Clerk vs Figma
User management and authentication as a service
vs. Collaborative interface design — the dominant tool for UI, UX + prototyping
Pricing tiers
Clerk
Free
50k MAU included. No SSO/SAML. Perfect for side projects and early prototypes.
Free
Pro
$25/mo (or $20/mo annual). 50k MAU, $0.02 each after. 1 enterprise SSO connection per app. Webhooks, JWT templates, custom session duration.
$25/mo
Business
$300/mo (or $250/mo annual). Advanced organizations, enhanced support, additional enterprise features.
$300/mo
Enterprise
Custom. Volume MAU discounts, SLA, workspace-wide SAML SSO, dedicated support.
Custom
Figma
Starter
$0. 3 Figma files, 3 FigJam files. Unlimited collaborators. Basic features.
$0 base (usage-based)
Professional
$15/editor/mo annual ($20/mo). Unlimited files, version history, team libraries.
$15/mo
Dev Mode Seats
$25/dev/mo. Read-only access for engineers (alternative to full editor seats).
$25/mo
Organization
$45/editor/mo annual ($55/mo). Design systems, branch + merge, SSO.
$45/mo
Enterprise
$75/editor/mo. SAML, audit log, security reviews, dedicated CSM, HIPAA.
$75/mo
Free-tier quotas head-to-head
Comparing hobby on Clerk vs free on Figma.
| Metric | Clerk | Figma |
|---|---|---|
| mao | 100 orgs/month | — |
| mau | 50000 users/month | — |
| sso connections | 0 connections | — |
Features
Clerk · 15 features
- Account Portal — Hosted sign-in/user profile pages at accounts.yourapp.com — zero UI code, fully …
- Bot Protection — Cloudflare Turnstile CAPTCHA integrated into sign-up.
- Clerk Billing — Built-in Stripe-powered billing: subscriptions, plans, proration — ties directly…
- Enterprise SSO (SAML/OIDC) — SAML and OIDC for enterprise customers. Per-domain connection. Pro+ (1 included)…
- Impersonation — Act as a user from dashboard to debug. Logged.
- JWT Templates — Custom JWT issuance for third-party backends (Supabase, Hasura, Firebase, Convex…
- Machine Tokens (M2M) — API keys and machine tokens for service-to-service auth in addition to user sess…
- Multi-Factor Auth — TOTP (authenticator apps), SMS OTP, backup codes. Forced or optional per user.
- Organizations (B2B) — Multi-tenant orgs with roles, permissions, invitations, domain allowlist, and pe…
- Passkeys (WebAuthn) — Passwordless passkey sign-in with per-device biometrics.
- Prebuilt Components — Drop-in React components: <SignIn/>, <SignUp/>, <UserButton/>, <OrganizationSwit…
- Sessions — Server-side session tokens. Sliding expiration by default; configurable absolute…
- User Management — Full user CRUD, metadata (public/private/unsafe), email/phone verification, ban/…
- Waitlist Mode — Collect sign-ups before opening the app. Approve waitlist entries to activate ac…
- Webhooks — Events: user.created/updated/deleted, session.created, organization.* — delivere…
Figma · 19 features
- Auto Layout — Flexbox-like layout constraints.
- Branch + Merge — Git-like workflow for designs.
- Comments + Reactions — In-file discussion.
- Components — Reusable + variants + properties.
- Design — Vector + layout tools.
- Dev Mode — Handoff view with code specs.
- FigJam — Whiteboard / brainstorming.
- Figma AI — Generative design + Make Designs.
- Figma MCP — AI agent access via Model Context Protocol.
- Figma Slides — Presentations.
- Inspect + Code Tokens — Extract CSS/iOS/Android.
- Plugin Ecosystem — 10,000+ community plugins.
- Prototyping — Interactive flows + transitions.
- REST API — Read file contents + export.
- SSO — SAML/OIDC (Org+).
- Team Libraries — Shared component libraries.
- Variables + Modes — Design tokens with dark/light mode switching.
- Webhooks — File / version events.
- Widgets — Custom interactive widgets in files.
Developer interfaces
| Kind | Clerk | Figma |
|---|---|---|
| SDK | @clerk/astro, @clerk/backend / @clerk/clerk-sdk-node, @clerk/chrome-extension, @clerk/clerk-expo, @clerk/clerk-js (vanilla), @clerk/clerk-react, @clerk/clerk-react-native, @clerk/nextjs, @clerk/nuxt, @clerk/remix, clerk-sdk-go, clerk-sdk-python, clerk-sdk-ruby, @clerk/tanstack-start, @clerk/vue | Plugins API, Widgets API |
| REST | Backend REST API, Frontend API | Figma REST API |
| MCP | Clerk MCP | Figma MCP (Dev Mode) |
| OTHER | Webhooks (Svix) | Figma Desktop, Figma Web, Figma Webhooks |
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