--- stoplight-id: evcv6ybhnlphi --- # 👋 Stoplight Style Guides Stoplight style guides enforce industry best practices and standards. Stoplight style guides are powered by Spectral, a JSON/YAML linter for API descriptions and more.

APIs

Enforce API best practices

Security

Enforce security best practices

Documentation

Enforce API docs

Industry Rules

Best practices from API leaders

## Use in Stoplight Platform Enable public style guides in the hosted Stoplight platform to: * Use as a starting point for a style guide project that can be enabled in API projects across your workspace [(Professional plans and higher)](https://stoplight.io/pricing) * Use in individual API projects that need governance > Best practice is to create a style guide for your organizaton, then enable Stoplight-provided style guides that meet your needs. You can tweak the style guide rules by disabling those you don't need, modifying others, and creating your own. Once you enable public style guides in Stoplight projects, you can use the rules as-is, disable them, or create your own rules.

Enable a Style Guide

Create a Style Guide

To use a public style guide: 1. Go to your Stoplight workspace. 2. Create a [style guide project](https://meta.stoplight.io/docs/platform/364e30f79daa0-create-a-style-guide) OR edit a project that has an API. 3. Select **Manage Style Guides**. 4. Enable a public style guide from list. You can then: - Use the style guide as-is to [automatically lint](https://meta.stoplight.io/docs/platform/7975f76a794c4-validation-and-linting) your API files - [Disable individual rules](https://meta.stoplight.io/docs/platform/3f80fd36750e3-disable-inherited-rules) that do not follow your organization's standards - [Reuse and customize rules](https://meta.stoplight.io/docs/platform/2331c5241ddfc) to meet your needs - For API projects stored in Git, use [with Spectral](https://docs.stoplight.io/docs/spectral/ecaa0fd8a950d-workflows) to automatically lint APIs ## Use Outside of Stoplight Platform You can export Stoplight style guides, and then use them with [Spectral](https://docs.stoplight.io/docs/spectral/674b27b261c3c-overview). Options include: * Run [Spectral CLI](https://docs.stoplight.io/docs/spectral/9ffa04e052cc1-spectral-cli) against design docs to get early feedback * Run Spectral in [VS Code](https://github.com/stoplightio/vscode-spectral?utm_source=github&utm_medium=spectral&utm_campaign=docs) as you work * Run Spectral as a [Git hook](https://docs.stoplight.io/docs/spectral/ecaa0fd8a950d-workflows#git-hooks) to enforce linting as part of the commit process * Use [Continuous Integration](https://docs.stoplight.io/docs/spectral/ecaa0fd8a950d-workflows#continuous-integration) to reject pull requests that don't match rules To use a public style guide in Spectral: 1. Visit [API Stylebook](https://apistylebook.stoplight.io/) and select the style guide you want to use. 2. In the upper right corner, select **Export > Spectral Files**. 3. Extract the downloaded file. 4. [Install Spectral](https://docs.stoplight.io/docs/spectral/b8391e051b7d8-installation). 5. Follow the guidance in [Spectral Workflows](https://docs.stoplight.io/docs/spectral/ecaa0fd8a950d-workflows) to see which approach work best for you.