Have you tried the new quick action search yet? Pressing Cmd-/ (or Ctrl-/ on Windows) now provides instant access to hidden features and plugins, similar to Spotlight or Alfred on Mac. Love this update!
Registration for Config 2021 is open until April 15th — don’t miss your spot at this free 2‑day conference! The speakers’ lineup is great, and I’m always looking forward to new product announcements in the opening keynote.
New use cases for Interactive Components keep rolling in. The creativity of the design community is truly mind-blowing! As you’ll see in this issue, Interactive Components have been used not only to add interactivity to standard UI elements like input fields and switches but also to create full-blown games like Sudoku, Go, or Minesweeper. (At this point, I began suggesting Figma to kids wanting to build video games. It’s a great intro to visual programming without actual programming.)
Exciting updates from Figma this week! First, they added comments to Figma Community, so now you can ask questions or provide feedback on plugins and files. Second, Interactive Components announced on the previous Config reached public beta! I collected a few demos and experiments made by early beta testers. Last but not least, news leaked about FigJam, a new whiteboard space Figma is working on — can’t wait to learn more!
Don’t miss an article on how Dropbox uses Smart Animate to illustrate product design concepts, a guide on switching between light and dark modes, a video stream of building an official Tailwind UI Figma kit, and an open-source Figma alternative. Enjoy!
Hello! 👋 Are you staying warm? We’ve been hit with a few snowstorms in the last weeks, so it’s a good time to get cozy and go through a reading backlog. This is one of the most densely packed and interesting issues I’ve sent in a while – hope you’ll enjoy it!
Figma announced the first Config of this year on April 21st, 2021. I can’t wait to hear their announcements! Netflix unveiled Hawkins, their design system used across 80+ applications. REI built a text input component with whopping 3,360 variants, while Uber programmatically created 256 components for map markers. In contrast to these two articles, Johan Ronsse makes an argument against overusing complex Figma features. Shopify shows how to set up your Figma projects to meet the needs of the whole team. And there are so many tips and tricks that I had to create a new section for them!
Figma introduced Support Forum, which in time will become an easily referenced resource for troubleshooting and best practices.
Zapier announced a new set of features for product teams, including native support for Figma Variants.
During an audit of marketing pages, the team at Figma realized they weren’t following their own advice. Over the course of a month, their small team created and organized a robust, adaptable style guide and component library that now lives in their CMS. I loved that part: “…every color has its own branded name, inspired by California, where Figma is based. An earthy green is avocado toast, and an ember yellow is sunset.”
Time to ship new features after a winter break! During the last couple of weeks, Figma released multiple updates and improvements. File templates may be the most noticeable one, but personally, I’m more excited about improvements to Styles. A way to review library updates before accepting them is a nice touch too! Also in this issue, check out how non-designers use Figma at Dropbox, how teams use Zeplin for developer handoff, and even how to organize your design system with Notion. Enjoy!
Happy New Year! 🎆 Hope you had wonderful holidays and feeling excited for the new year. 2020 is finally over, so let’s hope things will get only better from now on. Here is an original song with holiday greetings from the team at Figma!
In this issue, see the results of a design tools survey, watch “Love Triangle” by Pablo Stanley, listen to podcasts with Dylan Field, and read how Discord is building open-source design tools. Don’t miss an intro to Figma Motion plugin, a tutorial on creating type scales, and the whole new section with artworks made in Figma. Enjoy!
Figma celebrated five years since its public launch! Before that, a small team been working on it for over three years. Dylan Field wrote an excellent essay, “Meet us in the browser”, on their choice of the platform, the initial negative reactions, and a cultural change it delivered. Figma also ran its biannual Maker Week, and while the event is internal, I collected a few publicly shared projects and experiments.
I’m taking some time off during the holidays, so the next issue will be sent on January 4th, 2021. Happy holidays! 🎄
P.S. Readwise is one of my new favorite apps, and they’re currently looking for a Principal Product Designer. Passion for Figma is one of the requirements! They didn’t pay me to share this, but as a user I have skin in the game and want them to find someone great 😎
Auto Layout 3 with a new look is here! Now we can control how objects are stretched and distributed within an Auto Layout frame, and set its padding values independently. This update brings Auto Layout even closer to Flexbox layouts in CSS, which is great for aligning code and design. The new UI took some folks by surprise, so take time to go through the links and learn how it works.
P.S. Today is the final day of the Black Friday & Cyber Monday sale of my book Designing in Figma. Right now, the ebook is available for only $15, which is almost 50% off! The book was already updated with Variants and other recent releases, and the next update will include the new Auto Layout. All future updates are free.
A year ago, I sent the first issue of this newsletter to 19 subscribers 🥳 I started it with zero expectations, but this year Figmalion affected my life in a meaningful way. I wrote a post about starting it, finding the audience (👋), getting sponsors, it’s role in self-publishing the book, and running it behind the scenes. Thank you for being with me this year!