Modern 2026 ServiceNow ESC – Looking for Ideas & Inspiration

[NikolaTesla]

Hey ServiceNow Community!

I’m currently working on modernizing our ServiceNow Employee Center (ESC) experience and would love to see what others are doing for a more modern, clean, and user-friendly 2026-style design.

I’m looking for ideas, screenshots, best practices, and recommendations around things like:

• Modern homepage layouts
• Better navigation/menu structures
• Improved search experience
• AI/Virtual Agent integrations
• Personalized widgets/content
• Knowledge article presentation
• Mobile-friendly/responsive design
• Branding/themes/colors
• Employee self-service experience improvements
• Custom widgets/components
• Performance improvements
• Dashboard or landing page inspiration
• Accessibility improvements
• UX/UI trends you’ve implemented successfully

A few questions I’d love feedback on:

1. What are the biggest improvements you made to your ESC that users loved?
2. What widgets/components made the biggest impact?
3. Any examples of modern-looking ESC portals you can share?
4. How are you using AI or automation within ESC today?
5. What would you avoid when redesigning ESC?
6. Any must-have features for a modern employee portal in 2026?
7. How are you improving adoption and user engagement?

If you have screenshots, design ideas, lessons learned, or examples, I’d really appreciate it!

Thanks in advance — looking forward to seeing everyone’s ideas and creativity.

[Tanushree Maiti]

IN Esc ,users loves focus on creating a unified, consumer-grade experience that reduces the time spent looking for services.

Here are the most popular enhancements:

1. Replacing IT-centric menus with logical, employee-centric topics (e.g., "Onboarding," "Benefits") has significantly increased findability. 
2. Native, omni-channel experience allowing users to switch seamlessly between mobile and desktop
3. A single widget aggregating all pending actions, tasks, and requests across departments (IT, HR, Facilities).
4. Simplified, Side Navigation
5. Navigation Analytics
6. Approval Assistance Agent for REQ/RITM Approvals
7. Tab-specific filters for the Request page

8. Employee Center provides extensive flexibility to align the portal’s look and feel with your organization’s brand standards.

   You can:

   • Use custom fonts to match your corporate typography guidelines.

   • Adjust spacing and layout through CSS to achieve the desired visual rhythm and responsiveness.

   • Replace all iconography with your approved icon sets to maintain brand consistency.

   • Customize the overall visual identity by modifying layouts, applying CSS styling, and updating images and graphical elements.

Refer: Employee Center (Pro) – What’s New? ( March 2026)

Tips for Improving your Employee Center Portal User Experience (UX) 

December 2025 enhancements to Employee Center (Pro)

How to add Banners to Employee Center Pro Home Page