Just updated my annual Config Study Guide with the remainder of the recordings — all 70 talks are now organized and ready to watch. (Only the Learning Lab videos are still unavailable.) This is a practical way to work through the talks at your own pace, mark what you’ve watched, and trade recommendations with friends and colleagues.
A fresh edition of my annual Config Study Guide, with all recordings grouped by day, organized by stage (from larger to smaller), and color-coded by theme. The stage size is a good cue for how important organizers considered a specific talk — I recommend starting from the top of deep dives and themes you’re interested in. Some talks haven’t been published yet, so the study guide will be updated.
I make this resource because even while attending in person, I can only make it to a small fraction of talks I’m interested in. Use the Stamp tool to mark the talks you want to watch or have already watched, add your thoughts with stickies, and share your version of this file with friends.
Ridd digs into everything that launched at Config 2026 with Loredana Crisan, Figma’s Chief Design Officer. The key product philosophy she outlines: AI gets you to 70% — on shader effects, on motion — then you mold the rest. Weave, the node-based tool Figma acquired last year, is the clearest expression of this systems-over-screens direction: you build a workflow that produces a visual system, and the workflow is “the special sauce.” The big bet isn’t AI replacing the designer’s hand; it’s making AI a precision tool, which Loredana argues is still ahead of where the technology actually is.
“Figma Make changes who gets to ship things.” That’s Charlota Blunárová, whose collaborative embroidery app “Common Thread” took Best Overall after she built it in one afternoon with no engineering background. It’s the most direct statement of what Figma Make is actually doing at the edges of the design community. The other five winners — including Aleyna Çatak’s head-and-lip-controlled navigation system “Pucker” and Lee Black’s gesture-powered ambient music instrument “Airwwave” — make the same point from five different angles.
Dylan Field’s own Config 2026 recap, covering all six announcements at once: Code Layers, Figma Motion, Shader fills and effects, Generative Plugins, Weave Tools, and the Figma Agent. His framing: “AI has lowered the floor, but it has not raised the ceiling. Designers, creatives, builders: You will raise the ceiling.” A deliberate pushback against the narrative that AI replaces creative work.
Dylan Field opens Config 2026 by settling the design-vs-code debate once and for all: “Code is not the opposite of design. Code is material for design.” The keynote’s headline feature, Code Layers, puts live interactive code directly on the canvas alongside design layers, with a shared agent chat so teams can explore and riff together rather than each going a hundred prompts deep alone. From the same team: Figma Motion in beta, a full timeline-based motion tool with shader effects, 3D transforms, and export to MP4, GIF, and animated SVG. Worth watching in full: the Weave AI tools and custom shader section is genuinely impressive, and the generative plugin demos near the end show where the platform is heading.
“AI tends to pull us in deep before we’ve gone wide, and I think that’s a mistake.” Joey Banks’s recap of Config 2026 is a good summary of the features, but the reason to read it is this thread running underneath: the entire Figma canvas strategy this year is really an argument for staying in the messy middle rather than reaching for the polished AI output too fast.
If you’re heading to San Francisco for Config, the official conference is just the start. This Luma calendar aggregates the unofficial satellite events — happy hours, dinners, morning meetups, and a comedy night — organized by community members across the city. Several are already at capacity or on waitlist, so worth checking sooner rather than later.
Figma’s first Config-branded Makeathon, co-hosted with Contra, runs June 4–18: build something with Figma Make for a shot at $100K in prizes, including a $50K grand prize. All participants get Figma Pro free for the duration, and the first 10K to pre-register before June 3 unlock early access to Figma’s new design agent beta.
Config 2026 lands June 24–25 at Moscone. The agenda confirms the obvious: this year is about AI workflows and design systems built for them. Build your schedule now — last year the best talks filled up fast.
A first look at Config 2026 speakers — AI artist Holly Herndon, creator of the world’s first 3D-printed fashion collection Danit Pele, designer and author Vicki Tan, designer and founder Matthew Ström-Aw, and mathematician and educator Grant Sanderson from 3Blue1Brown. Config returns to San Francisco on June 23–25. Virtual registration is free.
Config is returning to San Francisco on June 23–25, 2026, and early bird tickets are available with a 50% discount ($450 instead of the regular $899) for a limited time.
The next year’s Config will be in San Francisco, CA, on June 23–25. The call for speakers is open until November 7, 2025.
“From giant inflatable glyphs to welcoming soundscapes, Figma’s Brand Studio designed an immersive conference that celebrated the spirit of makership at every turn.”
Ridd is spot on: “2024: Figma uses AI to help designers design 😡 👎 2025: Figma uses AI to help designers code 🎉 🙌”
A grown-up version of zines from previous years. Didn’t read it yet, but flipped through, and it’s a beautiful historic artifact.
Whoa, that was fast! All talks from this year’s Config are already available on this YouTube playlist.
If you have time for only one thing, watch this Config 2025 opening keynote led by Dylan Field.
If an hour-and-a-half keynote is too long for now, this blog post provides a good recap: “Dylan Field runs down everything we launched at Config 2025 and explains why pushing design further matters more now than ever.”
“Create a personalized virtual badge for Config 2025! Make it your own by adding stickers and don’t forget to share your badge on social to connect with virtual and IRL attendees!”