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A social media trend we could jump in on! Introducing our AI-generated Tanuki action figure. 🤩
Word on the street is that if this gets over 5% engagement rate, we can make it for real. 😉
People talk about how AI is going to make design obsolete, and/or make pixel perfect designs not be a thing anymore. I don't think so.
Pixel-perfect design mostly existed in designers’ minds anyway. The mocks might perfect but the final product rarely was. Most of the time, those designs were shipped sloppily because the product organization didn’t have the patience to see the polish through. How many truly pixel-perfect products do you see out there?Especially with growth focused companies. There are exceptions, but not many.
The idea that AI might ruin visual quality feels like a non-issue since wasn’t much quality to ruin in the first place.
I also don't believe AI makes design obsolete but I believe it will raise the floor. That it’ll lift the skill level of product teams, and I hope it will free up time for the kind of polish that usually gets cut. So ideally we continue see more overall better design and the more "handcrafted" polished designs as well.
My general view of AI is that it will just let us do more things, not take away things. We didn't stop writing less when email was invented.
Few aspects:
1. AI as a skill multiplier. LLMs can elevate frontend and design quality for companies that historically couldn’t hire strong talent—or for individuals who haven’t built those muscles yet. In a way that way, it’s not that different from using UI kits, Tailwind, or shadcn.
2. Rethinking design systems. Design systems were a product of the ZIRP era, when teams scaled quickly and you couldn’t trust every person to design and build a decent button. So systems enforced quality through components and rules. But AI flip can this, and Instead of assembling rigid blocks, you can quickly build good scaffolding and refine with AI or by hand. LLMs might even enforce standards even better than design systems because they could be trained to spot inconsistencies and fix visual bugs automatically. The kinds of things that usually get deprioritized.
3. Designing closer to code.
I think AI will allow us to design more in code. I think it’s a good thing if we move away from pixel-perfect Figma files. The way I’ve always designed: Figma is where you design the vibe. Code is where you make it perfect. The real product is the one in production, not the mock. So that’s where polish should happen. Future design tools should make that process easier.
4. Taste still matters. For teams that already care about design, teams like @linear, none of this really changes the hard part. Achieving a polished UI is not that hard if you just have the practice. The hard part is conceptual. It’s figuring out how features fit together, how ideas map across the system. That’s where most of the iteration happens. That’s the part AI still can’t do for you.
So yes, AI will make things faster. It will increase the volume of output, but maybe it will also shift the baseline.
Holistic quality still depends on taste, systems thinking, and the willingness to care about the final experience.
The era of "break things" is over. To make your company stand out and earn respect, you need to deliver quality experiences.
And data won’t get you there. You need people to care about it, ideally at the very highest levels.
Interview with @figma
https://t.co/RxPyV1OtU6
This week on Complementary @hobdaydesign and I discussed one of my favorite topics: design vs. development. We both had some hot takes but overall I'd say it was a productive conversation.
https://t.co/hnHZcgyQBw
@hobdaydesign TBH I thought it was triggered by the → Convert button and not 5 suggested actions. The arrows create a connection, and alignment aside that's the button that looks like a different state here.
@hobdaydesign@circlebackai The period at the end of the descriptor line changes the balance. Also, not quite directly related, but in the product image below the right panel is wider than the left one so it also impacts the perception of alignment.
While "agentic" will probably most used in relation to AI, I could see a strong case for using it in relation to design systems when they deliver on enabling independent decisions.