On April 19, 2025, security researcher Jane Manchun Wong dropped a bombshell on X that has the design and tech communities buzzing: Figma, the beloved design platform, is working on an “AI App Maker. “

This new feature, powered by Anthropic’s Claude Sonnet large language model (LLM) and integrated with Supabase for backend support, promises to transform how we create apps by accepting text prompts, Figma files, images, and more as input.

Let’s dive into what this means for designers, developers, and the broader tech landscape.

Figma’s Leap into AI-Powered App Creation

The screenshot shared by Wong reveals a sleek interface within Figma’s ecosystem, teasing a feature that could allow users to generate fully functional apps with minimal effort.

By leveraging Claude Sonnet—an advanced LLM known for its natural language understanding—Figma’s AI App Maker aims to bridge the gap between design and development. Imagine typing a simple prompt like “create a task management app with a clean, minimalist design,” uploading a few Figma files or images for inspiration, and watching the tool generate a working app prototype.

That’s the future Figma seems to be building toward.

This isn’t Figma’s first foray into AI. The company has been steadily integrating artificial intelligence into its platform, a strategy that became more evident after its 2023 acquisition of Diagram, an AI-driven design startup founded by Jordan Singer.

Diagram had already made waves in the design community with tools like “Designer,” a plugin that used GPT-3 to generate design ideas from text prompts. As noted in a Figma Blog post, Singer’s work sparked excitement across #DesignTwitter, and his startup was later recognized as a leader at the intersection of design and AI.

Figma’s acquisition of Diagram signaled their intent to lead the charge in AI-powered design tools, and the AI App Maker appears to be a significant step in that direction.

The Bigger Picture: Figma’s Aggressive Push into AI and App Development

The leak of the AI App Maker also sheds light on some of Figma’s recent business moves, particularly their aggressive stance on trademark disputes.

Just days before Wong’s post, on April 15, 2025, Figma had sent a cease-and-desist letter to Lovable, a no-code AI startup, over the use of the term “Dev Mode.”

Figma, which has its own feature called Dev Mode, successfully trademarked the term last year and appears determined to protect it—especially against competitors in the same space.

Lovable, which markets itself as an alternative to Figma by promising to eliminate “tedious prototyping work,” seems to have struck a nerve.

Figma’s actions aren’t just about trademark protection; they’re about asserting dominance in a rapidly evolving market. With a valuation of $12.5 billion as of last year, Figma is a giant in the design world, and they’re not taking kindly to upstarts encroaching on their turf.

The fact that Figma hasn’t pursued similar actions against larger companies like Microsoft, whose use of “Dev Mode” falls into a different category of goods and services, further underscores their focus on direct competitors.

This context makes the AI App Maker leak even more significant. As several X users pointed out in response to Wong’s post, Figma’s recent legal actions around “Dev Mode” now make sense—they’re likely preparing to roll out features like the AI App Maker that directly tie into their development-focused offerings.