Penpot is a genuine free alternative, not just a Figma copy

Penpot has matured into a real open-source design tool with layers, prototyping and native CSS/HTML export — useful if you want to understand what Figma abstracts away. It's not replacing Figma for most teams yet, but it's solid enough to actually build in.

Penpot's pitch is full design-and-prototype features with no file limits on its free plan, plus an Inspect tab that hands developers real CSS Grid/Flex code instead of Figma's proprietary layer data. It's open-source, self-hostable, and increasingly used by teams who care about data control rather than just polish. It won't out-feature Figma on AI or plugins any time soon — that's the honest trade-off. For a junior with both tools in their stack, Penpot is a genuinely good place to learn how designs translate to real code, because you can see the export directly.

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