Case Study: U.S. Census Bureau achieves first nationwide online census and an estimated $1.4B in savings with Adobe Experience Manager

How the U.S. Census Bureau went digital

The U.S. Census Bureau faced a once-in-a-decade challenge to modernize one of the nation’s largest websites—about 5 million pages—to support the inaugural nationwide online census and reach 330+ million people in 59 languages. With no enterprise CMS, limited analytics, and a need to scale for massive, unpredictable traffic while also boosting awareness and participation, the Bureau had to rethink site structure, workflows, and digital outreach ahead of the 2020 count.

Working with Adobe, the Bureau migrated to Adobe Experience Manager (as a FedRAMP‑certified managed service) and adopted Adobe Analytics and Target to enable traffic testing, real‑time optimization, and personalized experiences. The effort delivered the first nationwide online census, supported huge traffic spikes and multilingual access, improved site usability, and—according to GAO reporting—helped realize an estimated $1.4 billion in savings; the 2020 effort also achieved a 99.98% count of housing units and dramatically increased digital engagement.

U.S. Census Bureau

Stephen Buckner

Assistant Director of Communications