Top 10 Design Handoff Tools for Designers and Developers

When designers have transformed ideas and concepts into concrete and visualized images, what they still have to do is to find a proper way to hand off designs to developers.

To many designers, this handoff process is complicated, frustrating, and disastrous. Basically, it’s code, the culprit, that makes this process onerous.

At the same time, if developer fails to get what they need, no matter how well your design is, that amounts to nothing. So, successful design handoff is extremely important. In morden days, handoff tools are widely utilized to serve this purpose.

In this article, we’ve picked 10 of the best handoff tools to help you streamline the handoff process.

What is design handoff?

Design handoff takes place when requirements have been met and prototypes have been tested. The design is handed off to developers to start coding. It’s like a relay race, designers are about to finish their work and pass the baton to developers.

As designers and developers are trying to complete completely two different stages of product building. They don’t understand each other very well. Normally, designers don’t have too much perception about coding. At the same time, developers don’t have too much knowledge about the design process.

Basically, handoff means that the very same moment when designs are handled to the developers. It’s necessary to point out that there are two different versions of a project: the original design and the coded version.

The original version exists in the same form as prototypes. But, what developers need is the coded version that they could implement into a functional product or webpage. So, it’s obvious that there is a gap between designers and developers. This is the place where design handoff tools come into play.

What Can Design Handoff Tools Do?

When designers want to communicate with developers, normally they have to use team management tools, social media or other communication tools. If a handoff tool is taken, this confusing process can be greatly streamlined. They will be able to cooperate with each other and iterate the design.

In addition, a perfect handoff tool could even provide a unified design system. This could not only helps designers cooperate better with one another, but also generate the design that conforms to the same standard and specificaion. So, much time could be saved from the designers’ side. For developers, time could also be saved as mistakes are reduced at an early stage.

Above all, good handoff tools bridge the gap between designers and developers. It helps designers translate designs into codes so that developers can understand and use. It could also involve developers to their design process at an early stage. Generally speaking, design handoff tools could help designers attain three primary objectives. They could help designer export designs from the prototyping tool they are using to developers with assets marked.

At this stage, handoff tools also help designers convert designs into codes that developers want and need. So, they could inspect and implement the designs accurately. Last but not least, design handoff tools could facilitate feedback and collaboration between designers, developers and other stakeholders.

What does design workflow look like?

Let’s review the design process, then you will get a better understanding about design handoff. When a design is created, designers need to mock up the design in a screen design tool. Then, mockup is transferred to a design handoff tool.

At the moment, relevant parties could review the design, and leave their feedback. If there are any issues, the designers need to fix and iterate the design. Until a final version is made to meet different demands, the last version will be set and submitted to developers.

At this stage, design handoff tools translate the design specs into codes, layer by layer. Then developers could inspect the finished design and use codes as the base for developing the app or website.

In short, a good handoff tool helps designers hand the design specs, prototypes and other related design resources over to developers, allowing them to code everything more accurately. There will be no any guesswork or misunderstandings again.

Top 10 Design Handoff Tool

Design handoff tools bridge the gap between designers and developers. But, they also got different features. So, let’s check out the top 10 design handoff tools!

1).Mockplus Cloud

Mockplus Could is a all-in-one collaboration and handoff tool for designers and developers to prototype, collaborate and handoff designs in one place.

Designers can easily import wireframes, hi-fi prototypes and other visual designers directly from Sketch, PhotoShop, Adobe XD and figma. And all the related design specs, such as design spacing, measurements, assets and code snippets, are automatically generated. So, they can directly handoff everything to developer with a single link.

Developers can also join with a link, inspect designs, view code snippets and download assets with simple clicks. All resources can be auto tailored to the platform you’re developing for.

When projects have been linked with design systems, developers can even check variable names of different colors, fonts and other components with ease. It fastens the developing process.

Here are key features of Mockplus Cloud:

1. Import designs with assets from Sketch, Adobe XD, PhotoShop and figma;
2. Upload prototypes from Axure, Justinmind, Mockplus and documents;

3.Create UI flow and interactive prototypes with drag-and-drop;

4.Comment, review, test and iterate designs with simple clicks;

5.Inspect, copy and download design specs, assets, code snippets with one click;

It connects design and engineering closely.

2).Zeplin

Zeplin is a design handoff tool. It has integrated with Sketch, Figma, Photoshop and Adobe XD. If you use any of these tools, you will be able to translate your designs into CSS, Swift, Android, Objective-C or React Native code. At the same time, you can also export the styles of each layer and marked assets. It has also integrated collaboration applications including Jira, Slack and Trello.

Here are key features of Zeplin:

1. Integrate with Jira, Slack and Trello;
2. Generate RGB and HEX values for all your designs;
3. Provide buttons, icons or layers with assets marked;
4. Support different platforms, including iOS, Android and web.

3).Avocode

Avocode is also a useful and practical handoff tool. There is not too much difference between Zeplin and Avocode. It has also achieved integration with Sketch, Adobe XD and PhotoShop. Besides, Avocode also works with Figma and Linux. At the moment, it’s the only tool that has this feature. This tool enables you to control different versions and collaborate with email notifications. This tool also has integrated with Slack. So, you are allowed to organize and communicate with your team better.

Here are key features of Avocode:

1. Support CSS code exports and multiple images exporting;
2. Export styles to SASS, Stylus and Less;
3. Support different platforms, including Web, macOS, Windows and Linux;
4. Provide full specs, colors (HEX, RGBA, HSLA), fonts, styles and sizes.

4).Marvel

Marvel is famous for its ultra-friendly user interface. it’s one of the easiest and simplest tool to master. So, it won’t take too much time for you to get familiar with this tool. As a foolproof handoff tool, it could help you sync different interactions with ease. It’s a web application and works extremely well with Sketch. This could be its advantage as well as downside. If Sketch is your screen design tool, then Marvel is well worth trying. If you are not using Sketch, then this tool might be not that valuable for you.

Here are key features of Marvel:

1. Instantly turn designs into code, specs and assets;
2. Always in sync with the latest design changes;
3. Export code as CSS, Swift and Android XML;
4. Handoff works with Sketch or designs created in Marvel

5).Sympli

Sympli is also a powerful handoff tool. It has also integrated with Sketch, Photoshop and Adobe XD. Besides, it has a Git-based app called Versions. This useful application, however, is only available for macOS at this moment. This tool has cool and user-friendly interface and comes with lots of great features which could help developers a lot. With this tool, you are able to streamline your workflow with Jira, Azure Boards, Microsoft Teams and Slack integration. With XCode, Android Studio plugins, you cloud also access designs from your IDE flexibly.

Here are key features of Sympli:

1. Review and collaborate with inline comments;
2. Turn Sketch, Figma, Adobe XD and Photoshop mockups into assets and specs;
3. Integrate with project management and development tools;

6).InVision

InVision is one of the industry’s most popular prototyping tools. As a product design platform, this tool also has handoff feature. It also supports lots of plugins and integrations. Besides, InVison has an add-on to Sketch and Photoshop. This useful widget is called Craft. It allows users to sync your designs into InVision. So, any changes could sync to the whole team, and designers can switch to the latest version or roll back updates at any time. At the same time, developers could inspect and generate real codes from them.

Here are key features of InVision:

1. Personalize specs for interruption-free development;
2. Turn design to code with developer-ready specs;
3. Integrate with Jira, Confluence, Storybook, and Trello;

7).Figma

Figma is also a famous platform for designing, prototyping and collaboration. It also supports a deign handoff feature. As a one-stop platform, it has a practical feature intended for developers. Even with view-only permission, developers are allowed to navigate the file’s pages and frames. They can also get access to all the exportable resources like images and styles. At the moment, Figma supports CSS, Swift, and XML. Besides, it has a Side-by-Side Comparison feature, which allows developers to compare two windows with simple clicks.

Here are key features of Figma:

1. View size, distance and design properties;
2. Mark settings for different platforms;
3. Offline design mark exporting.
4. Send a link to your prototype or embed it in your preferred tool.

8).Adode XD

Adode XD is one of the most popular platform for wireframing, prototyping and collaboration. As a vector-based user experience design tool for web apps and mobile apps, it also supports proper design handoff features that can be used by developers to help them create code from the design. The platform also supports features like triggers, interactions, preview, overlay support, export to after effects. Besides, it has states, repeat grid, vector drawing tools, precision design tools, asset export, responsive resize. With Adode XD, you could work effortlessly with Dropbox Paper, Jira, Microsoft Teams, Slack, Zeplin, and more.

Here are key features of Adode XD:

1. Send links and CSS snippets to developers;
2. Follow conversations and feedback from stakeholders directly;
3. Work together in real time and create one source of truth;
4. Create custom names for colors and character styles to use in coding.

9).Framer

Framer is also a complete design tool that offers rapid prototyping, building blocks, and tons of design resources. At first, it’s just a JavaScript-based interactive tool. Now, it has Framer X, a tool that streamline the entire design process. Beyond any doubt, this full-service tool also supports the design handoff feature. When prototypes are created, developers are allowed to directly render the code on the canvas. With simple clicks, they could get CSS, HTML, and advanced react components.

Here are key features of Farmer:

1. Integrate with Figma and Sketch;
2. Support platforms like Web, macOS, iOS, Android;
3. Export code as CSS, and HTML.

10).Specctr

Specctr is a handoff tool that has entered the market a few years ago. The tool could also help designers simplify the handoff process. It has a unique panel that offers designers a quick and easy way to create and manage their projects. You are also allowed to preview CSS in the browser. It can also help you sync styles to projects page and share projects with developers, team mates, and other users. Besides, the Specctr panel allows you to redline your document in a few seconds, which is rather useful and handy.

Here are key features of Specctr:

1. Export code as CSS;
2. Upload specs to Cloud.

Wrap up

Let’s have a brief review of the top 10 design handoff tools. There are platform tools that support handoff features and tools specifically intended for handoff. If you want to streamline your entire workflow from the beginning to the very end, you could use platform tool such as Zeplin and Mockplus Cloud. If not, other tools are also a good choice.