When we first started talking with Figma, it was about investing in Payload and what we’re doing in open source. They saw what we were building was unique, and it lines up well with how they see the world.

You probably know the entire Payload team has been using Figma deeply for a long time, and it was pretty exciting for all of us to see that they share the same vision we do.

Speaking of which, in the past I’ve talked a lot about a “utopia” — about simplicity and developer experience. My team and I refuse to compromise on design intent, flexibility, and how that translates into well-structured code.

Figma and Payload together can and will solve a problem that’s been bugging me (and probably all of you) for years. The gap between design and code still exists. Designers create in Figma, then devs recreate in code, then content teams struggle to maintain it all. It’s inefficient and frustrating. And historically, the CMS tends to make it worse.

With Figma, we can (and will) solve these problems in new ways without compromising. If either Figma or Payload didn’t see this potential screaming at us from a mile away, neither would have moved forward.

I’d like to assure you directly that, in the immediate future, nothing is changing for users and how you interface with Payload remains the same. (I recently sat down with Wes Bos to talk more about us joining Figma and what it means for the future—you can check out that conversation below).

What that means is:

Payload remains open source—with Figma’s full commitment to OSS
Our commitment to building Payload and creating the best developer experience possible
The self-hosted capability of Payload
Our focus on our community (aka: all of you)
The team and I will still be running Payload (including Sean)

What does change:

We now have more resources
We can tackle bigger problems
We will integrate with design systems in ways no other CMS can
A lot more people will be using, testing, and building on Payload

I'm sure you have questions, and we'll do our best to answer and keep up with them in our Discord and on Github. In the meantime, I'm pumped about the future and I can't wait for what's ahead.