I am using auto layout a lot in my projects and think it is awesome. However, there is one small issue that annoys me a lot. The default setting for canvas stacking is always “Last on top”, which is usually not what I want. For instance when switching state of a dropdown in a layout, the dropdown list will appear below the content that is underneath it (at least in my case where the list is using absolute position). With lots of nested auto layouts, things quickly become a mess if you forgot to change this when you created the auto layout. I would suggest either of these solutions:
Change default to “First on top”.
Make the default setting optional
Remember the last used setting (like the animation properties work)
I deffo have this same problem, also it makes no sense that it’s last on top by default, it’s the opposite of what’s obvious and natural! I’d love some insight on the design process behind defaulting to last on top bcs i can never think of use cases for it
Could be relevant, if you want to have a footer-element that overlaps the above section with some kind of graphic element… but I agree totally hat this would be the exception rather than the rule.
Agree. The default being ‘last on top’ does not feel intuitive. In most instances personally I have to amend the default making unrequired extra steps to create my prototypes. Many frustrations with prototypes not working how expected come from this choice.
I agree. Probably 99% of the time things at the top need to appear on top (we scroll top to bottom, not bottom to top), yet the default is set to last on top? Yet another swing and a miss for Figma…
The reason for this is mostly that it is how it works on the web. Later elements/layers will stack on top of earlier elements unless explicitly set to a different stacking position using position: absolute/relative/fixed/etc and z-index which unfortunately doesn’t exist in Figma.
Interesting, good to know. Seems like many of us designers are unaware of that and still need to change it back to first on top in order to stop things from being hidden. So it doesn’t feel like it’s very helpful to include in design software.