Penpot vs Figma

Why Switch from Figma to Penpot?

Figma’s acquisition by Adobe (ultimately blocked by regulators) raised serious concerns about vendor lock-in, pricing increases, and the future of the platform. Figma stores all your design work on US servers, and its proprietary format means your designs are locked into their ecosystem.

Penpot from Spanish company Kaleidos offers a fundamentally different approach. It is completely free, fully open source, and uses SVG as its native format — an open web standard. Your designs are never locked in, and you can self-host for complete data sovereignty.

Feature Comparison

Feature	Penpot	Figma
Price	Free	Free tier / $12-$75/editor/mo
Data location	Your choice (self-hosted) or EU 🇪🇺	United States 🇺🇸
GDPR compliant	✅ Full	⚠️ Partial (US entity)
Open source	✅ Fully	❌ No
Native format	SVG (open standard)	Proprietary
Self-hostable	✅ Yes	❌ No
Real-time collaboration	✅ Yes	✅ Yes
Components & design systems	✅ Yes	✅ Advanced
Prototyping	✅ Basic	✅ Advanced
Plugin ecosystem	⚠️ Growing	✅ Extensive
Unlimited projects	✅ Yes	❌ Limited in free tier

Pricing

Penpot’s pricing is simple: it is free. This is where it stands apart from every other design tool on the market:

• Penpot Cloud: Free — unlimited projects, unlimited files, unlimited team members
• Penpot Self-Hosted: Free — full control over your data and infrastructure
• Penpot Premium: Coming soon — will offer additional features for teams
• Figma Free: 3 files, limited collaboration
• Figma Professional: $12/editor/month
• Figma Organization: $45/editor/month
• Figma Enterprise: $75/editor/month

For teams of any size, Penpot can save thousands of dollars per year compared to Figma’s per-editor pricing model.

Privacy & Data Sovereignty

Penpot offers privacy advantages that proprietary tools simply cannot match:

• Fully open source under the Mozilla Public License 2.0
• Can be self-hosted on your own infrastructure in any EU country
• The cloud version is hosted in EU data centers
• SVG-native format means your work is always in an open standard
• No telemetry or data collection on self-hosted instances
• Kaleidos, based in Madrid, Spain, operates fully under EU law
• No risk of a US acquisition changing the terms of service

Migration Guide

Switching from Figma to Penpot can be done project by project, allowing a gradual transition without disrupting ongoing work.

1. Install the Penpot Figma importer — Penpot provides a Figma plugin that exports your designs in a Penpot-compatible format. Install the plugin from Figma’s community plugins directory and familiarize yourself with its export options. (10 minutes)
2. Export and import your Figma files — Open each Figma project, run the Penpot export plugin, and download the resulting file. Then import it into Penpot Cloud or your self-hosted instance. Review the imported designs for any elements that need manual adjustment, particularly complex auto-layout, variants, or advanced prototyping flows. (15-30 minutes per file)
3. Set up your Penpot workspace — Create your team workspace, organize projects into folders, and set up shared libraries for components and design tokens. If self-hosting, deploy Penpot using the official Docker setup on your own server. (1-2 hours)
4. Rebuild design systems — Import or recreate your component libraries in Penpot. While many components transfer via the importer, complex Figma-specific features like variant properties may need to be rebuilt using Penpot’s component system. (2-8 hours depending on library complexity)
5. Train your team — Penpot’s interface is intuitive for designers familiar with Figma, but there are differences in shortcuts, tooling, and workflow. Schedule a brief team walkthrough of Penpot’s unique features, especially SVG-native editing and CSS-ready output. (1-2 hours)

Estimated total time: 1-3 days for a typical design team. Difficulty: Easy to moderate — the Figma importer handles most of the heavy lifting.

Real-World Use Cases

Portuguese digital agency eliminates per-seat design costs — A 25-person design agency in Lisbon switched from Figma Organization to self-hosted Penpot, saving over 13,500 euros per year in licensing costs. The agency hosts Penpot on its own infrastructure in Portugal, keeping all client design data under EU jurisdiction. The SVG-native format also simplified the handoff to developers, who can inspect and use design assets directly without additional export steps.

Finnish public sector designs accessible government services — A Finnish government digital services team adopted Penpot for designing citizen-facing web applications. The self-hosted instance ensures that design prototypes containing sensitive public service workflows never leave government infrastructure. The open-source licensing also aligns with Finland’s public sector policy of preferring open-source solutions where available.

Italian design school teaches open standards to students — A design school in Milan integrated Penpot into its UX and UI curriculum as the primary design tool. Because Penpot is free with no student licensing restrictions and uses the open SVG standard, students learn design principles without being locked into any commercial vendor. Graduates leave with skills transferable to any SVG-compatible tool, and the school pays nothing for software licenses.

Company Background

Penpot was created by Kaleidos, a Spanish software company founded in 2011 and headquartered in Madrid. Kaleidos was co-founded by Pablo Ruiz-Múzquiz and a team of developers with a strong commitment to open-source software. Before Penpot, Kaleidos built Taiga, an open-source project management platform, establishing the team’s expertise in building collaborative tools for creative and technical workflows.

Penpot was first announced in 2021 as the world’s first open-source design and prototyping platform, and it quickly attracted attention from the design community. In 2022, Kaleidos received significant investment to accelerate Penpot’s development, including a notable round of funding that helped grow the engineering team. By 2024, Penpot had surpassed 500,000 registered users and was adopted by organizations across public and private sectors in Europe and beyond.

What distinguishes Penpot is its commitment to open standards. By using SVG as its native file format — an open W3C standard — Penpot ensures that designs are never locked into a proprietary format. The platform is licensed under the Mozilla Public License 2.0, and its development is entirely transparent, with all code publicly available on GitHub. Kaleidos employs approximately 50 people in Madrid, and the Penpot team includes designers, engineers, and community managers who actively engage with the open-source community to shape the product roadmap.

Security & Compliance

Penpot’s open-source architecture and self-hosting capabilities provide unique security advantages for organizations that need full control over their design infrastructure.

• Open-source codebase (MPL 2.0) enabling complete security auditing by internal teams or third-party auditors
• Self-hosting option allowing organizations to run Penpot entirely on their own infrastructure within their chosen jurisdiction
• TLS/HTTPS encryption for all data in transit between clients and the Penpot server
• Authentication security supporting standard email/password, LDAP, and OpenID Connect for enterprise single sign-on
• GDPR-compliant cloud hosting with the managed cloud version hosted on EU infrastructure
• No telemetry or tracking on self-hosted instances, ensuring zero data collection by Kaleidos or any third party
• Regular security patches released through the open-source development process, with community-driven vulnerability reporting

Integration Ecosystem

Penpot’s integration ecosystem is built around open standards and developer-friendly APIs, making it highly interoperable with modern development workflows.

• SVG-native format enabling direct use of design exports in web projects, vector editors, and any SVG-compatible tool
• REST API for programmatic access to projects, files, components, and team management
• Figma import plugin allowing migration of existing Figma files into Penpot’s native format
• CSS-ready design output providing developers with directly usable CSS values from design elements, streamlining handoff
• Docker-based self-hosting with official Docker Compose configurations for deployment on any Linux server or cloud provider
• Webhooks support for connecting Penpot events to external services and automation workflows
• Component libraries and shared assets enabling design system management across teams and projects
• Community plugins and extensions with a growing ecosystem of third-party tools built on Penpot’s open architecture

Who Should Switch?

Penpot is ideal for:

• Design teams that want to eliminate per-seat licensing costs
• Open-source advocates who believe design tools should be free and open
• EU organizations that need GDPR-compliant design workflows
• Agencies that want to self-host and control client data
• Anyone concerned about vendor lock-in with proprietary design formats

The Bottom Line

Penpot is still maturing and does not yet match Figma feature-for-feature, particularly in advanced prototyping and plugins. However, it is completely free, fully open source, uses open standards, and can be self-hosted for total data control.

For teams that value openness, data sovereignty, and cost savings, Penpot is an excellent choice that is improving rapidly. For those who need the most advanced design features today, Figma remains more polished — but you pay for it with both money and data control.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can I import my existing Figma files into Penpot?

Yes. Penpot offers a Figma import plugin that converts Figma files into Penpot's native SVG format. While most design elements transfer well, some advanced Figma-specific features like complex auto-layout or certain plugin effects may need manual adjustment after import.

Is Penpot suitable for professional design teams working on production projects?

Yes. Penpot supports real-time collaboration, components, design systems, prototyping, and team libraries. Many professional teams and agencies across Europe use Penpot for production work. While some advanced features are still catching up to Figma, Penpot covers the core workflows needed for UI and UX design.

How does Penpot's SVG-native format benefit my workflow?

SVG is an open web standard maintained by the W3C. Because Penpot uses SVG natively, your designs are never locked into a proprietary format. You can open and edit exported files in any SVG-compatible tool, use them directly in web projects, and maintain full ownership of your work regardless of what happens to Penpot as a product.

Can I self-host Penpot for my organization?

Yes. Penpot provides Docker-based self-hosting that can be set up in under an hour. This gives you complete control over your design data, which stays on your own servers. Self-hosted instances receive the same features as the cloud version and can be updated independently.

Is Penpot really completely free, or are there hidden limitations?

Penpot is genuinely free with no limitations on projects, files, or team members. There is no freemium model with restricted features. A premium tier is planned for the future to offer additional team management features, but the core design tool will remain free and open source.