Welcome to our DVA test website
We’re making changes to the DVA website to help veterans, families, advocates, and providers find the information and support they need—faster and easier.
During May, this test site (beta.dva.gov.au) will exist at the same time as the main DVA website (dva.gov.au). This means users can explore the new features and provide feedback through the test site for consideration.
We will also continue to refine the website design and make sure all elements and features are working. This also includes transforming the Veteran Cards, Making a claim, Provider forms and General enquiries web pages.
While most content will be available on the test site, not all pages on the test site are final. For the most up to date information please continue to use dva.gov.au.
Providing feedback
There is an easy-to-use feedback slider on the right-hand side of the test site. You can use this to share your thoughts on the navigation, design, and content.
What’s new
Appearance
The test site includes a refreshed, modern design for a more accessible and user-friendly experience.
Content
The most popular (frequently visited) pages have been revised to make content easier to understand.
Service-focused navigation
We’ve introduced a service-focused navigation to help you find information quickly. This is based on the strong feedback we received through surveys, workshops and user testing.
This navigation makes it easier for you to find important information and complete key tasks. The ‘top menu’ service-focused options are:
- Access benefits – here you can access key task related pages such as pension and payments, claims and compensation and veteran cards.
- What we help with – here you can access information about DVA support and services.
- Recognition and remembrance – here you can learn more about how we recognise and honour of service and sacrifice of the veteran community.
- Family and dependants – here you can access key information and supports related to family members/dependants
- Providers – here health professionals can access resources to help in their work to support veterans
- About us – here you can access corporate information including how to contact DVA, working with us and privacy and legal resources.
These menu options can be accessed by going to ‘Menu’ at the top right-hand corner of the test site.
Further improvements
DVA will continue to refine the website during the test phase to make sure all elements and features are working.
In time, we will also introduce enhanced search functionality, to help you find what you’re looking for easily and quickly.
The search tool will look across publicly available content on related DVA websites and summarise information for you.
FAQs
About the DVA Website Enhancement Project
The website is being updated based on feedback from veterans, families, advocates, providers, and staff. The goal is to make the website easier to navigate, more accessible, and clearer to understand.
The updated website includes:
- a modern, accessible design
- service-focused navigation to help users find information quickly
- refreshed content for priority pages to make it easier to understand
- improved accessibility with alternative content formats such as infographics.
We consulted widely with veterans, families, advocates and providers through workshops, navigation testing, a public survey, presentations and co-design activities. The changes are based on what users told us during consultation.
No. The dva.gov.au URL will stay the same. While the site is in test, it will have a separate URL: beta.dva.gov.au
About the test (beta) site
A test site (technical term: beta site) allows users to explore the new features and provide feedback through the test site before the full launch.
Anyone! Veterans, families, providers, DVA staff (and anyone who wants to) can visit the test site and provide feedback between 5 May and early June 2025.
There is an easy-to-use feedback tool directly on this test site. Users can share their thoughts on navigation, design, and content.
All content will be available. However, you should not use the test site to perform any action, for example: submit a web form or make an enquiry.
Please use the main DVA website for any action dva.gov.au.
The test website is only for reviewing/reading and providing feedback to us.
No. The test site is for reviewing and providing feedback, only. Please use MyService to submit claims: dva.gov.au/about-myservice. Use the main DVA website to perform any other action, such as making an enquiry: dva.gov.au.
We’re aiming to launch the refreshed DVA website in mid-2025, once feedback from the test site has been reviewed and any necessary updates have been made. When the refreshed site goes live it will be accessed at dva.gov.au, the test site URL (beta.dva.gov.au) will no longer be active. Even after the new site launches, DVA will keep listening and making improvements based on user feedback.
Responding to feedback
Yes. Accessibility has been a key priority for the website enhancement project. By making changes we’ve made sure the website continues to meet best practice accessibility requirements as outlined in the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.0.
The website’s new look and feel is modern and approachable while also providing an enhanced level of accessibility. Its appearance has been carefully refreshed to reflect modern design principles, including:
- using icons to the navigation supports accessibility and a more intuitive user experience.
- using a font that supports accessibility and easier reading.
- using colours that are part of the DVA’s official brand colour palette that work well together.
Our goal is for the website to work best for the people who use it the most – veterans, families and providers. By focusing on user experience, rather than the department, we can make sure the website provides people with the information they need, in a way that’s easy for them to access and understand.
Through the test website feedback process we have made some adjustments, such as increasing the font weight (level of ‘boldness’).
It’s important our website continues to evolve to meet user needs and support the work of our department in delivering for the veteran community. Feedback is essential to ensuring we continuously improve.
We carefully review all feedback and take into consideration user demand, overall site performance, and alignment with long term goals. While we may not be able to implement every suggestion, we make sure that your ideas are considered in future updates. Feedback is not just for the testing period. We encourage feedback on our website at any time.
We consider every piece of feedback we receive. Some feedback is referred to relevant teams in the department (for example, to review content for accuracy), while other feedback is provided to our web services team, who can make updates directly in the test site.
As an example on how we address feedback, responses showed that several pages on the test site had inconsistent fonts and font size. We also received reports of ‘broken’ links that did not work. In response, we have made updated directly on the test site.
The website now has a ‘service-focused’ navigation system making it easier for users to find support, benefits, and essential services.
Through consultation and analysing website use data (such as popular pages, time spent on page) we’ve learnt what information people look for the most, and what they want easy, quick access to. This has informed the homepage with 6 key categories directly under the page heading, and a streamlined drop-down menu with 7 key categories and sub menus that further narrow down content.
The ‘Quick links’ menu, including the link to 'Forms', was removed from the footer of the homepage based on user research and accessibility reviews. The quick links also duplicated existing navigation with analytics showing these were rarely used, with under 3% click-through usage.
Removing the ‘Quick links’ will enhance mobile performance, support screen reader users, and create a cleaner, more user-friendly homepage. Key services remain accessible via the improved mega menu and main navigation, reflecting how users look for information.