MarkupGen vs. Figma Dev Mode: What's the Difference?
If you're moving a design from Figma into a real codebase, you've probably run into both of these names. Figma Dev Mode and MarkupGen both exist to make the hand-off between design and code less painful — but they sit at different points in that process, and it's worth being clear about which problem each one actually solves.
What Figma Dev Mode is good for
Figma Dev Mode is a mode built into Figma itself, aimed specifically at developers who need to implement a design. At a high level, it's an inspection tool: select a layer or component and it surfaces the values behind it — spacing, color, typography, and so on — plus auto-generated code snippets (commonly things like CSS, iOS or Android output) for that individual layer.
That's genuinely useful, and it has an advantage nothing else on this list does: it lives right inside Figma, in the same place designers already work. A developer can jump into Dev Mode, click through a design, and get an accurate read on how a component is built without asking anyone.
Broadly speaking, though, Dev Mode is scoped to inspection and per-layer snippets rather than producing a complete, ready-to-ship page or component file. Turning what it shows you into an actual file — with layout structure, responsive behavior, and everything assembled — is still work a developer does by hand, layer by layer.
What MarkupGen does differently
MarkupGen starts from a different premise: instead of inspecting values one layer at a time, it takes a whole frame and outputs a structured, complete file. It's a SaaS platform with a companion Figma plugin, and the workflow looks like this:
- Export the frame from Figma using the MarkupGen plugin — structure, styles and images land in your workspace in one step.
- AI builds HTML/CSS from the actual structure and style of the design, not a rough approximation.
- Refine content, fonts and layout visually in an in-app editor before anything gets exported.
- Export the final code package as Vanilla HTML/CSS, Tailwind CSS, or React components — pick whichever format fits the project.
A few things follow from working at the frame level instead of the layer level:
- Auto Layout maps to Flexbox as a whole. Direction, gap, padding and alignment across the entire frame become a single, coherent Flexbox structure, rather than separate snippets you stitch together yourself.
- Responsive behavior is generated automatically, based on the design's own Figma resizing constraints — not left for you to guess at breakpoints.
- Output is semantic and SEO-ready by default: no unnecessary nested
<div>s, and a proper heading hierarchy instead of everything styled to merely look right. - Every export gets an automatic quality score, so you have a sense of how production-ready the output is before you commit to it.
So which one do you need?
| Figma Dev Mode | MarkupGen | |
|---|---|---|
| Scope | Individual layers/components | Whole frame |
| Output | Values + code snippets for hand-off | Complete HTML/CSS or React file |
| Where it runs | Inside Figma | Standalone workspace + Figma plugin |
| Best for | Inspecting an existing design | Getting a ready-to-use file or component |
Realistically, these aren't mutually exclusive. Dev Mode is a solid way to inspect a design and understand it while you're still inside Figma, and there's nothing wrong with using it that way. MarkupGen picks up from there for teams who'd rather start from a complete, structured file than assemble one by hand from inspected values — it's a complementary next step, not a claim that inspection tools are obsolete.
Projects stay private to your workspace, and MarkupGen doesn't use private designs to train models for other customers. There's a free plan to start, with paid tiers if you need more.
If you want to see how a full frame turns into working code, read the step-by-step guide to converting a Figma design to HTML, or just try MarkupGen for free on one of your own frames. Questions first? Reach the team at support@markupgen.com, or start from the homepage.