Expressive vs standard

One option decides which Material 3 the site speaks:

themeConfig: { md3: { style: "expressive" } } // or "standard"

Flip it right here with the switch in the top bar — this site ships both.

At a glance

	Expressive	Standard
Colour scheme	expressive, 2025 spec	tonal-spot, 2021 spec
Surfaces	Tinted toward the seed	Near-neutral
Cards	28px corners	12px corners
Callouts	20px corners	12px corners
Code blocks	16px corners	12px corners
Buttons	Pill, squash to 12px when pressed	Pill
Spatial motion	Springs with visible overshoot	Near-critically damped springs
Display type	Weight 720, wider (Roboto Flex wdth 118)	Weight 400, normal width
Headlines	Weight 640	Weight 500
Decoration	Cookie, clover and sun shapes on icons, avatars, headings	Circles and rounded squares
Loading indicator	Wavy	Flat

What stays the same

Both styles share the same seed, the same contrast guarantees, the same layout and every default-theme feature. Switching style never moves content; it changes how the same content feels.

Which one to pick

• Expressive for anything product-facing — a project's front door, where personality helps people remember it. This is the vaam-apps default.
• Standard for reference-heavy sites read for hours at a time — an API reference, a runbook — where calmer surfaces and quieter motion get out of the way.

In your own CSS

The difference is mostly carried by tokens, so your own components follow the style without knowing about it:

.my-card {
  border-radius: var(--md-sys-shape-card); /* 12px or 28px */
  transition: transform var(--md-sys-motion-spring-spatial-default-duration)
    var(--md-sys-motion-spring-spatial-default);
}

For the occasional thing only one style should do, the <html> element carries the active style:

:root[data-md3-style="expressive"] .my-card:hover {
  transform: rotate(-2deg);
}

In a Vue component, useMd3() gives you the same thing reactively:

<script setup lang="ts">
import { useMd3 } from "@vaam-apps/vitepress-md3";

const { style, isExpressive } = useMd3();
</script>