The Future of Design Systems is Complicated | Figma Blog (opens in new tab)

Design systems have evolved from simple visual metaphors into complex frameworks supporting many platforms, use cases, accessibility needs, and performance expectations. The article argues that teams need more structure to manage this complexity, but excessive control can suppress creativity. The future lies in balancing consistent systems with flexibility, experimentation, and contributions from the wider design community.

Complexity Is the New Normal

• Early systems such as Google’s Material Design used familiar metaphors—like stacked paper—to help users understand digital interfaces.
• Google later abandoned that metaphor as users became more comfortable with digital interactions and products expanded across:
  • New devices and form factors
  • Accessibility standards
  • More sophisticated interactions
  • Higher performance expectations
• Products such as Instagram evolved from single-purpose apps into platforms for discovery, advertising, partnerships, and shopping.
• Larger teams now work across multiple interconnected systems, creating a need for better ways to organize design and development work.

Taming Chaos with Structure

• Design teams are adopting processes inspired by software development, particularly branching and merging.
• Contributors can work on isolated branches, propose fixes or components, and have system managers review changes before incorporating them into the main system.
• Spotify’s Encore supports “local systems,” allowing sub-teams to fork and extend the central system for specialized needs.
• Spotify’s advertising team developed a strong collection of video-player components, which later influenced the broader organization.
• Open design systems can:
  • Gather feedback from a wider range of users
  • Encourage outside contributions
  • Make products and design decisions more transparent
  • Build organizational trust and visibility

When Structure Becomes Too Restrictive

• Strict systems can limit experimentation and make designers feel they lack creative freedom.
• A design system should reduce the effort required to express ideas, not create additional barriers.
• Shopify designer José Torre compares systems to gardening rather than architecture:
  • Architecture implies that everything is planned and finished.
  • Gardening involves planting, observing, adapting, and intervening as unexpected growth occurs.
• Components such as buttons and menus may develop in unforeseen directions, so systems need room to evolve rather than enforcing rigid boundaries.

Finding the Balance

• Effective design systems must combine consistency with adaptability.
• Teams should establish enough structure to coordinate large, interconnected efforts while allowing local experimentation and new patterns to emerge.
• Collaboration, contribution workflows, and ongoing maintenance are more valuable than treating a design system as a fixed, finished artifact.

Design systems should be treated as living ecosystems: structured enough to provide shared foundations, but flexible enough to support creativity, accessibility, and changing product needs.