UX/UI prototyping tools are becoming some of the most important design software in the modern day. With lives lived with computers in our hands, apps, and responsive web design, we need more design intention than what’s been offered in previous years. With Figma, you can easily design and prototype entire websites, apps, or even presentations and small animated videos. With great power and development, it’s no wonder that Figma rules against its open-source alternative of Penpot. Although Penpot is Figma’s best alternative, the real deal is the better option for UX/UI design.

6 No development skills required to run

Figma is a ready-made software tool

Penpot requires development knowledge to self-host, something that many UX/UI designers might not have, especially if running on macOS, which is traditionally more challenging to use self-hosting tools such as Docker.

Although Penpot can also be hosted through its own Penpot servers and self-hosted, Figma makes hosting much easier. You can access Figma directly from your browser or download the free desktop app; no coding or development skills are required to access it either.

Figma acts like a regular app or tool, even compared to the free version. It doesn’t cause bloatware, either. The app and browser versions function similarly, so you don’t lose out on anything by choosing one over the other.

5 More power and bigger community

Overall, a better system

As with many comparisons between open-source and proprietary software, there’s usually a considerable gap between the power behind the project. Figma became publicly available in 2015, announced by co-founder Dylan Field.

At that time, Figma easily surpassed other major UX/UI and prototyping tools to become the number one choice tool for most web designers and developers. This includes overtaking Photoshop and Adobe’s terrible attempt at UX/UI software in Adobe XD as the go-to web design tool. After a sniff of acquisition potential from Adobe itself in 2022, which was abandoned in 2023, Figma remains at the top of the food chain in web prototyping and design tools.

In comparison, Penpot is a community open-source tool that was birthed in 2019. Although it has a tight-knit community of users and developers, it doesn’t have the power, funding, or development knowledge behind it, as found in Figma.

4 Smoother user experience

Minimal lagging for silky scrolling

Figma is much smoother when scrolling and zooming within larger projects than Penpot. You won't notice lag or issues if you’re working on big projects taking up to 30 screens in your single-page Figma project. Penpot will struggle even for projects with less than 10 screens, in comparison.

Figma uses Web Assembly, or WASM, and C++ to build the backend of its tool, which does all the heavy lifting as you design. The front end of Figma simply updates, allowing for a smooth process and experience.

3 Stronger collaboration features

Teamwork makes the dream work

Although both Figma and Penpot have competitive pricingfor team accounts, Figma has better team collaborative features. Both products allow for team collaboration within a document, letting multiple designers work on the same document simultaneously.

Figma lets users directly add comments, feedback, or questions to any design. This takes live collaboration up a notch. Direct comments and feedback features aren’t available in Penpot.

Figma also benefits from Penpot via its version history and branching for managing design iterations. This lets users revert to previous versions or branch off into multiple design decisions to easily work together to form the perfect design.

2 Applying several states to components

Make light work of creating components

Credit: Source: Figma

In Figma, you can apply different states or variants to your components. This allows you to group together and organize similar components into a single container, simplifying your component library. Overall, this makes it easier for everyone in your Figma team to find the components and variants they’re looking for.

UX/UI design components are as simple as shapes, buttons, fields, or more complex items, like cards and menus. The ability to apply several variations to the same component allows you to easily reuse it without spending extra time.

This isn’t an option in Penpot at the time of writing. You must create new components for each and every variant required.

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6 reasons why Penpot is the best open-source alternative to Figma

With all the same features as Figma and a tiny fraction of the cost for premium use, Penpot makes the best open-source alternative to Figma.

1 Advanced prototyping features

Design for the web in the best way

One of Figma’s main purposes is to prototype web, apps, or other digital designs before they’re sent to developers and published for the public. Figma’s prototyping options are more advanced than Penpot’s.

Figma’s prototyping options have auto-layout functions that are adaptive to different interfaces. While Penpot offers adaptations for other interface designs, it must be done manually. Saving time with auto-layout is a great feature of Figma.

The prototyping options in Figma are vast and easy to navigate. Choose from dozens of existing hardware screen types or customize your own; you can also plug another device in to view the prototype live from the intended screen.

Make great UX/UI with Figma’s fantastic tools

Despite Penpot being the best Figma alternative — and it’s great that it’s open-source, too — Figma still offers more than Penpot if you’re looking for serious UX/UI design and prototyping. The power, funding, and development from Figma are obvious when compared to Penpot’s community open-source equivalent. Penpot is a great open-source tool, and open-source users would see great benefits in using it, but it just isn’t better than Figma. Beyond their free plans, Figma’s team pricing can work out better depending on how large your team is, but its free plan alone is great for individuals.