shadcn/ui vs Figma
Beautifully designed React components you copy-paste into your app
vs. Collaborative interface design — the dominant tool for UI, UX + prototyping
Pricing tiers
shadcn/ui
OSS (MIT)
$0. MIT license. Free forever. No signup. Components copy-pasted into your repo and owned by you.
$0 base (usage-based)
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 oss on shadcn/ui vs free on Figma.
| Metric | shadcn/ui | Figma |
|---|---|---|
| No overlapping quota metrics for these tiers. | ||
Features
shadcn/ui · 12 features
- 50+ Components — Button, dialog, dropdown, form, table, etc.
- Accessibility — WAI-ARIA compliant.
- Blocks — Full-page layouts ready to use.
- Charts — Composable Recharts wrappers.
- CSS Variables — Themeable via --primary, --background, etc.
- Custom Registries — Publish your own components via registry spec.
- Dark Mode — Built-in toggleable theme.
- Form Components (react-hook-form) — Integrated with react-hook-form + Zod.
- MCP Server — Query component catalog from AI agents.
- Radix UI Primitives — Headless accessibility foundation.
- shadcn CLI — Scaffold + add components.
- Themes + Theme Editor — CSS vars-based color system.
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 | shadcn/ui | Figma |
|---|---|---|
| CLI | shadcn CLI | — |
| SDK | — | Plugins API, Widgets API |
| REST | Component Registry | Figma REST API |
| MCP | shadcn MCP Server | Figma MCP (Dev Mode) |
| OTHER | Docs + Component Browser, Theme Customizer | Figma Desktop, Figma Web, Figma Webhooks |
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