Articles

The official press release from Adobe. ​“Adobe and Figma will benefit all stakeholders in the product design process, from designers to product managers to developers, by bringing powerful capabilities from Adobe’s imaging, photography, illustration, video, 3D and font technology into the Figma platform. […] The transaction is expected to close in 2023, subject to the receipt of required regulatory clearances and approvals and the satisfaction of other closing conditions, including the approval of Figma’s stockholders.” See also Adobe’s Investor presentation on acquisition.

The official announcement from Dylan Field.

The design team at Spotify discusses balancing conflicting goals of creating a playful space for experimentation and fostering interdisciplinary team collaboration in the Figma files. The key to achieving both is balancing the exploratory nature of design with a logical organization in your shared work. ​“A chaotic mess of brilliant designs is incomprehensible without a helpful file structure but too much structure early on might stifle your team’s inspiration.”

Steve Dennis reflects on his experiences of using Figma and tries to identify the biggest pain points. It’s a thoughtful list of possible improvements that I pretty much agree with. Design tokens and the official marketplace would be at the top of my list.

Pavel Babkin shows how to move objects along the path using the Figma Motion plugin.

Yuhki Yamashita is the Chief Product Officer at Figma and leads the product and design teams. In this interview with the Merit Office Hours, they talk about the value of process, adapting to asynchronous work, and the importance of mentorship.

An interview with Badrul Farooqi, the first Product Manager (and 18th employee) at Figma. He spent nearly five years at the company and worked on the two largest customer-facing products at Figma: the core design tool and Figma Community. Learn about solving problems for the most discerning customers, the benefits of being an internal transfer PM, how and where to talk to customers for maximum benefit, and more.

Insightful interview about the role of community in Figma’s go-to-market strategy early on. ​“As Senior Director of Marketing, Claire Butler joined Figma as one of the first ten employees and the company’s first business hire. She began shaping the company’s bottoms-up growth strategy and laying the track for a vibrant community before the product was even publicly available.” The conversation is also available as a podcast.

Jaelyn Brown shares her experience as an Early Career Program Manager Intern with a focus on developing engagement for HBCUs (Historically Black Colleges and Universities) and HSIs (Hispanic Serving Institutions).

Pavel Babkin explains how to use link animation for layer properties in his popular Motion plugin to easily animate complex scenes.

A quick look at the process of updating an existing component with Component Properties and releasing an update with minimal friction for the design team.

Practical ways to overcome seven common Figma design issues caused by Auto Layout, constraints, groups, frames, components, and duplicates.

Danny Sapio shares a few best practices on using Figma for max efficiency: make components, use Auto Layout and don’t use groups, apply consistent spacing and styles, keep files organized and archive old designs, learn shortcuts, leverage community files, and present your work smoothly and cleanly.

Christine Vallaure highlights some of Figma’s features and possibilities to help you build a design that aligns with code as much as needed and improve your teamwork.

Molly Hellmuth gives a few practical recommendations on creating a bulletproof color system.

At Microsoft, Figma is winning over Adobe XD as their design tool of choice. Jordan Novet wrote an interesting profile for CNBC showing how several acquisitions and internal demand led to its rise in popularity, even while Microsoft and Adobe have worked together for over 20 years.

“Cloud 100 leaders from Algolia, Figma, Gong​.io, and Papaya Global share their stories from the trenches as they offer both strategic and tactical advice to founders on building enduring businesses.”

Learn everything you need to know to master the latest version of Auto Layout and optimize your work.

Elizabeth Alli shares how to embed an interactive Figma prototype into Notion.

I’m not familiar with the Specify app, but this use case is something I’ve been thinking of automating myself. Happy to see that there is an existing solution! As Sun Tzu once said, ​“If you wait by the river long enough, the Figma tools and plugins you need will float by.”