Figma – Muzli feed

Claude Code to Figma: How the New “Code to Canvas” Integration Works

Claude Code to Figma (officially called “Code to Canvas”) is a new integration between Anthropic’s Claude Code and the Figma design canvas. Announced on February 17, 2026, it lets developers, designers, and product teams capture a functioning UI built with Claude Code and convert it into a fully editable Figma frame. Not a screenshot. Not a flattened image. A real design artifact that teams can manipulate, annotate, and iterate on.

For years, the design-to-code pipeline moved in one direction. Designers handed off. Engineers interpreted. Context got lost somewhere in between. This integration opens the reverse direction, and it changes how teams evaluate AI-generated interfaces.

What Is Claude Code to Figma? (And Why It Matters Now)

AI coding tools have made it trivially easy to go from idea to working prototype. Claude Code, Cursor, Windsurf. You describe what you want, and you get a functioning interface in minutes. The bottleneck moved. It is no longer “how do we build this?” It is “how do we decide which version to ship?”

That decision process lives on the canvas. It lives in Figma, where teams compare options side by side, leave comments, and align before committing to a direction. Until now, there was no clean way to bring a coded prototype back into that decision space.

Figma’s partnership with Anthropic addresses exactly this gap. The question is no longer whether AI can build interfaces. It is whether teams can evaluate and refine what AI builds, together, in a shared space.

How Code to Canvas Works: The Step-by-Step Workflow

The core workflow has four steps:

Build or iterate on a UI using Claude Code. Local dev server, staging environment, production. Anything running in a browser.
Capture the screen. The integration grabs the live browser state and converts it into a Figma-compatible frame.
Paste into Figma. The captured screen lands on your canvas as an editable design artifact. Not a flat image. A real frame.
Collaborate. Your team annotates, duplicates, rearranges, and compares options directly on the canvas. No code access required.

The power is in multi-screen sessions. You can capture an entire flow (onboarding, checkout, settings) and lay it out on the canvas in a single session, preserving sequence and context. Duplicate frames, test structural changes, compare alternatives. Rejected ideas stay visible for future reference. The canvas becomes a decision-making space for AI-generated interfaces.

Setting Up the Figma MCP Server with Claude Code

The integration runs on Figma’s MCP (Model Context Protocol) Server. MCP is an open standard that allows AI tools to connect with external data sources and applications. Think of it as a universal adapter between Claude Code and Figma’s design environment.

Setup takes three steps:

Enable the MCP server. Open Figma desktop app preferences, turn on “Dev Mode MCP Server.” It runs locally at http://127.0.0.1:3845/sse.
Connect Claude Code. Run a single terminal command: claude mcp add --transport sse figma-dev-mode-mcp-server http://127.0.0.1:3845/sse
Start working. Reference Figma designs by selecting frames directly in the desktop app, or paste design links into Claude Code prompts.

Requirements: Figma desktop app (not the browser version), a Figma Dev or Full seat, and Claude Code installed via npm.

Once connected, the pipeline flows both ways. You can push code into Figma, and you can pull design context into Claude Code. The MCP server does not just pass screenshots. It reads components, variables, styles, and layout structure. Claude understands your design system semantically.

If you are already working with MCP-connected design workflows, this is the natural next step.

Claude Code to Figma vs. Figma Make vs. Figma MCP: What Is the Difference?

These three tools serve different purposes within the same ecosystem. Here is how they compare:

	Claude Code to Figma (Code to Canvas)	Figma Make	Figma MCP Server
Direction	Code to design	Text/design to code	Bidirectional context layer
Starting point	A working UI in a browser	A prompt or an existing design	Any Figma frame or Claude Code session
Output	Editable Figma frames	Front-end code or prototype	Structured design context for AI tools
Primary user	Developers, technical designers	Designers, non-technical users	Both, as infrastructure
Best for	Bringing AI-built prototypes back to the canvas for team review	Generating code directly from designs or natural language	Connecting design systems to AI coding tools

Figma positioned these as complementary: different starting points, same destination. Figma Make is more accessible to non-engineers. Claude Code to Figma is faster for teams already building full working web apps in the terminal.

What Designers Can Do (Without Writing Code)

Once a coded UI lands on the Figma canvas, designers work in their native environment:

Side-by-side comparison. Place multiple AI-generated variants next to each other. Spot patterns, gaps, and inconsistencies across flows.
Structural exploration. Duplicate frames, rearrange steps, test layout changes. No code required to explore a different information hierarchy.
Annotation and feedback. Leave comments on actual built interfaces, not approximations. PMs, designers, and engineers react to the same artifact at the same fidelity.
Design system alignment. Check whether the AI-generated UI matches your existing components, tokens, and patterns. Flag inconsistencies before they reach production.

The designer’s role shifts. When AI generates five variants in minutes, the bottleneck is choosing. The canvas is where choosing happens.

Canvas to Code: The Return Trip

The reverse direction matters just as much. Select a frame in Figma, prompt Claude Code with a link to it, and Claude generates production-ready code that respects your design system. It reads your components, tokens, and Tailwind variables. Not a rough approximation. Actual code that matches your system.

This creates a true round-trip workflow:

Design in Figma > Generate code with Claude > Capture working UI back to Figma > Refine on canvas > Push updates back to code

Each cycle preserves context. Nothing gets lost in translation because the same system of record (MCP) connects both environments. For teams working with AI design tools, this is the closest thing to a closed loop between design and development.

Known Limitations and Workarounds

This is a powerful integration, but it is not a magic bullet. Some realities to keep in mind:

Terminal-first workflow. Claude Code lives in the command line. Designers unfamiliar with terminal tools will need support during setup. If you are new to this world, our vibe coding guide is a good starting point.
No visual refinement loop. Once you are back in code, adjusting padding or hover states means editing code manually. There is no in-tool visual feedback yet.
Multi-frame complexity. Converting multi-screen flows requires capturing each screen individually, then combining them. This adds time and token overhead for complex projects.
Not a sandbox. Claude Code operates directly in your codebase. Changes affect the same files engineers ship. This requires awareness, not just enthusiasm.
Desktop app required. The MCP server runs through Figma’s desktop application, not the browser version.
Token costs. Larger design files and multi-screen flows consume more tokens. For complex projects, budget accordingly.

What This Means for the Design-to-Dev Handoff

The bigger story is not about one feature. It is about the direction.

Design tools and coding tools are converging, not as competitors, but as parts of the same system. Figma is betting that AI does not replace the canvas. It feeds the canvas with more options, faster. The designer’s role shifts from producing artifacts to curating and refining what AI generates.

For teams already building with AI coding tools and Figma plugins, this integration removes the last major friction point: getting the work back into a shared space where everyone can contribute.

Code is powerful for converging on a solution. The canvas is powerful for diverging, exploring, and deciding. Now they are connected.

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Figma vs Framer: Which Design Tool Should You Actually Use in 2026?

If you’re searching for “Figma vs Framer 2026,” you’re probably not looking for a feature list.

You’re trying to decide where to invest time, focus, and budget.

Here’s the short answer.

TL;DR

Use Figma if you design complex digital products, manage scalable design systems, or work inside structured engineering workflows.
Use Framer if you need to design and publish real websites without rebuilding everything in code.
Use both if you’re a modern design team: product system in Figma, public-facing site in Framer.

Think of it this way:

Figma is the brain of your product.
Framer is the face your users actually see.

The real question is not which tool is better.

It’s whether you’re designing a system or shipping a site.

What Is Figma in 2026?

Figma is a collaborative product design platform focused on interface design, design systems, prototyping, and developer handoff.

It is primarily used for:

Designing multi-screen web and mobile applications
Building and maintaining design systems
Managing components, tokens, and variables
Supporting structured design-to-engineering workflows
Collaborating across large product teams

In 2026, Figma’s strength is not just visual editing. It is system logic.

Advanced variables and multi-mode configurations allow teams to simulate real application behavior before development begins.

Figma manages design complexity.

What Is Framer in 2026?

Framer is a visual website builder that turns design directly into a live, hosted website.

It is primarily used for:

Marketing websites
Startup homepages
Interactive landing pages
Designer portfolios
Motion-heavy brand experiences

Framer combines visual layout, interactions, CMS, hosting, and publishing into one workflow.

With features like server-side rendering and structured layout systems, Framer sites are not prototypes. They are production websites.

Framer removes publishing friction.

The Core Difference

The main difference between Figma and Framer is structural.

Figma is built for internal product systems.
Framer is built for external web deployment.

Figma focuses on:

Governance
Version control
Component architecture
Developer handoff

Framer focuses on:

Speed
Visual fidelity
Interaction
Going live

Once you frame it this way, the confusion disappears.

Side-by-Side Comparison

Category	Figma	Framer
Core purpose	Product design system	Website builder and publisher
Output	Design files and prototypes	Live production website
Best for	SaaS apps, dashboards, complex UI	Marketing sites, portfolios
Dev handoff	Essential via Dev Mode	Not required, designer publishes
Design systems	Advanced tokens and variables	Site-level styles and components
Biggest limitation	Cannot publish production sites	Not ideal for large app systems
Pricing model	Per editor seat	Per project, includes hosting

When Figma Is the Right Choice

Figma is the better choice when:

You are designing a product with dozens of screens.
Your team requires strict design system governance.
Multiple designers collaborate on shared libraries.
Developers depend on structured specifications.
You manage variants, themes, and token-based styling.

If your design system is effectively a product in itself, Figma is the natural foundation.

When Framer Is the Right Choice

Framer is the better choice when:

You need a live website quickly.
You want interactions to ship without engineering rebuild.
Your marketing team needs autonomy.
You are building a portfolio or campaign landing page.
Hosting and deployment should be built into the workflow.

If the goal is shipping, not simulation, Framer dramatically shortens the path from idea to production.

For a practical look at how teams structure production ready Framer sites, see our breakdown of the best Framer website templates for 2026: https://muz.li/blog/the-best-framer-website-templates-for-2026/

The Figma-to-Framer Import Reality

Many designers assume that importing from Figma into Framer is seamless.

It is not magic.

Figma encourages free-form canvas thinking. Framer requires structured layout logic. If your Auto Layout setup is not clean and responsive, your imported structure will need rebuilding.

The practical workflow is simpler:

Define brand foundations and tokens in Figma.
Build responsive components directly in Framer for production use.

Use each tool for what it was designed to handle.

Prototyping: Simulation vs Production

Figma prototypes simulate user flows.

They are ideal for testing, validating, and presenting complex product behavior. They are not production outputs.

Framer interactions ship directly to production.

When you design a hover state or page transition in Framer, that interaction becomes part of the live site.

For apps, simulation is essential.
For websites, production readiness matters more.

Can You Use Both?

Yes. Many teams in 2026 do.

A common hybrid workflow:

Product UI and design systems live in Figma.
Marketing sites and growth pages are built in Framer.
Brand tokens are shared between both environments.

This separation reduces friction and avoids forcing one tool into solving the wrong problem.

FAQ

Is Framer replacing Figma?

No. Framer focuses on website publishing, while Figma focuses on product design systems. Their core purposes are different.

Can you publish a website directly from Figma?

No. Figma produces design files and prototypes, not hosted production websites.

Is Framer good for SaaS product UI?

It can handle simple interfaces, but it is not built for large-scale application systems with complex state logic.

Which tool is better for startups?

If you are building the product itself, Figma is essential.
If you need a marketing site live quickly, Framer is faster.

Do design leaders use both?

Yes. Many teams separate internal product systems from public-facing web publishing.

Final Verdict

Stop comparing feature lists.

Start matching tools to workflows.

Choose Figma if you are managing complexity.
Choose Framer if you are removing friction.

The most effective teams in 2026 are not loyal to one tool.

They are clear about what they are building.

……

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Best Figma Plugins for Designers in 2026

A curated list of the best Figma plugins for UI/UX designers in 2026. Organized by workflow, tested in production, and filtered for plugins that actually save time.

The Figma plugin directory has over 5,000 entries. Most of them do one thing you could do manually in 30 seconds. Some of them haven’t been updated since 2023. A few of them are genuinely great.

We installed, tested, and filtered down to 16 plugins that belong in a modern design workflow. The filter was strict: does it solve a real problem, is it actively maintained, and does it work without breaking your file? If a plugin required five minutes of setup for two minutes of value, it didn’t make the list. Here’s what survived.

AI-Powered Design

This category barely existed two years ago. Now it’s the fastest-moving corner of the Figma ecosystem. These three plugins approach AI from different angles, and each one is worth knowing.

UX Pilot

Generates complete UI screens from text prompts, with built-in predictive heatmaps that show where users will look before you test anything.

Best for: Product designers who want fast layout exploration without leaving Figma
Why it works: It doesn’t just generate screens. It layers research validation on top. Describe a dashboard, get three layout options, see predicted attention maps for each. That feedback loop used to take a week.
Skip if: You need pixel-level control from the start. Treat its output as a first draft, not a final comp.

Relume

AI wireframing that generates full-page layouts from a sitemap, with direct Webflow export.

Best for: Freelancers and agencies building marketing sites at speed
Why it works: You describe a page structure in plain English and get a wireframe with real content hierarchy. The Webflow integration means your wireframe becomes a live site without rebuilding from scratch. It collapses three steps into one.
Skip if: You’re designing complex product UIs. Relume thinks in pages, not in systems.

Uizard

Converts hand-drawn sketches and screenshots into editable Figma screens.

Best for: Early-stage ideation and converting whiteboard sessions into working files
Why it works: Take a photo of a napkin sketch, drop it in, get editable layers. It’s not going to win design awards, but it eliminates the tedious step of manually rebuilding rough concepts. Acquired by Miro in 2024 and still actively developed.
Skip if: You’re a senior designer who moves faster in Figma than on paper. The translation adds a step you don’t need.

Design Tokens and Systems

If you’re building or maintaining a design system in Figma, token management is the infrastructure layer that holds everything together. These plugins handle the bridge between design decisions and code. For a deeper dive into the full process, check out our guide to building a design system in Figma

Tokens Studio

The most established token management plugin for Figma. Syncs design tokens to GitHub, GitLab, or JSONBin with full version control.

Best for: Design teams maintaining production design systems with developer handoff
Why it works: It treats tokens as data, not just styles. You define color, spacing, typography, and shadow tokens in a structured hierarchy, then push them to a Git repo where developers consume them directly. Two-way sync means changes flow in both directions. No copy-pasting hex values into Slack.
Skip if: You’re a solo designer with a small project. The setup overhead only pays off at scale.

Supa Design Tokens

A lighter, faster token setup tool that generates tokens from your existing Figma styles.

Best for: Designers who want token structure without the full Tokens Studio workflow
Why it works: Point it at your existing styles. It extracts and organizes them into a token-ready format in minutes. No Git integration, no complex config. Just clean token output you can hand to a developer or feed into a build pipeline.
Skip if: You need two-way sync or version control. Use Tokens Studio for that.

Design Tokens W3C Export

Exports your Figma tokens in the W3C Design Tokens specification format.

Best for: Teams adopting the W3C standard for cross-tool token interoperability
Why it works: The W3C Design Tokens spec is becoming the industry standard for how tokens are defined and shared across tools. This plugin exports your Figma tokens in that exact format. Future-proofing, essentially.
Skip if: Your team doesn’t care about spec compliance yet. It’s a standards play, not a productivity play.

Accessibility and QA

Accessibility plugins have gone from “nice to have” to “part of the workflow.” Shipping inaccessible designs in 2026 is a liability, not just bad practice. These three cover different depths of the same problem.

Stark

The most comprehensive accessibility suite for Figma. Contrast checking, vision simulation, alt text suggestions, focus order, touch target sizing, and more.

Best for: Teams that need a full accessibility audit inside Figma
Why it works: It covers WCAG 2.1 and 2.2 in a single plugin. The vision simulation alone (see your design through the eyes of someone with deuteranopia, protanopia, or low vision) changes how you think about color choices. Integrates with Jira and Linear for issue tracking.
Skip if: You only need quick contrast checks. Stark is powerful but has a learning curve and a paid tier for full features.

axe for Designers

Free AI-powered accessibility checker built by Deque, the same team behind the axe testing engine used by developers worldwide.

Best for: Designers who want solid accessibility checking without a subscription
Why it works: It catches color contrast failures, missing labels, touch target issues, and text scaling problems. The AI suggestions are specific: not just “this fails” but “here’s what to change.” And it’s free. That matters for freelancers and small teams.
Skip if: You need the full depth of Stark’s vision simulations and WCAG 2.2 coverage. axe is excellent for fundamentals, not exhaustive audits.

Contrast

A minimal, fast contrast ratio checker. Select two colors, get a pass/fail against WCAG AA and AAA.

Best for: Quick spot-checks during active design work
Why it works: No setup. No dashboard. Select foreground and background, see the ratio. It does one thing and does it instantly. When you’re iterating on color and need to verify contrast every few minutes, speed matters more than features.
Skip if: You need anything beyond contrast ratios. For broader checks, use Stark or axe.

Accessibility plugins catch issues, but they don’t replace accessible design thinking. For a practical UI accessibility checklist covering typography, interaction, motion, and navigation, see our guide to accessible interface design.

Content and Data

Placeholder content is one of those small problems that eats real time. These plugins fill your designs with realistic data so you’re not designing around “Lorem ipsum” and gray boxes.

Content Reel

Populates designs with realistic names, addresses, avatars, dates, and custom text strings.

Best for: Filling complex UIs (tables, user lists, profiles) with varied, realistic content
Why it works: It randomizes data intelligently. You get different names, different lengths, different avatar photos. Your design gets stress-tested with real variation instead of looking perfect with identical placeholder text. Custom strings let you add your own content sets.
Skip if: You only need photos. Use Unsplash for that.

Unsplash

Inserts free, high-quality stock photos directly into your Figma frames.

Best for: Quick image fills for mockups and presentations
Why it works: Search, click, done. The image lands in your selected frame at the right size. No downloading, no resizing, no attribution headaches (Unsplash license covers commercial use). It’s been around for years because it just works.
Skip if: You need editorial or brand-specific photography. Stock photos have a look. You know it when you see it.

Google Sheets Sync

Pulls live data from Google Sheets into Figma text layers and images.

Best for: Data-driven designs, dashboard mockups, and CMS-style content management
Why it works: Connect a spreadsheet, map columns to layers, sync. Your design updates when the data changes. For dashboard designs with 50 data points, this saves hours of manual entry. For client presentations, it means real numbers instead of made-up ones.
Skip if: You need real-time API data. This syncs on demand from Sheets, not from live endpoints.

Icons and Assets

Icon management sounds trivial until you’re searching through five different icon sets trying to find a consistent “settings” icon at 2 AM. These two plugins solve that.

Iconify

Access to over 275,000 icons from 150+ open-source icon sets, searchable inside Figma.

Best for: Designers who work across projects with different icon style requirements
Why it works: One search bar, every major icon set. Material Design, Heroicons, Lucide, Tabler, Bootstrap, Phosphor, and dozens more. You search “calendar,” you see every version across every set. Pick the style that fits, drop it in. No more downloading ZIP files and importing manually.
Skip if: You’ve already committed to a single icon set. In that case, use that set’s own plugin.

Phosphor Icons

A focused library of 1,500+ icons in six weights (thin, light, regular, bold, fill, duotone).

Best for: Product teams that want a single, consistent icon system with weight variation
Why it works: Six weights for every icon means you can match your typography weight. Thin icons for body text contexts, bold for navigation, fill for active states. That level of weight consistency across 1,500+ icons is rare. The duotone style is genuinely distinctive.
Skip if: You need a massive icon library. 1,500 covers most product needs, but niche categories may have gaps.

Productivity and File Health

Figma files get messy. Layers named “Frame 847,” hidden elements nobody remembers, unused styles. These two plugins keep your files workable.

Rename It

Batch rename layers with sequential numbering, find-and-replace, and keyword patterns.

Best for: Cleaning up files before handoff or when layer naming has gotten out of control
Why it works: Select 200 layers, apply a naming pattern with auto-incrementing numbers, done. Regex support for power users. It turns a 30-minute manual renaming session into a 30-second operation.
Skip if: You name your layers properly as you go. (Be honest with yourself here.)

Cleaner

Scans and removes hidden layers, empty groups, and unused elements to reduce file size and complexity.

Best for: Large files that have accumulated cruft over months of iteration
Why it works: Figma files slow down when they’re bloated with invisible junk. Cleaner finds it, shows you what it found, and lets you remove it in bulk. The preview step matters. You see exactly what will be deleted before anything happens.
Skip if: Your files are small and well-maintained. On big team files with 50+ pages, though, this is essential.

How to Build Your Plugin Stack

Not every plugin on this list belongs in your workflow. Here’s how to think about it.

If you’re a solo product designer: Start with Stark (or axe if budget is tight), Content Reel, Iconify, and Rename It. That covers accessibility, content, assets, and file hygiene. Add an AI plugin when you’re comfortable with the basics.

If you run a design system: Tokens Studio is non-negotiable. Add W3C Export if your team is adopting the spec. Cleaner keeps your shared libraries from bloating.

If you’re a freelancer building websites: Relume for wireframing, Unsplash for imagery, Google Sheets Sync for client content. Speed is your advantage.

If you lead a design team: Stark for accessibility compliance, Tokens Studio for system consistency, Cleaner for file health. These three compound across every designer on your team.

One principle applies everywhere: install plugins one at a time. Use each one for a week before adding the next. A stack you understand beats a stack you installed.

Key Patterns

Looking across the plugins that made this list, a few trends stand out:

AI plugins are maturing fast. Two years ago, AI Figma plugins generated novelty screenshots. Now UX Pilot, Relume, and Uizard produce genuinely useful starting points. The gap between “AI output” and “shippable design” is shrinking.
Tokens are becoming infrastructure. The W3C spec, multi-platform sync, and Git-based workflows mean design tokens are no longer optional for serious teams. They’re the bridge between design and engineering.
Accessibility moved from audit to workflow. Stark, axe, and Contrast exist because accessibility checks should happen during design, not after development. The plugins that embed into your process win over the ones that require a separate review step.
File health is a scaling problem. Solo designers rarely need Cleaner or Rename It. Teams of five or more can’t survive without them. Plugin value scales with team size and file complexity.
The best plugins do one thing. Contrast checks contrast. Rename It renames layers. Unsplash inserts photos. The plugins that try to do everything tend to do nothing well. Specificity wins.

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How to Build a Design System in Figma: A Practical Guide (2026)

Most design systems become component graveyards. This guide shows how to build one in Figma that teams actually adopt: from tokens to theming to ship-ready components.

Here’s a pattern you’ve probably seen: a design team spends three months building a component library. It’s beautiful. The spacing is perfect. The variants are thorough. Six months later, nobody uses it. Designers detach components “because it’s faster.” Engineers build their own versions because “the Figma one doesn’t match the code.” The system exists in Figma. The product exists somewhere else.

This happens because most design system guides focus on what to build. The hard part was never building components. The hard part is building components that survive contact with real projects, real deadlines, and real people who didn’t design them.

This guide starts from the real problem.

Why Most Design Systems Fail

They fail at adoption, not at craft.

A design system succeeds when three things are true: designers use it by default (not by mandate), engineers trust it enough to not rebuild it, and it updates without breaking things. Everything else: the beautiful documentation site, the component showcase, the naming convention debate: is secondary.

The most common failure modes:

The museum problem. The system is perfect but untouchable. Making a change requires three approvals, so designers work around it instead.
The translation gap. Figma components don’t match code components. Names are different, properties are different, states are different. Two systems pretending to be one.
The coverage trap. The system tries to cover every edge case before shipping. It takes so long that the product evolves past it.
The style guide disguise. What’s called a design system is actually a color palette and a font choice. There’s no structure underneath.

If you’ve been through any of these, this guide is for you.

The Foundation Layer: Tokens Before Components

A 3D visual diagram in a transparent glass style showing the chain of values in a design system: Raw, Core, Semantic, and Component, ending with a teal "Add to cart" button.

Don’t start with buttons. Start with decisions.

Design tokens are the atomic decisions that everything else is built from. Before you draw a single component, define the values that your entire system shares.

The three-tier token architecture:

Tier 1: Primitive tokens, the raw values.

An open black professional display case containing neatly organized rows of material and color samples in smooth cube shapes, including textures of marble, wood, metal, and colored glass.

These are your actual numbers and colors. They answer the question “what exists?”

color-blue-500: #0835fb
spacing-4: 16px
radius-sm: 4px
font-family-sans: Inter

You never apply these directly to designs. They’re the ingredient list.

Tier 2: Semantic tokens, the purpose layer.

A translucent blue glass cube placed on a dark fabric next to a note reading “color-primary: color-blue-500

These reference primitives but add meaning. They answer “how should this be used?”

color-primary: color-blue-500
color-text-muted: color-gray-400
spacing-section: spacing-8
radius-input: radius-sm

This is what you apply to designs most of the time.

Tier 3: Component tokens, the specific layer.

A high-quality 3D render of a rounded, rectangular translucent blue glass button with a shopping cart icon and the word "button" in white sans-serif typography.

These reference semantic tokens and map to exact component properties. They answer “where exactly does this go?”

button-primary-bg: color-primary
input-border-color: color-border-default
card-padding: spacing-section

You only need this tier if you’re building at enterprise scale. For most teams, semantic tokens are enough.

Setting this up in Figma:

Create three Variable Collections:

Primitives, all raw color, spacing, and radius values
Semantic, purpose-driven aliases that reference primitives
Components (optional), component-specific aliases

Name them clearly. Add descriptions to every variable. Future-you will thank present-you.

Figma Variables in 2026: What Actually Changed

Figma’s variable system has grown significantly. Here’s what matters for your design system:

Extended variable types. Beyond Color and Number, you now have String for labels and paths, Boolean for toggles and states, and the new Composite type for grouped values like shadows and borders. This means fewer workarounds and more of your system lives in variables instead of loose styles.

Modes got more powerful. More modes per collection means your Light and Dark themes, brand variations, and density options can all live in one structured system. Before, you’d create separate components for each theme. Now, one component switches modes.

Variable import and export. This is the big one for teams. You can now sync tokens between Figma and your code repository. Changed a color in Figma? Export it. Your CI/CD pipeline picks up the change. This makes single source of truth an actual reality instead of a slide in a presentation.

Component Slots. These let designers customize specific areas of a component instance without detaching it. Instead of building 15 variants of a card component for different content arrangements, you build one card with slots.

AI features that help. Figma’s Check Designs catches inconsistencies, for example a text layer using Inter Regular 15px when your system defines 16px. Visual Search finds duplicate components hiding in your file. These are maintenance tools, not generation tools. They keep your system clean.

MCP integration. Figma’s Model Context Protocol lets AI tools like Claude and Cursor read your design system directly. This means code generation tools can reference your actual tokens and components, not guess at them. If you use variable fonts in your system, MCP ensures the code inherits the right font settings.

Building Components That Survive Real Projects

Three rules. Every component should follow all three.

Rule 1: Start with the states, not the default.

Most designers build the default state first, then add hover, active, disabled, error, and loading as afterthoughts. Reverse this. Map out every state a component needs before you design any of them. If you start with the default and add states later, the structure breaks.

States to define for every interactive component:

Default
Hover
Active or Pressed
Focused
Disabled
Loading
Error
Success

Rule 2: Auto Layout everything.

If a component doesn’t use Auto Layout, it will break the moment someone adds content that’s longer than your placeholder. Every single time.

Auto Layout rules:

All spacing is defined by variables, not magic numbers
Padding uses semantic spacing tokens
Fill container for flexible-width elements, hug contents for fixed elements
Nested Auto Layouts for complex arrangements such as header, body, and footer

Rule 3: Name it like a developer reads it.

Your Figma layer names should match your code component names. If your button’s primary variant is called Type=Primary, Size=Medium, State=Default in Figma, that should map to <Button variant="primary" size="md" /> in code.

Naming matters more than aesthetics in a design system. It’s the bridge between design and engineering.

Component architecture tips:

Base components are private (prefixed with . or _). They contain the raw structure.
Composed components are public. They combine base components into what designers actually use.
Use component properties for simple variations (on/off icon, text content). Use variants for visual changes (primary/secondary/ghost).
The detach test: have someone unfamiliar with your system try to use it. If they detach a component to make it work, your system failed at that point. Fix the component, not the person.

Theming: Light, Dark, and Multi-Brand

A large translucent cube illuminated by a diagonal beam of light, casting soft gradients on its surface in a dark room.

With Figma Modes, theming is finally structured instead of hacky.

Setting up your first Light/Dark theme:

In your Semantic color collection, create two modes: Light and Dark
Map each semantic token to different primitives per mode:

color-bg-primary → Light: white, Dark: gray-900
color-text-primary → Light: gray-900, Dark: white
color-border-default → Light: gray-200, Dark: gray-700

3. Apply semantic tokens to all components: not primitives

4. Switch modes on any frame to see the theme change instantly

The swap test: select any component instance, change the mode from Light to Dark. If anything breaks: wrong contrast, invisible borders, text that disappears: your token mapping has a gap. Fix it now.

Multi-brand theming:

For multi-brand systems, create a separate collection for brand tokens:

brand-primary, brand-secondary, brand-font-heading
Each brand gets its own mode in this collection
Semantic tokens reference brand tokens, which resolve to the correct brand values

This lets one Figma file serve multiple brands. The structure is the same. The values change.

The Adoption Problem (And How to Solve It)

A top-down view of a dark workbench featuring a precise arrangement of physical tools like screwdrivers and a hammer alongside digital UI components made of blue glass and geometric material samples.

You’ve built the system. Now comes the part nobody writes about: getting people to use it.

The 3-minute test. Sit a designer who’s never seen your system down in front of it. Time them. Can they find a button, place it, and configure it correctly in 3 minutes? If not, your system is too complex. Simplify the entry point.

Documentation that people actually read:

One page per component, not one document for everything
Visual examples first, rules second
When to use and when not to use, the negative guidance is often more useful
Keep it inside Figma if possible. External docs get forgotten

Getting buy-in from engineers. Speak their language:

Tokens equal CSS variables
Component properties equal props
Modes equal themes
If an engineer can look at your Figma system and immediately understand the code equivalent, adoption is almost guaranteed

The one metric that matters: component usage rate. Track how many component instances versus detached components exist across your team’s files. If the detach rate is above 20 percent, something in your system isn’t meeting real needs. Find out what and fix it.

According to Figma’s data, teams with mature component libraries see a 34 percent improvement in task completion speed. The ROI is real, but only if the system is actually used.

The Ship-It Checklist

Before you call it v1, make sure:

Token architecture defined, Primitive to Semantic at minimum
Core colors, spacing, radius, and typography as Figma Variables
Light and Dark modes working and tested
10 core components built: Button, Input, Select, Checkbox, Radio, Card, Modal, Badge, Avatar, Toast
Every component uses Auto Layout
Naming convention documented on one page
At least one full page built using only system components
Engineer handoff tested, one developer can build from your system
Usage guidelines written, under 500 words per component
The detach test passed with a designer outside your team

What not to do for v1:

Don’t build every component. Ship 10, learn, then build more
Don’t write perfect documentation. Write good-enough documentation and improve it based on real questions
Don’t wait for consensus on naming. Pick a convention, document it, move on

A shipped system that covers 60 percent of cases beats a perfect system that covers 100 percent of cases but lives in a branch nobody merges.

Design systems aren’t products you launch. They’re gardens you maintain. Start small, grow what works, prune what doesn’t. The teams that treat their system as a living thing, versioned, measured, iterated, are the ones whose systems survive year two.

Looking for design system references and component libraries? Explore curated resources on Muzli.

……

💡 Stay inspired every day with Muzli!

From Design to Code Without Losing Context: An MCP-First Workflow

Looking for a seamless way to turn AI-generated code into real design assets? Continue with our follow-up guide, Claude Code to Figma: How the New “Code to Canvas” Integration Works, and see how the MCP-first workflow evolves into a fully visual pipeline.

A practical example of preserving design context across AI and development tools

AI tools are now involved in every stage of product development, but most workflows still break at the handoff points. This article presents a practical example of an MCP-first design to development workflow, showing how design, AI, and development tools can work together as one continuous system.

The process described here is one example among many. Its purpose is not to define a single correct workflow, but to demonstrate how shared context and clean handoffs can turn disconnected tools into a coherent product process.

Why this matters now

Over the past year, AI has quietly entered almost every part of the product lifecycle.

Design teams experiment with AI inside design tools.
Developers rely on AI-assisted coding environments.
Product teams look for ways to speed things up across the board.

And yet, the biggest problem has not been capability.

It has been fragmentation.

Design intent gets lost between tools.
AI reinterprets decisions instead of continuing them.
Development often starts with partial context and missing assumptions.

This is where an MCP-first approach becomes useful.

MCP as a connective principle

MCP, Model Context Protocol, is not a specific product or platform.

It is a way of thinking about how context moves between tools.

Instead of each tool starting from scratch, MCP enables tools to share structured context such as:

component structure
naming conventions
design rules
system constraints
decisions already made

The goal is not more automation.
The goal is continuity.

Each step should continue the previous one, not reinterpret it.

Starting point: a finalized design in Figma

This workflow begins after exploration and discovery.

At this stage, there is a finalized Figma file that represents real product decisions:

defined components
a connected design system
design tokens
a clear hierarchy
states and behaviors

Figma acts here as a source of intent.

Not only how the interface looks, but how it is meant to behave, scale, and remain consistent.

For an MCP-based workflow to work well, the design needs to be reasonably structured and system-aware.
AI does not fix messy foundations. It amplifies them.

Connecting Figma to a language model via MCP

The next step is creating an MCP connection between Figma and a language model.

The model does not receive screenshots or flattened exports.
It receives structured design context:

component names
hierarchy
relationships
tokens
references to the design system

Claude is used here as an example, but it is not a requirement.
The same approach can be applied with other language models, including internal or open-source ones.

What matters is the model’s ability to read structured context, reason about design decisions, and produce precise, execution-oriented output.

The language model as a design interpreter

In this workflow, the language model is not acting as a designer.

Its role is to interpret the existing design and translate it into explicit instructions.

Using a dedicated skill or structured process, the model produces a specification that describes:

component structure
rules and constraints
token usage
interactions and states

This is not a creative prompt.
It is a specification.

This step is the core of the workflow.
It turns visual intent into something downstream tools can execute reliably.

Creating a prototype in Figma Make using the specification

Figma Make is used next, but not in isolation.

It is already connected to:

the design system
the token setup
the same naming conventions used in the design

The specification produced by the language model is provided as input.

This means the prototype is not generated directly from the design file itself, but from a clear interpretation of it.

The result is a prototype that is consistent, aligned with prior decisions, and suitable as a foundation for further development.

Moving the result into GitHub

Once the prototype is created, it needs to become part of the broader product workflow.

With a single push, the output of Figma Make is moved into GitHub as part of the existing project.

The key idea here is the transition itself.

What was created in a design-driven environment becomes a shared technical baseline that development tools can work with and build upon.

GitHub serves as the meeting point between design, AI, and development, and allows the work to continue without losing context.

Continuing development in Cursor

From GitHub, the workflow continues in Cursor.

Cursor does not start from a blank state.
It works with an existing structure that already reflects:

design intent
system rules
previous decisions

At this stage, teams can add logic, connect data, refine interactions, and move closer to a production-ready product.

AI here is not inventing the product.
It is continuing it.

MCP setup between GitHub and Cursor

Pulling a project from GitHub into Cursor

The workflow at a glance

At a high level, this MCP-first design to development workflow looks like this:

Figma defines intent
a language model interprets that intent
a structured specification bridges design and execution
Figma Make generates a prototype
GitHub becomes the shared baseline
Cursor continues development

MCP is what keeps this chain intact.

Why this approach works in real teams

The value of this workflow is not speed.

It is alignment.

Design decisions are preserved instead of reinterpreted.
AI works with context rather than guessing.
Development continues from a shared understanding instead of reconstructing intent.

Each step hands over context, not just output.

The tools can change.
The order can evolve.
The models can be replaced.

What should remain is the principle that tools should continue each other, not reinterpret each other.

That is the difference between experimenting with AI and actually building products with it.

……

💡 Stay inspired every day with Muzli!

Best Figma Plugins For Designers In 2025

Looking for the latest tools to supercharge your workflow? Explore our updated guide, Best Figma Plugins for Designers in 2026, featuring this year’s most powerful, innovative, and productivity-boosting plugins.

Designing in Figma only continues to improve — and in 2025, the perfect plugins are what tip the scales. This list, handpicked by experienced designers, showcases the most practical, cutting-edge, and timesaving Figma plugins available today. Whether you’re fine-tuning design systems, streamlining routine tasks, or pushing into new creative areas with AI, these plugins are here to assist every part of your process.

— — — — — — — -

📂 Workflow, Accessibility & File Management

These plugins are designed to save you precious time, ensure accessibility, keep your files organized, and allow you to focus on the design itself rather than repetitive technical tasks.

Design Lint

Detect and fix inconsistent styles across your file.

Rename It

Batch‑rename layers, frames and groups using find/replace or numbering.

Instance Finder

Locate all instances of a component across pages in a file.

Find and Replace

Globally search and replace text strings throughout your design.

Clean Document

Automagically organize and clean up your Figma document.

Destroyer

Let Destroyer recursively detach instances, remove auto layouts, detach styles and variables within your current selection so you can iterate faster!

Batch Styler

Update multiple text or color styles in bulk.

Stark — Contrast & Accessibility Checker

Accessibility checker for color contrast and color blindness simulation.

TinyImage Compressor

Compress and export optimized images (PNG, JPG, WebP).

— — — — — —

🎨 Visual Design & Advanced Effects

Elevate your designs with plugins that enable stunning visual effects, precise image manipulation, and unique shape creation.

Ruri Shader

Adds chrome, metallic, and gradient shader effects to text and shapes.

Color Spark

Quickly generates fresh color palettes with complementary colors.

Noise & Texture

Add seamless noise, patterns, gradients, and textures to elevate visual depth in your designs.

3D Wave

Instantly soften shapes and elements with realistic 3D wave-like deformation.

Fast Isometric

Turn elements into isometric 3D with one click — ideal for dynamic visuals and UI illustrations.

ARC — Bend your type!

Curve text upward, downward, or into perfect circles for expressive typographic layouts.

Image Tracer

Convert raster images into editable vector shapes.

Remove BG

Remove backgrounds from images in one click.

Shapelax

Adds cursor-based parallax animations to your designs.

……

✍️ Text, Fonts & Copywriting Tools

Essential plugins for efficient text handling, font management, and improving content clarity and tone.

Content Reel

Fill designs with real names, data, and avatars.

TypeBalance

Automatically adjusts text for optimal readability and accessibility.

Better Font Picker

A visual font selector showing live previews.

Google Fonts Pro

Browse and apply Google Fonts without leaving Figma.

Writer for Figma

Grammar, style, and tone checking for UI copy directly in Figma.

— — — — — —

🧑‍💻 Development Handoff & Design Systems

These plugins bridge the gap between design and development, enabling seamless transfer of specifications, assets, and code, while supporting robust design system management.

Tokens Studio

Manage design tokens (colors, spacing, typography) and sync with code.

Locofy Lightning — Figma to Code in a flash

Generate production‑ready front‑end code (React, HTML/CSS, Flutter) from designs.

Anima

Generate responsive code (HTML, CSS, React, Vue, Tailwind) from your designs, with AI-assisted personalization.

Musho AI

Turn text prompts into dev-ready layouts with smart copy, auto-layout, and polished visuals.

html.to.design

Import any existing website and turn it into fully editable Figma layers in seconds.

Figma to HTML with Framer

Copy-paste your Figma designs into Framer to generate editable layouts in real time.

Figma to Webflow (HTML, CSS and Website)

Transform your static designs into a production-ready site with Webflow. Sync your design system — components, variables, and styles — to give your team the power to launch sophisticated sites quickly.

Relume Figma Kit (v3.2)

A comprehensive UI kit with 1,000+ components, mobile variants, and color variables — updated monthly for use with the Relume Site Builder.

Zeplin

Publish designs for dev handoff with specs, assets, and style guides.

Figr Identity — Generate Design Systems with AI

Auto-generates a design system from any Figma file.

Brandfetch

Instantly import company logos, brand colors, and fonts.

— — — — — —

🖼️ Visual Content & Asset Libraries

These plugins provide quick access to vast repositories of images, illustrations, and icons — whether created by photographers, illustrators, or AI tools — empowering designers to enrich their projects’ visuals.

Lummi

AI-generated stock photo plugin with built-in background remover, upscaling, and reframing tools.

Neaticons Icon Library

Massive, high-quality icon library plugin with over 23,000 icons.

UIHut — UI Kit, Illustrations, 3D Assets

Access UI kits, templates, and illustrations from UIHut directly in Figma.

Unsplash

Quickly add royalty-free stock images into your designs.

Blush

Browse and customize illustrations from top artists.

Iconify

Access 100,000+ open-source icons in one place.

IconScout — 3D Assets, Lottie Animations, Icons & Illustrations + Unicons + AI Tools

Insert premium icons, illustrations, and stock photos.

Storyset by Freepik

Add customizable scene-based illustrations (onboarding, business).

Mockup Plugin

Place your designs into high-quality device, print, and AI-generated mockups with ease.

InFrame

Instantly wraps your designs in device mockups for presentations.

User Profile | Avatar

Quickly generate beautiful avatars and user profile components for mockups and prototypes.

— — — — — —

🎬 Prototyping & Animation

Plugins to enhance your animation creation, interactive prototypes, and presentation capabilities, bringing your designs to life.

PitchDeck Presentation Studio

Turn Figma frames into a slide deck with transitions.

Animate it

Drop-in UI animations and reusable motion presets for prototyping.

LottieFiles — Create animations & export from Figma to Lottie

Export interactive micro-animations as Lottie directly from Figma, with support for gradients, components, theming, and a library of 500,000+ animations.

Figmotion

Create keyframe animations with a timeline directly in Figma.

Jitter · Animation for Figma

Export polished UI animations and motion graphics for web, video, or social media.

Autoflow

Draw smart arrows between frames for UX flows.

Breakpoints

Define breakpoints inside Figma to preview responsive layouts and share interactive prototypes.

Charts

Build data-driven charts (bar, line, pie, area) from spreadsheets or live data.

— — — — — —

🤖 AI-Powered Design Tools

Leverage artificial intelligence to automate tasks, generate content, and explore new design possibilities, pushing the boundaries of creativity.

Artifig AI — Turn Ideas into Live Figma Plugins

Create custom Figma plugins using natural language prompts.

Ugic AI: Generate UI Based Any Component Library

Generates multi-screen UI drafts using your design system and AI.

Wireframe Designer (AI)

Converts text prompts into usable wireframe layouts.

Content Generator AI

Replaces lorem ipsum with realistic, AI-generated placeholder text.

PicsAI

AI image generation plugin for custom illustrations and graphics.

— — — — —

Figma’s plugin ecosystem has grown impressively since last year’s Best Figma Plugins for 2024, and 2025 takes it even further with smarter AI tools, deeper dev integrations, and highly polished visual utilities.
We hope this list helps you speed up your workflow, experiment more fearlessly, and elevate the quality of your designs.

……

💡 Stay Inspired Every Day!

Muzli Recap: The Highlights from Figma Config 2025

From Design Tool to Creative Operating System

This year at Config 2025, Figma took another bold leap forward—transforming from a collaborative design platform into a full-stack creation environment. The announcements, which touched everything from prototyping and code to websites and marketing content, made one thing clear: Figma wants to be the one place where everything gets done.

Here’s our recap of the most important updates:

Figma Sites – Publish Live Websites from Inside Figma

Design it. Launch it. No code required.
Figma Sites lets designers build and publish real, responsive websites directly from their design files. The platform includes smart blocks, layout tools, and even text-based animation prompts (e.g. “make text float like a feather”). A CMS layer is expected later this year.
→ It’s a direct challenge to tools like Webflow, Wix Studio, and Framer.

Figma Make – From Text to Functional Code

With Figma Make, users can describe features in plain language and get working code snippets in return. It’s powered by Claude 3.5 and allows designers and product teams to prototype functionality, not just interfaces.
→ Think Copilot, but built into your canvas.

Figma Draw – A New Home for Illustration

Figma is now a vector-based drawing tool, too.
Figma Draw introduces expressive brushes, textures, and real-time stroke effects—making it possible to illustrate logos, icons, and visuals without ever leaving the design environment.

Figma Buzz – Scalable Content Creation for Marketing Teams

Figma Buzz brings AI-assisted content generation to the marketing world. It offers approved templates, AI-generated visuals, and copywriting tools for teams creating emails, ads, and social content at scale.
→ A collaborative, brand-safe alternative to Canva—built into Figma.

Bonus Announcements You Shouldn’t Miss

Grid 2.0 – Flexible layout grids with more responsive control
AI Prototyping – Generate flows, wireframes, and animations from text
Visual Search – Instantly locate components via image-based search
Deeper Dev Mode – New “Ready for Dev” and “Focus View” for handoff
GitHub Integration – Code-ready assets and tighter workflow alignment

Our Take

Figma continues to expand its territory—from design to development, content, and beyond. The direction is clear: fewer tools, more unified workflows.

And while the excitement is real, so are the questions.
Will designers lose the magic of making when AI fills in the blanks? Can one platform serve everyone—from product to marketing to engineering—without becoming bloated?

Only time (and use cases) will tell.

For now, we’re excited. Inspired. And yes—already experimenting.

Watch all the announcements on config.figma

Level-up your designs with these 11 Figma plugins

Canvs Editorial
Meaningful stories and insightful analyses on design

When you’re a designer, there’s always more to do than time allows. There’s always the small mundane tasks that take up most of the time, hindering work.

That’s where Figma plugins come in to your rescue.

Best ones aren’t about adding bells and whistles to the design. They’re uber practical and they make a noticeable difference to how quickly you can bring your idea to fruition.

We have hand-picked and rounded up a few Figma plugins that you may find useful.

1. Sparkliner:

This plugin will help you generate sleek and minimal graphs. All you have to do is drop in your data from Excel, CSV, JSON, or type it in directly, and watch it being created into a graph. You can also explore different visual patterns for your visualisation.

2. Redline:

When it’s time for developer hand-off, detailing measurements, specs, and redlines can take hours. But with Figma Redlines, you can simplify that entire process.

This plugin allows you to generate clean, customisable redlines in seconds, with control over styles, colours, and units. It lets you measure and annotate everything without the usual hassle.

3. Super PDF:

With Super PDF you can import, export, merge, and view PDF files directly within Figma and FigJam. You can also combine multiple frames into a single pdf and export it.

4. Clear Guides:

You can remove all the guides from all the selected frames at once. It is useful while working on older files where a lot of guides were used.

5. Figma Sound Kit Plugin:

This plugin will let you add standard sounds to prototypes. You can access three sound kits and 1000+ sound files.

6. Filter/effects:

This plugin gives you a range of 60+ effects to apply directly to your images. Select where you want to apply the effect, apply the effects, and save. You can also tweak it or reapply the effects as needed.

From essentials like brightness and contrast to more experimental effects like noise displacement and ripple, it’s designed to let you experiment while keeping the process tight.

Some of the effects you’ll find inside:

Noise RGB
Simplex Noise
Noise Displace
Fluid Destruction
Ripple
Gaussian Blur
Lens Blur
Emboss
Night Vision
Neon

& 50 more.

7. Stippling:

You can create stippling effects on your design with this plugin. All you need to do is pick an image or frame, adjust the settings (you can play around with shape, size, spacing, brightness, and more) according to your preference, and you’re all set.

8. Copy & Rotate:

As the name suggests, with this plugin you can create radial patterns by copying and rotating elements. You can easily edit every copy it generates, since it builds upon Figma components. You can choose number of copies needed, the rotation radius, and even skipping certain elements.

9. Skew:

This plugin lets you skew any layer or group of layers easily. Pick your layer, move the sliders to skew the layers up to ±90° in each axis, and you’ll see the changes happen in real-time.

10. Gradient Map:

With this plugin, you can quickly generate gradient maps from any image in Figma. For that, you need to select an image, choose from a set of predefined gradients, or create your own. You can add up to 8 colours.

11. Vector Fields:

Vector Fields plugin will let you experiment and generate patterns of your liking. You can create visually compelling patterns using dots, lines, arrows, triangles, or even custom SVGs. Just pick a frame, and the plugin automatically adjusts everything to fit.

And that’s the lot!

We love curating lists of Figma resources which can help designers do their best work.

You can check out our previous roundups here:

If you find these useful, keep an eye out for more of our picks.

Experiment, find the ones that fit your workflow, and watch your work feel like a breeze.

Stay Inspired Every Day!

Why Most UI/UX Designers Fail Before They Even Open Figma

Rehan Pinjari
Self-Taught UI/UX Designer & Developer

Hello there, designers! 👋 Asking the right questions before starting a new project has been a game-changer for me.

I know it’s easy to skip the chit-chat and go right into Figma, but trust me: with over 6 years of UI/UX experience, I’ve found that the right questions are the building blocks of every successful design project.

They’re like the GPS that stops you from driving off a cliff or at least into an area of endless revisions.

So take a coffee and let’s talk about why this is important, what questions to ask, and how to ask them like a pro.

I’ll even cover some stories and pro suggestions that you can use. Ready? Let’s go!

Why Most Design Projects Fail (And How to Avoid It)

Illustration of a stressed UI/UX designer, Rehan Pinjari, with 6+ years of experience, sitting at a laptop with a hand on their head, surrounded by declining charts, a rocket, and question marks, representing design project failures from the blog post ‘Asking the right questions before starting a new project.’

Over two-thirds of projects fail because no one tries to get everyone on the same page from the very start. What about the fallout? Wasted time, money delays, and confusion lead to a cooked mess.

I’ve had the experience of designing a feature only to discover that it couldn’t be built because of an unknown old system. Oof.

Here’s where questions come in handy. Asking the correct questions at the start helps to avoid unfortunate events by setting targets, sharing limits, and keeping everyone on the same page.

Do you want an idea of what I’m saying? Take an infographic titled “The Cost of Skipping Questions”: one side shows a smooth project schedule with smiling people (time and money saved), while the other shows an irregular pattern of delays and dollar signs flying out the window (chaos and rework).

Spoiler: you want the first one.

Here’s my tried-and-true checklist of pre-project questions for designers.

I’ve divided them into six main groups (plus a few more!), with detailed examples and an explanation of “why it matters” from my personal experience. Let’s go in.

1. Project Goals & Business Impact

What is the main business goal? (e.g., boost conversions and decrease abandonment)
What is the one statistic that defines success in this project?
Who are the important stakeholders, and what do they expect?

Why This Matters: I previously thought that the client cared more about aesthetics than their value, but talking about goals early saved me from a complete revision.

Pro tip: Ask stakeholders what are their top goals. Unresolved problems here could put at risk the project later.

2. User Research & Target Audience

Who is the main user group? (Age, location, behavior, and pain points.)
Have we done any user research or surveys?
What are some common feedback from consumers in this industry?

No personas? If you can do a quick user interview that would be helpful.

Pro Tip: For a recent SaaS project, asking for user personas upfront led to an onboarding flow that users loved.

3. Competitive & Market Analysis

Who are the top competitors, and what works well in their UX?
What makes this product/service stand out?
What 3 things do users hate about competitors’ products?
Should we follow industry trends or break them?

I’ve seen projects fail because no one asked about competitors, don’t sleep on this.

Explain your response! This can help set your project apart.

4. Project Scope & Deliverables

What specific screens, pages, or features are needed?
Which platforms will this design run on? (Mobile, Web, Tablet, SaaS)
Are there any tech stack limits or frameworks to consider?
What is the needed level of interaction and animation?

These questions once helped to clarify a confusing feedback loop during a tight deadline contract.

5. Content & Branding Guidelines

Do we have a brand style guide? (Colors, typography, imagery)
What type of content will be included? (Text, images, videos)
Is there a tone of voice to align with?
Who’s handling copywriting and image selection?

I continually confirm content timelines — once, a “rush job” delayed because no copy was available.

6. Development & Technical Constraints

What tech stack is the dev team using?
Are there CMS, backend, or third-party integration limits?
What’s the performance/load time standard?

Invite a dev to your all meetings at least once a week. I once designed a feature that couldn’t be built. 🤦

Bonus 7. Post-Launch & Iteration Strategy

How will success be measured post-launch? (Metrics, A/B testing, Heatmaps)
Is there a plan to collect user feedback?
Will there be continued design support?

Pro Tip: Asking this shows you’re thinking long-term, it wows clients every time.

How to Ask Questions Like a Pro

Cartoon-style image of a laptop screen showing a virtual meeting with four people, question marks above them, on a purple-to-orange gradient background, illustrating collaboration challenges for Rehan Pinjari’s UI/UX design blog about pre-project questions.

It’s not only important to ask, but also how. You don’t want to sound like someone who is questioning someone suspicious, right? Here’s how to get meaningful responses without feeling awkward:

Collaborative Speaking: “What’s success?” vs “How can we define success together?” It is less combative and more team-oriented.
Timing Tips: Set goals at the very start and save limits for planning sessions.
Go more deeply: If they reply, “Make it user-friendly,” ask, “What does that mean for you? Do you have an example?

Building trust is the goal, not just giving answers. Do this, and you’ll be the designer everyone wants to work with.

Personal Trick: I usually ask for examples of designs they enjoy (or dislike). It’s related to a cheat code for aligning expectations.

Pro Mistakes to Avoid (Lessons from My Experience)

Illustration of a worried UI/UX designer, Rehan Pinjari, working at a desktop computer with an exclamation mark above their head, set on a green background with a plant, symbolizing design project stress from the blog post on avoiding failures.

I messed up so you didn’t have to. Here are two important ones:

Mistake #1: Assuming Stakeholders Agree on Goals

Arrange a “Goal Prioritization” voting session during the start. When the top three goals are not aligned, it serves as a warning sign.

Mistake 2: Skipping Technical Chats with Developers.

Involve a developer in discovery meetings. I once planned a feature that could not be built because of CMS limitations, resulting in a whole redesign. Yikes.

How to Scale This Process (For Agencies & Teams)

Have a team or agency? Here’s how you make this work:

Document everything: Set up a “Project Kickoff Hub” in Notion or Confluence to collect all answers. It’s a lifesaver for onboarding and mid-project updates.
Mentor juniors: Teach them to ask “Why?” five times to get to the bottom of the problem. It improves critical thinking fast.
Template it: Here’s an email-friendly stakeholder interview starter:
Subject: Let’s Crush This Project- Quick Questions to Start Body: “Hi, [Name], I’m excited to get started! Could you please share your opinions on [insert 2–3 critical questions] to ensure that we are on the same page?

After 6+ years of improvement, this strategy is quite successful.

Final Words

Asking the correct questions not only avoids disasters but also helps you to do well. This approach will help you create better designs, stay on schedule with projects, and wow customers (and colleagues).

Try these on the next task and feel the difference.

Choose 5 questions from this list, apply them to your next project, and then tag me on Instagram with the results for a free design review!

Oh, and what is your must-ask question? Please share your thoughts in the comments section below; I’d appreciate hearing them!

……

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12 Figma plugins you’ll need in 2025

Canvs Editorial
Meaningful stories and insightful analyses on design

As a team of product designers, Figma and Figma plugins are the bread and butter of our day-to-day.

They save time, help take care of the mundane tasks, and add value where it counts. And, with so many plugins out there, it’s hard to know which ones are worth it.

We’ve pulled together a few that we actually use and are central to our workflow. These resources have made our work faster and easier, and there’s a good chance they can do the same for you.

Here’s a list of few:

1. Aidentic

Aidentic is an AI design assistant that helps make your interfaces more usable.

It looks over your mockups and suggests tweaks for things like text, images, fonts, and colors. What’s great is you can apply the changes you like straight to your design with a single click.

2. Slide UI

Slide UI is a massive UI/UX block database with over 10,000 ready-to-use blocks that help speed up your design process.

Instead of starting from scratch, you can simply search for the blocks you need — like a nav bar or a hero section — drag them onto your artboard, and customize them to fit your style.

It’s faster than building components and more flexible than using full templates, giving you the best of both worlds.

3. Figma resources by Vijay Verma

Vijay Verma’s collection of Figma resources is a must-see for designers looking to level up their workflow. It has some thoughtfully crafted plugins that solve real design challenge. Whether you need to organise, optimise, or add polish, there’s something here to make your work easier.

4. Inima

Inima lets you turn your Figma prototypes into animated files like GIFs, APNGs, or keyframes. It offers more animation control than Figma’s ‘smart animate.’

Just set up your prototype, hit “render” in the plugin, and download the animation in your preferred format. Simple and effective for adding motion to your designs.

5. Web to Figma

Web to Figma allows you to import full webpages or specific components straight into Figma. Use the plugin to grab a webpage by entering a URL, or the Chrome extension to capture elements from any site. It’s great for creating moodboards, collecting design inspiration, or collaborating with developers by comparing live sites to your designs.

6. Google fonts

The Google Fonts plugin makes it easy to browse and add fonts directly to your Figma text nodes. You can quickly explore the full range of Google Fonts and save your favorites, with all variants available for instant use.

7. Ghost UX Writer by Zeta

Ghost UXWriter is a plugin from Zeta designed to simplify UX copywriting for designers, writers, and developers. It lets you quickly insert or copy pre-written UX copy directly into your designs, with options to adjust tone — from plain to playful.

8. Random Picker

Random Picker is a versatile Figma plugin that allows you to randomly select a specified percentage of layers or objects within your design. The plugin will instantly highlight the randomly selected layers.

9. Stark — Contrast & accessibility checker

Stark Suite is an all-in-one tool that makes accessibility easier for designers and developers. It has features like contrast checking, alt-text suggestions, vision simulator (for people with different kinds of vision), and typography analysis.

It’ll help you catch and fix accessibility issues before they become problems.

10. Style Replacer

Find and replace a style with another in your components.

Style Replacer will help you quickly replace a style with another in your components. Instead of manually updating each instance, it allows you to replace styles efficiently and consistently.

11. Similayer

Similayer enhances Figma’s ‘Select all with…’ feature by giving you more control. It lets you select layers based on a range of properties, making it easy to fine-tune your selection process. You can even select within multiple layers to narrow down elements by specific values, streamlining tasks that would otherwise take time.

12. Overlord

Overlord makes it easy to transfer vector shapes from Figma to Adobe After Effects with just one click. It’s a handy tool for anyone working on motion graphics, helping you skip the hassle of exporting files.

Check out these 2 articles for more Figma plugins:

Designing smarter, not harder

This is just the start — there are plenty more tools out there to help you design smarter. Keep exploring and testing new ones to see what fits your workflow best. And make sure to try out the plugins we’ve highlighted — you might find something that really changes the game for you.

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5 professional, free & paid Figma Design Systems, 2024-2025

A Design System is an invaluable resource for designers, serving as a single source of truth that ensures consistency, efficiency, and scalability throughout the design process.

By providing a comprehensive library of reusable components, guidelines, and patterns, it streamlines collaboration across teams, eliminates redundant work, and fosters a unified visual language across projects. Designers can focus more on solving complex problems and crafting user-centric experiences rather than reinventing basic elements for every project.

Additionally, a well-maintained Design System bridges the gap between design and development, making implementation smoother and reducing the risk of inconsistencies. It’s not just a tool—it’s a foundation that empowers designers to work faster and smarter while delivering cohesive, high-quality products.

Untitled UI / $129

Untitled UI is the largest UI kit and design system for Figma in the world.

Untitled UI has been a staple in the market for years, earning its reputation as one of the most popular UI kits and design systems for Figma.

It provides everything needed for any design project, from simple websites to complex web applications, all in one comprehensive package.

Staying true to traditional component creation, Untitled UI is expertly built with 100% Auto Layout 5.0, intelligent variants, Figma’s latest variables features, and a strong emphasis on accessibility. Boasting over 10,000 components and variants, 900+ global styles for colors, typography, and effects, and an impressive library of 420+ beautifully designed mobile and desktop page examples, it stands out as one of the most extensive and versatile UI kits available.

Get Untitled UI here

Detachless / Free

The Detachless UI Kit for Figma is an excellent free resource designed to simplify and speed up web design. It offers a wide range of components and styles to help you craft stunning designs with minimal effort.

Detachless allows you to kickstart your web projects effortlessly, providing all the essential tools for a seamless and cohesive design workflow. It’s a valuable asset for any designer looking to enhance their efficiency and unleash their creativity in Figma.

Get Detachless here

Frames X / $77

Created by Dmitriy Bunin in late 2021, Frames X is a standout example of a mid-weight design system for Figma.

Frames X includes over 5,500 reusable components and variants, all built with Auto Layout and supporting dark mode. It also features color styles, icons, and more than 420 “building blocks” to kickstart your website and app designs.

Get Frames X here

Keep / $99

Keep is a streamlined design system that stands out by offering seamless integration for both Figma and React, bridging the gap between design and development. Unlike traditional design systems that often focus solely on design tools, Keep provides a cohesive framework that ensures consistency across design and code.

With its dual compatibility, designers can effortlessly prototype and refine their ideas in Figma, while developers can implement those designs with precision using React components. This end-to-end solution not only accelerates the workflow but also reduces the risk of misalignment between design and implementation, making Keep an essential resource for teams aiming for efficiency and collaboration.

Get Keep here

Atomize / Free & $59

Used by over 12,000 designers and teams from companies like Thoughtworks, Blurb, Latch, and more, Atomize empowers designers to create modern and visually appealing user interfaces and websites, while eliminating tedious tasks.

Get Atomize here

Bonus- All-In-One

All-Access Pass to UI8.
Instant access to all 10,006 existing products and daily new releases.
Unlock $270,453 worth of assets including UI Kits, fonts, Design Systems, mockups, icons, illustrations, themes & templates.

Get All-Access Pass Here

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Top 9 Figma plugins you can’t miss in 2024

Canvs Editorial
Meaningful stories and insightful analyses on design

As a designer, having the right tools can make a big difference in your workflow.

This quarter, we’ve picked out 9 of the best plugins that stood out to us, and which will make you an efficient designer in 2024.

Each one offers something useful, from simplifying work or handling mundane tasks.

These plugins are easy to integrate into your workflow and can help you be more productive.

Whether you’re an experienced designer or just starting out, these new plugins are definitely worth a look.

Let’s get into it.

1. Vector to 3D

Vector to 3D converts your 2D text and vector layers into 3D models with just one click, using a powerful built-in ray tracing renderer.

Create stunning 3D icons, banners, mockups without needing to be a 3D specialist.

2. AI Design Reviewer- Copy, UI, Accessibility & CTA Feedback

Built by the creators of Siri, the AI Design Reviewer is trained on hundreds of guidelines from Nielsen Norman, Refactoring UI, and IDEO.

It’ll provide instant feedback and suggestions to enhance your web designs, improve your copy with tailored suggestions, catch and fix UI bugs quickly. It’ll also ensure your designs meet WCAG, AA, and AAA accessibility standards.

3. Cassini Copilot

Cassini is a collaborative toolkit for product teams that seamlessly integrates into your existing setup — whether it’s your browser or Figma workspace — making various stages of the product development process smoother and more organized. Here are a few key ways in which it helps:

Dev feedback — Cassini’s overlay tool helps you compare developed screens with their designs, so you can catch and fix any inconsistencies.
Visual referencing — Using Cassini’s Chrome plugin, you can snap screenshots of references from the web, group them into Sets, and share them easily with your team for feedback.
Team reviews — Cassini streamlines team reviews with features like comment grouping, multi-pin comments, and setting due dates for action items, making discussions productive and efficient.

4. Circular Text

Easily generate both circular and arc text in your designs with the Circular text plugin.

By default, the text wraps around a full circle. However, you can adjust the settings to create text that follows an arc of any angle (like 90 or 180 degrees).

5. Noise & Texture

Noise & Texture plugin lets you dynamically create seamless tiled noise, textures, patterns, gradients, and more.

Simply select a layer, apply your chosen noise or texture, and adjust the settings to see live updates. You can also customise your canvas size and default colors to fit your design needs.

6. Instance Finder

Instance Finder helps you locate all instances of a component used in your file.

Select a single instance or component, and the plugin will search through all pages and frames. It’ll create a comprehensive list of where the component is used.

The list is organised by page for easy navigation, and clicking on any item will zoom in on that specific instance.

7. Animate on path

Animate on path is a powerful plugin with which you can select the object you want to move, such as a frame, instance, or shape.

Next, choose the curve you want the object to follow. You can create curves using the pen tool.

8. Design system organizer

Design system organizer lets you bulk swap instances and styles between master components with the same name.

You can also copy styles between different files.

Manage pathnames, like “toolbar/nav/back,” using a convenient folder-like interface.

9. Find and replace styles

Find and replace styles plugin is ideal for finding and replacing styles across components, instances, and library styles. It’s especially useful for aligning parameters in bulk, such as auto layout or library styles, ensuring your designs are pixel-perfect across projects.

Making the most of Figma

These Figma plugins are designed to make a real impact on your design process.

As you try these out, you’ll find ways to work more efficiently and add some fresh touches to your designs. See how each one fits into your process and enjoy the benefits they bring.

Canvs Editorial regularly brings you insightful reads on design and anything related. Check out the work we do at Canvs Club.

The Canvs Editorial team comprises of Editorial Writer and Researcher — Paridhi Agrawal, the Editor’s Desk- Aalhad Joshi, and Content Operations- Abin Rajan. Follow Canvs on Instagram for more design-related content.

While you are here, do check out Cassini, a quick and easy way to review designs, websites and collect screenshots, all in one place.

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Muzli Recap: Highlights from Figma Config 2024

An Electric Atmosphere of Innovation and Anticipation

Figma is an increasingly dominant player in the design world. This fact made 2024’s Figma Config one of the key events for the design community this year.

The Moscone Center in San Francisco was filled with eager designers and tech enthusiasts. But beneath the excitement, there was also a sense of caution — is Figma going to announce something that will completely transform the design landscape?

As expected, AI became one of the most popular topics of the conference. Figma promised groundbreaking innovations to reshape the way we work and collaborate. But can they deliver? Or are they just riding the hype wave?

We’ve been closely watching this year’s conference, so let’s dive into the full list of features and updates that were unveiled…

Figma AI: Think Bigger and Build Faster

One of the biggest highlights was Figma AI, which brings intelligent design suggestions directly into the workflow. AI-powered tools offer layout recommendations, automatic adjustments for spacing and alignment, and color palette suggestions. These features not only speed up the design process but also enhance creativity by providing designers with new ideas. Additionally, efficiency updates automate tedious tasks like generating realistic images and copy, rewriting text, and automatically wiring up prototypes.

Visual Search

Figma AI includes visual search capabilities to easily find components and assets. This feature allows designers to quickly locate and utilize existing design elements, streamlining the workflow and improving efficiency.

AI-Powered Text and Image Tools

Figma AI now includes tools for generating realistic images and rewriting text with just a few clicks. These AI-powered features enable designers to create high-quality visual content and compelling copy effortlessly. The tools analyze the context of the design and suggest relevant images and text improvements, enhancing both speed and creativity in the design process.

Quick-Click Prototyping

Quick-Click Prototyping streamlines the creation of interactive prototypes. This new feature allows designers to convert static designs into clickable prototypes in seconds. By selecting elements and choosing interaction types, designers can quickly set up navigation flows and test user experiences without extensive setup.

and the feature we’ve all been waiting for 😁

Automatic Layer Renaming

To improve organization and clarity, Figma now includes Automatic Layer Renaming. This feature uses AI to rename layers based on their content and context within the design. It eliminates the need for manual renaming, ensuring that files are always tidy and easy to navigate, especially in complex projects.

Generate Designs from Text Prompts

A groundbreaking feature introduced is the ability to generate designs from text prompts. By describing the desired design in natural language, Figma AI can create initial layouts, components, and styles. This feature empowers designers to quickly iterate on ideas and explore new concepts without starting from scratch.

UI3: Figma, Redesigned

The redesigned interface, UI3, is more than just a facelift. It aims to make navigation more intuitive and workflows more streamlined. The revamped file browser now includes global search and notifications, helping users find what they need faster and stay updated on project changes. The new interface focuses on components, making it easier to access and manage design elements.

Figma Slides: Build, Collaborate, and Present

Figma Slides is a new tool designed to change how we create presentations. It combines Figma’s collaborative features with the functionality needed to build compelling slide decks. With Figma Slides, teams can collaborate in real-time, incorporate live designs, and use a zoomed-out grid view to manage slide layouts.

Updates to Dev Mode: From Design Ready to Dev Complete

Dev Mode was a major focus at the conference, with updates designed to bridge the gap between designers and developers. New features include the Ready for Dev View, which helps developers find what they need among multiple design explorations, and Focus View, which allows developers to see only what is ready to build. Additionally, Code Connect surfaces design system code and makes it more useful across various frameworks and programming languages. These updates ensure that design and code are more closely aligned, making the handoff process smoother and more efficient.

Enhanced Prototyping Capabilities

Prototyping in Figma has reached new heights with the introduction of micro-interactions and advanced animation effects. These features allow for the creation of more interactive and realistic prototypes. The improved device preview options let designers test their prototypes on various devices and screen sizes directly within Figma, ensuring a seamless user experience. Conditional logic support enables the creation of sophisticated user flows that accurately simulate real-world interactions.

What do we at Muzli think about the new updates?

Without a doubt, Figma Config 2024 was a landmark event, showcasing innovations that could fundamentally change the design process. We at Muzli were happy to see the advanced collaboration tools, the cool AI features, and the improvements in prototyping and accessibility. Even Figma Slides sounds like a fun and long-overdue replacement for Powerpoint or Canva.

This event establishes Figma as an even stronger player that will be really hard for competitors to catch.
BUT we have to pause and ask ourselves — is all this too good to be true? Will they be able to deliver on these promises? And on a more philosophical note — is this AI going to make us more efficient design machines and take away all the fun and creativity? What new challenges will we need to tackle?

All this and more, in the next episode 😄
Special reporter Eyal, out.

You can watch all the announcements here:

Config 2024: Figma product launch keynote

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Advanced Figma tips and tricks to save designers time

Article by Spaceberry – UI/UX Design Studio

Advanced Figma features can save designers hours of work. If you’re still dragging your cursor to the top corner of the screen to create sections or manually locking layers one by one, this article is definitely for you. We’ve compiled new Figma functionalities and old methods — perhaps you’ve missed something?

Multi-edit variants

Figma has just launched a new multi-edit feature for variants, making component editing a breeze. Just pick a variant or a nested layer and use Multi-edit variants in the toolbar, or press Q on your keyboard (remember not to press cmd+Q on Mac!). In multi-edit mode, changes to one variant, like text, icons, or size adjustments, automatically update all variants in the component group.

Select matching objects

Editing matching objects in a section is now as easy as editing components! Just select an object within a frame or group at the top level of the canvas or inside a section. Then, click “Select matching layers” in the top toolbar or use the shortcut: ⌥ Option + ⌘ Cmd + A for Mac; Alt + Ctrl + A for Windows. All selected objects will be surrounded by a blue bounding box, allowing you to edit them collectively.

💡 Tip: You can preview matching objects before selecting them by pressing Shift while selecting one element. Additionally, you can manually select them while holding Shift, eliminating the need to double-click deeply nested objects within groups or frames.

Hold and slide to hide or lock layers

It turns out, that to lock/unlock multiple layers, you don’t have to click on each one individually. We can lock one layer and then drag it with the mouse key held down across the layers list to apply this action to other layers. It’s also working for hiding layers.

Copy and paste properties between layers

You can easily copy fill, stroke, and text properties between layers using the right-click menu or keyboard shortcuts.

- On Mac: Copy properties — ⌥ Option + ⌘ Cmd + C; Paste properties — ⌥ Option + ⌘ Cmd + V.
- On Windows: Copy properties — Ctrl + Alt + C; Paste properties — Ctrl + Alt + V.

💡 Tip: You can copy only the fill property if it’s not a style or variable. Simply left-click on the fill property and then use cmd+c/cmd+v on Mac or ctrl+c/ctrl+v on Windows to paste it onto the selected layer.

Rename layers in bulk

Correctly naming layers is crucial for quickly identifying their purpose and locating specific objects or groups within a Figma file, especially when collaborating with other designers. Aligning layer names with actual code can enhance communication between designers and developers, catering to the team’s needs and ensuring smoother workflow integration. If you didn’t assign the correct names to layers when initially creating them, editing them later can become quite challenging. However, Figma’s tools significantly simplify this task.

To open the “Rename layers” modal, select the desired layers, then use the following keyboard shortcuts:

- On Mac: ⌘ Cmd + R
- On Windows: Ctrl + R

Alternatively, right-click on the layers in the panel and choose “Rename”.

From this window, you can rename all the selected layers at the same time.

If you already have a unique name for layers but want to include additional suffixes or prefixes in the layer names, you can simply attach them to the existing name, as shown below:

You can also delete or modify existing parts of the name. The “Match” field enables you to specify which portion of the layer’s name you wish to modify.

Leaving this field blank allows you to alter the entire name. However, you can also use it to delete or modify specific parts of the layer’s name.

To do this, enter the part of the name you want to replace in the “Match” field, and in the “Rename to” field, enter what you want to replace this part with or leave it blank to delete. The other part of the name not specified in the “Match” field will remain unchanged.

Use Tab to autocorrect typos

Spell check finds and corrects spelling mistakes. It displays red squiggly lines under errors while you’re editing text. If you spot a mistake, simply select the word and press Tab to fix it with the first suggestion from the spell checklist. Our designers think Figma’s spell check could be better, but we hope they improve it in future updates.

💡 Tip: if you often find yourself distracted by the error highlights, you can disable them in the Figma > Text > Spell Check menu.

Use math inside Figma fields

Mathematical expressions on Figma are the functions we can’t work without. It’s a feature that (almost) everyone knows about. But it’s worth reminding, especially for those still reaching for their phone calculator to figure out element widths. All numeric values in Figma’s sidebar can be calculated on the fly. You can apply addition, subtraction, division, and multiplication right in the input field. That’s how simple it is!

Align like a pro

We find it challenging to remember all the alignment shortcuts, especially now that auto-layouts have reduced their usage significantly. Nonetheless, try to rely heavily on shortcuts for distributing vertical and horizontal spacing.

💡 Tip: Figma’s tooltips show shortcuts when you hover over alignment settings in the sidebar, which is handy if you forget.

Variables bulk edit

Before discovering how to bulk edit variables, it was challenging. Attempting to select them using “Shift” only opened the menu for one variable when clicking “Edit,” which seemed like a mistake on Figma’s part. However, right-clicking on a variable revealed the option for bulk actions.

Collapse nested layers

When working with projects with lots of nesting, open layers can be frustrating. Fortunately, Figma has a solution. Just hold down the “Option” key while collapsing layers in the side menu to collapse all nested layers with one click. And for expanding, it’s the same trick — hold down “Option” to open all nested groups and frames.

Finale Note

These are just a few tips to get you started. Figma offers a wealth of features to streamline your design process. Keep exploring and experimenting to discover your own favorite time-saving tricks! For even more advanced techniques, consider exploring resources on Figma plugins and the Figma Community.

Sometimes, even the tiniest details can save hours in project development (not to mention a few nerve cells of a perfectionist, like when collapsing layers). So, be sure to try incorporating at least a few of these tips into your workflow and see how it enhances your experience. Share in the comments which tip you found most helpful or unexpected, and don’t hesitate to share your own Figma feature discoveries as well.

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45 Game-Changing 2024 Figma Plugins You Can’t Miss!

In this post, you’ll find the ultimate collection of 45 popular and practical plugins for Figma in 2024. Carefully curated, these plugins are poised to enhance your workflow, amplify your creativity, and elevate your Figma experience. Dive into this meticulously crafted selection, designed to serve you best in your collaborative design journey with Figma

Figma to Wix Studio

Transform your Figma designs into advanced, high-converting websites with Wix Studio, the platform for agencies and enterprises.

Figma to Webflow (HTML, CSS and Website)

The Figma to Webflow plugin, built by Webflow Labs, lets you turn your static designs into clean, production-ready Webflow HTML and CSS. Add Webflow Interactions, wire up content using our powerful CMS, and one-click publish onto the fastest hosting infrastructure.

Figma to HTML with Framer

Export your Figma designs by simply copying what’s on the canvas and pasting it in Framer. The plugin takes care of adapting your design to Framer’s layout tools in real-time, so you can focus solely on making a great website.

Fast Isometric

Fast Isometric is a Figma plugin for quickly creating isometric designs with a variety of tools and templates, simplifying the process of crafting impressive three-dimensional graphics and interfaces.

Breakpoints

Preview responsive layout inside a Figma frame and share animated prototype.

Relume

Create websites using the Relume Site Builder and access them through the plugin to easily edit them in Figma.

Musho AI

Musho turns your prompts into nearly-complete, dev-ready websites with simple layouts, great copy, and gorgeous images.

ARC — Bend your type!

Curve your text upward, downward or into a circle

Unsplash

Insert beautiful images from Unsplash into your The Unsplash License allows images to be used freely for both commercial and personal projects.

Jitter · Animation for Figma

Create professional animated content with Jitter. Use it to design on-brand animated UIs, videos, social media posts, websites, apps, logos and more. Sign up for free.

Magician

Design with the power of AI to do everything from copywriting to generating unique icons from text.

Remove BG

Remove the background of images automatically with just a single click

Anima — Figma to Code: React, HTML, Vue, CSS, Tailwind

Let Anima code like YOU with AI Code Personalization
Get code, based on your design, and accelerate the design to development process.

Icons8 — icons, illustrations, photos

Keep your flow with the largest and most consistent collection of curated graphics. Get 1.5M+ icons, photos, and illustrations without ever needing to leave Figma!

Content Reel

Design layouts more efficiently by pulling text strings, images, and icons from one palette. Content Reel lets you create custom content and share it with other Figma users.

Vector to 3D

This plugin converts text and vector nodes into 3D models with just one click! The converted models will be automatically placed and rendered with GPU ray-tracing. You can use it to render a nice 3D icon, text, or any other 3D-style images without being a 3D specialist.

Mockup

Just select a device, choose a frame, and your design appear on the screen. Easiest mockup plugin

Autoflow

Automagically draw flow arrows in Figma! Illustrate user flows, diagrams, or graphics in a hand-drawn or minimalist style.

Blobs

Create organic blob shapes with the click of a button. Every shape that is generated is unique to the last. You can control how unique a shape is along with how many points it has.

Glow

Apply a smooth, beautiful glow to your elements.

LottieFiles — Create animations & export from Figma to Lottie

LottieFiles for Figma redefines animation creation, enabling designers to effortlessly convert their designs into Lottie animations. This powerful feature supports everything from basic animations to multi-frame and multi-variant component sequences.

To Path

put any objects or text on a path

Noise

The Noise plugin for Figma adds texture and depth to designs with customizable noise patterns. Generate Perlin, simplex, and cellular noise, adjust parameters like scale and opacity, and preview changes in real-time. Enhance your designs quickly and efficiently with this valuable tool.

Table Creator

Create custom-styled tables which can be easily resized, edited and automatically adjust to content. Control the design of your tables by modifying the components.

Chart

Chart is the most powerful plugin for Figma that uses real or random data to create 18 types of charts. Chart supports copy-paste from editors like Excel, Numbers, Google Sheets, live connection with Google Sheets and remote JSON (REST API), local CSV and JSON files.

Stark — Contrast & Accessibility Tools

Now, you can create and test accessible software in record time. Whether you’re building a website, online shop, mobile app, or SaaS product, Stark gives every designer, engineer, PM, and QA expert the manual and automated tools to make it accessible with ease.

3D Wave: Soften everything like fabric

Make Everything into 3D Wave!

Get Waves

Get Waves is a free SVG wave generator to make unique SVG waves for your next design. Choose a curve, adjust the complexity, randomize!

User Profile | Avatar

Enables designers to display beautiful generated avatars 📸 in your design prototype.

UI Faces — Free AI avatars

Free, AI-generated avatars for your creative projects.

Noise & Texture

A Figma plugin to dynamically generate seamless tiled noise, textures, patterns, gradients, and more. Select a layer and add your noise or texture. Change the settings and see your layers updated live.

Mesh Gradient

generates a gradient image with an underlying 2d mesh, and lets you edit the vertices & edges of the mesh to get the perfect gradient look.

Beautiful Shadows

The plugin allows you to create beautiful shadows by simply dragging a ‘light source’ which casts a shadow on selected elements.

Ruri Splines

Create high quality splines, shapes, spots by adding gradient along path effect to any curve. With collection of more than 250+ handcrafted and fully editable curves & colors you will have unlimited options to combine.

Pixels

Apply Pixelate / 8bit Effect Filter on images. Raster & Vector.

Drawkit 3D Builder

Build beautiful design with DrawKit 3D builder you can easily mix and match 3D illustrations and icons and drop them into your Figma file.

Sine wave

Generate sine waves easily within a few clicks

Fit Curve

The Fit Curve plugin helps to create curves with a smooth curvature in Figma. Featuring an intuitive interface with a series of circular buttons and slider, it allows for precise modification of handle lengths on Bezier curve segments.

Figma To Elementor

Figma plugin to easily convert Figma design into Elementor widgets. The json data generated from this plugin can be directly pasted into Elementor editor with right click on elementor editor > paste from other site > Ctrl +V. Working better for well grouped design.