the default media display are no longer forced into a 16:9 crop; they now display uncropped at a medium responsive size.
Layout & component refinements
Many components have been reviewed and refined, bring extra polish to the overall look and feel.
- Card background colors: Card components now use a refined background at 90% opacity instead of using the background-stronger variable. This brings card backgrounds perfectly in line with the intended design palette while maintaining strong accessibility contrast.
- Content column gaps: We've increased the gaps between columns on content pages to better delineate main content from sidebar content.
- Call to action (CTA) redesign: CTAs have been redesigned to use an elegant 8-1-3 layout. This provides adequate breathing room for the main text (8 columns), a one-column gap, followed by the action button (3 columns).
- FOI Listings: Freedom of Information (FOI) listings have been upgraded. They now use a responsive Search view mode instead of a rigid table, and feature faceted search so users can easily filter results by date.
- Sidebar nav parent: Stronger navigation logic that now includes the parent link directly in the sidebar menu.
- TOC Smooth scrolling: Clicking links in the Table of Contents now features smooth scrolling behavior.
- New card date component: A new date card component has been introduced to display important dates and events. On narrow cards, the date displays as a full-width band above the text; on wider cards, it appears as a calendar tab beside the text, separated by a hairline border.
- Item list – Item: The item paragraph now includes a Date field across all eleven view modes (teaser, tile, summary, stack, icon, card, etc.).
- Enhanced file links: File links across the site (and via the Teaser Icon component) now consistently display a download icon, the file name as the link, followed by the file type and size. Basic pages also now show a "Download" heading above their attachments. We also pushed a small layout fix ensuring file "download" tiles no longer squash their icon or filename.
- Refined Teaser Icon: Teasers icons now feature a bold title followed by category and date, separated by a short divider (which only draws if a date exists to prevent empty gaps).
- Datatable component: A brand new component allowing CSVs to be uploaded and displayed as interactive tables.
Audience selection widget
Previous iterations of the site included a lightweight “Audience filter” that allowed content to be selectively shown based on the audience of the user. This is the easiest way to personalise the site. This capability has been extended with an Audience widget, giving the user visibility and control over their audience.
- Audience widget: Visitors can now explicitly choose their own audience via a dropdown block (often located in the footer), rather than relying solely on inferred browsing behavior. This choice is remembered in the browser, perfectly announced by screen readers, and ensures personalized content is highly accurate.
- Asynchronous audience filters: Choosing an audience in standard filter views now updates the page immediately without a reload. It raises a toast notification in the bottom right that clears after five seconds (unless hovered or focused) and announces the change to assistive technologies.
Accessibility (A11y)
Accessibility is a continuous journey, and Q3 brings major quality-of-life updates for all users, aiming to achieve WCAG2.2 AA standards:
- Semantic rich text rendering: Editor-authored rich text now consistently renders a much fuller set of standard HTML elements. Tags like <abbr> (hover to show full term), <dl>, <dt>, <dd>, <hgroup>, <cite>, <address>, <dfn>, <time>, along with citations, highlighted text, and collapsible "details" sections now display beautifully. This massively improves machine-readability for screen readers, search engines, and AI assistants.
- Combobox search suggestions: Search suggestions now act as an accessible combobox. Screen readers announce the suggestion list with a count and navigation hints, and individual suggestions are announced as they are highlighted.
- Zoom & short viewport support: On short viewports (like a phone held in landscape, or a browser zoomed to 400%), sticky elements like headers, footers, sidebars, and tables of contents are released to scroll with the page, ensuring users aren't left with zero reading space.
- Distinct navigation landmarks: Menu landmarks now have distinct accessible names. For example, the sidebar menu announces "In this section" rather than sharing "Main navigation" with the header.
Editor experience & under the hood
- No-code favicons: Site administrators can now upload and manage favicons entirely through the Drupal UI without writing code! By enabling the Metatag: Favicons submodules, you can configure 16x16, 32x32, SVG, and Apple touch icons directly from the Global Metatag settings.
- Clearer help text: We’ve reworded the editor help text across roughly two dozen fields (primarily tightening grammar) to make instructions clearer without changing how the fields behave.
Custom welcome message
As a friendly touch, the platform is convivial afterall, a customised welcome message is displayed to the user based on the time since they last logged in and what time of day it is. User profile pages now feature a dedicated intro block placed above the existing profile blocks.
Conclusion
Morpht is deeply committed to the continuous evolution of Convivial for GovCMS. This Q3 release reflects our ongoing dedication to providing a starter site that is not only highly flexible and empowering for content editors, but fundamentally accessible by design.
As we push our components to meet and exceed WCAG 2.2 AA standards, our goal remains the same: to give government agencies the most robust, inclusive, and user-friendly digital foundation possible.
We have invested significant time and expertise into this latest round of improvements, but we are always looking for ways to refine the platform further. We welcome your feedback on these new features and would love to discuss how Convivial for GovCMS can accelerate and elevate your next project.
