Multiplayer Editing in Figma | Figma Blog (opens in new tab)

Figma’s multiplayer editing release made real-time collaboration a core part of its design workflow. The company replaced a simple whole-document save-and-upload model after it caused overwrites, stale links, and confusing collaboration problems. Although multiplayer required major changes to conflict resolution, undo/redo, layout behavior, file formats, and performance, Figma concluded that it ultimately simplified the user experience.

Why the Original Saving Model Failed

• Early Figma downloaded documents locally, let users edit in the browser, and periodically uploaded the entire document.
• This approach was easy to build and familiar to users of syncing services such as Dropbox.
• In team settings, however:
  • Users could unknowingly overwrite one another’s work.
  • Shared links could display an outdated version while changes were still saving.
  • Version history preserved data, but did not prevent collaboration mistakes.
• Alternatives such as “baton-passing,” where only one person could edit at a time, lacked the simplicity and flexibility Figma wanted.

How Figma’s Multiplayer Engine Works

• Each user’s changes are sent to the server and broadcast to other participants in real time.
• Independent simultaneous changes can coexist.
• When users modify the same property on the same object, Figma resolves the conflict by selecting the latest change.
• Implementing this model required changing fundamental parts of the editor rather than adding multiplayer as a separate synchronization layer.

Undo, Redo, and Conflict Resolution

• Undo becomes ambiguous when other users modify the same objects afterward.
• Figma adopted a guiding principle: undoing actions, copying something, and redoing back to the present should leave the document unchanged.
• Redo therefore cannot simply reapply the original edits, since that might overwrite newer work by collaborators.
• Conflict resolution also had to account for:
  • Related properties that must be changed together.
  • Actions that indirectly affect multiple objects.
  • Layout operations where apparently unrelated edits can interact.
• These requirements led Figma to revise aspects of its layout system.

Performance and File-Format Changes

• Professional-quality multiplayer required extensive measurement and tuning.
• Figma overhauled its file format because the previous representation was inefficient for transmitting small incremental messages.
• The team expected additional challenges as new collaborative features were introduced.

A Simpler Collaborative Experience

• Multiplayer reduced UX complexity by eliminating workarounds for stale files, overwrites, and coordination.
• Users can see collaborators’ mouse cursors and selections, providing immediate context about who is present and where they are working.
• Cursors can also serve as lightweight communication tools, such as pointing at an object or getting someone’s attention.
• Each participant appears as an avatar in the top-right corner.
• Clicking an avatar lets one user present to another, making presentations opt-in rather than forcing a single presenter and synchronized viewing mode.

Figma’s experience suggests that real-time collaboration is best treated as a foundational part of the editor. Despite the substantial engineering investment, multiplayer editing can make collaborative software both more powerful and easier to use.