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Question

Cannot move file from another person’s Drafts after ownership transfer

  • May 16, 2026
  • 1 reply
  • 12 views
Harlie

Hi everyone,
I was on an Education plan and was downgraded to Starter. I am trying to transfer a design to a new user. The file ownership was transferred from a designer Poonam to me, but the file still shows as being in Poonam’s Drafts. When I select Move, I get the message: ‘You can’t move files that are in another person’s Drafts.’ We mainly need to preserve the design; preserving comments would be helpful but is not required.
Thanks

1 reply

samuelabolade0

Hi everyone,
I was on an Education plan and was downgraded to Starter. I am trying to transfer a design to a new user. The file ownership was transferred from a designer Poonam to me, but the file still shows as being in Poonam’s Drafts. When I select Move, I get the message: ‘You can’t move files that are in another person’s Drafts.’ We mainly need to preserve the design; preserving comments would be helpful but is not required.
Thanks

 

 

 

Hey! This is a known Figma quirk even after ownership is transferred, the file stays physically in the original owner's Drafts folder, which is why you're hitting that move restriction.

Quickest fix: Ask Poonam to log back in and move the file into a shared Team Project first. Once it's out of her Drafts and inside a project you both have access to, you'll be able to take full control of it from there. If Poonam is no longer available or can't log in, that's when you'll need to contact Figma Support directly to have them manually migrate the file on the backend.

To open a ticket: https://help.figma.com/hc/en-us/requests/new — explain the ownership transfer situation, mention the Education-to-Starter downgrade, and ask them to move the file out of the original owner's Drafts. They've handled this before.

As for preserving the design without comments — a quick workaround is to duplicate the file contents into a new Figma file you own. You'll lose comments but keep everything visual intact.

Also — if you need ongoing Figma help, whether it's navigating issues like this, organising your files, or actual design work, feel free to reach out. I work as a Figma virtual assistant and can help you get things like this sorted fast.

Hope that unblocks you!

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