Prototyping a component failing unless using the interactions menu

Hey hey ​@ZakLINK 👋 Thanks for the clear video — that made it easy to see exactly what's happening. Looking at the docs, this is the expected behaviour (I agree the silent snap-back is confusing and doesn't give you much to go on).

The short version: a "Navigate to" interaction can't be created by dragging the noodle from a component instance. With an instance selected, the Prototype panel is in "Variant interactions" mode (we can see this in your video), where the only drag-to action available is Change to — which switches between variants in the same component set. A separate frame isn't a valid variant target, so the connection snaps back on release. From the docs:

Use the Change to action to switch between variants in a component set. Figma Help Center

That's why it works from the interactions menu instead — there you can explicitly choose On click → Navigate to → [frame].

The cleaner setup is to author the connection on the main component rather than the instance. Per the Help Center:

If you add a prototype connection from a main component, and use instances of that component in your designs, the prototyping connections of the instances will be inherited from the main component. Figma Help Center

Drag the Navigate-to connection from the main component (kept on the same page as your instances) and every instance inherits it automatically. Note it won't show on the canvas by default — select an instance to see the inherited connection. Figma Help Center

Docs for reference:

• Add prototype connections from main components
• Prototype actions (Change to)

Lastly (whew 😅) I found a related Idea you can upvote here. If your exact case (Navigate-to from a nested instance) isn't represented there, please post a fresh Feature Request and I can link it back here for visibility. Talk soon! — Jaycee