How do I configure developers to only use Dev Mode without file editing capabilities?

Hi there,

Thanks for the post! If your account is on an Organization/Enterprise plan, you have the option to adjust the Design seat permissions from “Full” to “Viewer-restricted” for developers. You can find more information on how to do this here: https://help.figma.com/hc/en-us/articles/360052677454-Manage-free-and-paid-seats-in-an-organization.

If you are Professional plan, unfortunately, there is no option to choose Dev Mode only access: https://help.figma.com/hc/en-us/articles/20652568757399-What-s-new-in-Dev-Mode#h_01HMY6W4HH5HTCSXVCTN64R6FG.

I hope this clears up your questions, but don’t hesitate to reach out if you have any further queries!

Thanks,
Toku

This is just chaos!
Is there a mode that’s only Dev Mode, not Full Design seat yet for Professional? I don’t need/want to upgrade to Oganization/Enterprise plan just to have this single and obvious feature…
It’s so basic not to give design seat to developers especially to prevent unintentional design overrides and changes… It’s called DEV mode for some reason right?

Thanks for your feedback and we keep sharing voices with our internal team!

On the Pro plan, too. We have developers who need developer mode, but we don’t want them to edit the files.

Many times, devs might be dragging around the file and accidentally also drag a design element around, without noticing. That’s project-breaking and super annoying for the designers, and will lead to other developers implementing faulty designs.

I think it’s detrimental to your reputation and utterly strange that this isn’t a default feature.

Also, how can the “Team permissions” be “Can view” but the “Design seat” be “Full”?

That just makes no sense at all 🙂

What we need is this:

Team permissions: owner, designer, developer, or viewer.

Owners: can do it all
Designers: can edit and use dev mode
Developers: can view and use dev mode
Viewers: can only view

That’s all. Super simple, easy to understand. There is no need for a “Design seat” (what a weird label that is to begin with).

I second this. It’s complete chaos since Dev mode is no longer a free feature. I would be ok with Dev mode being a paid feature but not part of a Design / Editor seat! It makes no sense to give Developers the ability to edit the designs they are building. There is a workaround for this, but it’s highly inconvenient (limiting editing permissions of each design file). I’m hoping this is just a horrible transition period and a dedicated developer seat is soon introduced (without editing permissions).

Yes!! 🙏 🎉 🙌

Owners: can do it all
Designers: can edit and use dev mode
Developers: can view and use dev mode
Viewers: can only view

Why is it so crazy in Figma…
Figma Team:
Let us, designers, give developers access to dev mode only (not editing), without adding extra seat in our account. Charge their side, not ours

This is bad! Look what you are doing to us 😅

+1
We definitely need to be able to have Dev Mode seats without editing capabilities to prevent unintentional design overrides and changes!
Developers usually don’t need to edit files, they just need to access informations about the design…

This change made dev mode totally useless for us. A desperate attempt to force customers into shelling out for an Organisation/Enterprise plan. We are switching to Zeplin for developers. Anyone else needing to provide inspect access for engineers without edit access, I recommend you do the same.

This is about as dark as dark practices come. There they know the implications of what this means and do it anyway. I try to understand this reasoning, but I can’t think of a fair reason. Very disappointing.

To configure developers to use only Dev Mode without file editing capabilities, set up their access permissions to restrict file editing. In your system or development environment, create a specific role or profile that grants access only to Dev Mode functionalities and explicitly denies file editing permissions. Ensure that when you approve requests for Dev Mode, you assign this restricted role or profile to users, preventing them from accessing file editing features while still allowing them to work within Dev Mode.

Has this been fixed yet or is the recommendation to use Zeplin instead?

What a joke Figma has become. They are making everything about Org and Enterprise and leaving out Pro…
Making everything to maximise profit over quality.

4 posts were merged into an existing topic: Add Dev Mode To Professional Subscription separately from design seat