Useful Figma plugins for beginners: what to install and how not to get lost

Step 1

Learn to find and run plugins

All plugins live in Figma Community. You can run a plugin right from your file: in the left panel open the Tools tab, filter by price and type and choose Plugin, search for the one you need, open its details and click Run. Two other ways: right-click an object and choose Plugins, or open the plugin's Community page and click Open in.

• •on the free Starter plan, plugins work in Figma Design, FigJam, Figma Slides and Figma Buzz;
• •only one plugin runs at a time, and you have to run it manually;
• •run the last plugin again: Cmd + Option + P (Mac) or Ctrl + Alt + P (Windows);
• •save plugins you use often: they're linked to your account and available in any file.

Step 2

Check a plugin before running it

A plugin is third-party code, and Figma states plainly that it can see data: your username and avatar, your cursor position and every layer in the file. So before running one for the first time, open its Community page and check:

• •who made it and whether there's a support contact: Figma doesn't support third-party plugins, questions go to the developer;
• •network access: Restricted network access or No access to network is safer than Unrestricted or Unknown;
• •Data security info: developers can voluntarily describe what they do with data;
• •price: paid plugins marked In-app purchases include a free trial based on time or usage.

💡 Don't run unknown plugins in files with client or confidential designs. Keep a separate learning file for experiments.

Step 3

Photos and copy: Unsplash and Content Reel

A layout full of gray boxes and "Heading, heading" is hard to judge. Fill it with realistic content:

• •Unsplash inserts Unsplash photos straight into your design. Under the Unsplash License the photos can be used in commercial and personal projects; premium photos from an Unsplash+ subscription have a separate license;
• •Content Reel fills your design with text strings, images and icons from one panel: names, addresses, emails and so on. You can create your own text sets and upload up to 20 PNG or JPEG files;
• •Lorem ipsum plugins quickly fill blocks with dummy text, but for learning case studies it's better to write real copy in your target language: that shows whether real word lengths fit.

💡 Ready-made data sets in plugins are often in English and use US address and phone formats. For a Ukrainian app, check how real Ukrainian names and addresses will look.

Step 4

Icons and images: Iconify and Remove BG

You don't need to draw every icon yourself at the start. Iconify brings together hundreds of open-source icon sets in one plugin and inserts them as vectors. Pick one set for the whole project so your icons share line weight and style. For a commercial project, check the license of the specific set.

• •turn each icon into a component so you can swap it in buttons and lists later;
• •Remove BG removes photo backgrounds in one click via the remove.bg service; it needs a remove.bg account;
• •before removing a background, consider whether it's easier to find a photo with a clean backdrop.

Step 5

Accessibility and diagrams: Stark and Autoflow

Once a design is ready, it needs checking and presenting. Stark is a set of accessibility tools: Contrast Checker, Focus Order, Alt-Text Annotations and Vision Simulator. Check the plugin's page for terms and pricing. Autoflow draws arrows between screens to show a user flow; the free version limits the number of arrows per file.

• •you can check basic contrast without a plugin: Figma's color picker has a Check color contrast button with AA and AAA levels;
• •a flow diagram for your portfolio can also be drawn with plain arrows, and clickable transitions are made in Prototype mode;
• •exercise: build one screen where photos, icons and copy are added with plugins, check the contrast and share the result in the community.

💡 A plugin speeds up what you can already do. If you don't understand what it did, do the same thing by hand first.