Last year I use Figma. Most likely you have already heard about it. In this article I will describe the advantages and disadvantages, based on personal observations. All this will be subjective. I started using Figma while the logic of working with components was very raw. For a year, evolution was almost unnoticed. Today, the elements inside the component interact with each other more logically and orderly. However, there are still disadvantages ...

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Evolution is impossible without consumer participation.

The Figma team listens to us - the users, which means we have faith in the perfect tool, in which Figma will eventually turn into. Using the example of my own product, I was able to notice how the performance of the environment has increased over the past few months.

They apparently did not expect so many components.

When I developed my first design system at Figma at the beginning of this year, I was faced with a performance threshold. “Oops, it seems they didn’t expect so many components” - I thought, after another long wait, while in my product the primary color for all templates is pereressa. It is used in more than a hundred components.

I literally sensed performance improvements.

Gradually, in the process of developing my system, I began to notice that many processes in Figma began to happen faster. Since I constantly had to change a million little things for a variety of objects, I immediately fixed the moments when it started to happen faster. Then even faster. Then another. They clearly optimized something, as if there had been no reason before. Figma - a cool product, but not without flaws. I will list three main ones that, in my opinion, reduce the speed of work:

Lack of global colors

Until now, we have to invest color as a component in each module in order to get a design system that is flexible for customization. They are already working on it, but nonetheless. I believe that the introduction of global colors can greatly improve the performance of a volumetric atomic system. Hundreds of components will get rid of the extra nested element that needs to be redrawn whenever you change the color scheme.

No local component search

Search becomes available only after the publication in team library. Suppose this is acceptable for teams. But it is unacceptable for a freelancer who wants to use his design system for his own clients. He clones it for a new client and quickly customizes it for his requests. And he, by the way, also needs a search. And absolutely do not need the features of the team.

Without searching, working in the 'Components' tab (Alt-2) becomes extremely difficult if you operate among 500+ modules.

Difficult work in Instance, if a lot of components

This becomes important when there are many components, and they have many similar duplicates, but with minor changes. For example, a dozen cards, hundreds of icons. You will not be able to quickly find the required card module in the drop-down list if they are called Card 1, 2, 3, 4 .... N. And not a very good idea to turn the name of the component into its description.

Honestly, I would not want to scare you with these flaws. I understand perfectly well that the development team has a giant to-do list and does not please all customers, trying to fulfill everyone’s wishes. After all, the company has to balance between moving along its own business path and between hundreds of new requests, with which the Feature request section in the chat is added daily. Plus weight, I note only those that delight me personally.

Components

The very principle of the components is delightful. For example, you displace any element inside a component and it displaces in dozens or hundreds of subordinates. Mass editing in just 3-5 actions.

Clever sticking

Snap is so well thought out and sensitive that you can work with many objects at a great distance at once. You will move and move them and not worry that they will not fall into the grid.

Smart highlighting

I select a lot of objects and I am not afraid to miss, because the selection is saved in the action history. And if you combine selections with the Ctrl / Alt keys, many routine actions go into semi-automatic mode.

As mentioned at the very beginning, everything said is subjective. Today we already have a great opportunity to choose a design tool for the soul and OS preferences! And I am confident in the future of these opportunities will be even greater.