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A free Figma alternative
zvena Design is a browser-based interface design tool built on the open-source Penpot editor. Components, auto layout, prototypes and inspect mode are free for your whole team — no seats, no trial.
What zvena Design does
- Boards, vector shapes, the pen tool, boolean operations, masks, effects, shadows and blur.
- Components with variants, shared team libraries and design tokens in the W3C format.
- Auto layout with flex and CSS grid, with clear sizing: fixed, hug contents or fill container.
- Prototypes with interactions, transitions and animations; a view mode and share links for presenting.
- Inspect mode for developers: CSS, SVG and measurements straight from the design. Export to PNG, JPG, SVG and PDF.
- Real-time multiplayer editing, comments and version history.
- Plugins through the Penpot plugin API.
- Live frames in zvena Docs: paste a board into a spec and the preview updates itself when the design changes.
zvena Design vs Figma
| Feature | Figma | zvena Design |
|---|---|---|
| Price for a team | Paid per editor seat | ✓ Free, unlimited members |
| Works in the browser | ✓ Yes | ✓ Yes |
| Desktop app | ✓ Yes | ✗ Browser only |
| Real-time collaboration | ✓ Yes | ✓ Yes |
| Components and variants | ✓ Yes | ✓ Yes |
| Auto layout | ✓ Yes | ✓ Flex and grid |
| Prototyping | ✓ Yes | ≈ Transitions and animations; no variables or conditions |
| Dev / inspect mode | Paid seat | ✓ Free |
| Design tokens | ≈ Variables | ✓ Tokens (W3C format) |
| Plugins | ✓ Large ecosystem | ≈ Penpot plugin API |
| Linked team docs | ≈ Through other apps | ✓ Built in (zvena Docs) |
| AI features | ✓ Yes | ✗ None, by design |
| Your files used for AI training | ≈ Depends on plan and settings | ✓ Never |
| Open-source foundation | ✗ No | ✓ Penpot, MPL 2.0 |
| Hosted in the European Union | Not by default | ✓ Yes |
Figma is a trademark of Figma, Inc. Comparison based on publicly available information; features and plans change over time.
What's missing
zvena is young, and we would rather tell you up front:
- No .fig import. Move designs over as SVG exports for now; direct import is on our roadmap.
- No whiteboard, slides or website builder — nothing like FigJam, Figma Slides or Figma Sites yet.
- No variables or conditional logic in prototypes.
- No desktop or mobile apps. zvena runs in modern browsers.
- No community file gallery. Start from our templates instead: a landing page, a mobile app and a UI kit.
Who it's for
- Teams that want everyone — designers, developers, PMs — in the file without paying per seat.
- Freelancers and agencies sharing work with clients through view links.
- Students and educators who need a full-featured tool for free.
- Anyone who would rather keep their work away from AI training.
How to move from Figma
- Create your account. Sign in with Google, GitHub or an e-mail link. You get a personal workspace and 2 GB of storage.
- Export from Figma. Select the frames you need and export them as SVG.
- Import into zvena Design. Drag the SVG files onto the canvas. Layers come in as vector shapes you can edit.
- Rebuild what matters. Recreate text styles, turn repeated elements into components, set up auto layout and move colors and type into tokens.
- Invite your team. Create a shared workspace on the Team page and send an invite link with the right role.
New to the editor? zvena Design is based on Penpot, so the Penpot user guide covers every tool. Writing specs too? See the Notion alternative.
Free for everyone. No credit card, no trial, no ads.