If you’ve ever had to rebuild a webpage in Figma — for refactoring, design audits, redesign proposals, onboarding, or component extraction — you know how much time it takes to manually reconstruct spacing, structure, and styles.
As someone working at the intersection of UX and engineering, I’ve always felt this workflow should be faster.
So we built Pixlore, a Figma plugin + browser extension that turns any webpage (or HTML) into a clean, editable Figma layout — and adds AI-powered editing on top of it.
This post walks through what it does, why developers use it, and how it fits into real engineering workflows.
Why Devs Use a “Web → Figma” Workflow
Most developers work with existing interfaces:
- auditing UI before refactoring
- reverse-engineering a competitor or legacy interface
- aligning UI structure with design systems
- onboarding teammates to a product
- rebuilding or optimizing sections of a site
But manually recreating:
- flexbox/grid behavior
- spacing logic
- component structure
- typography scale
- color tokens
- responsive constraints
…is repetitive and error-prone.
Pixlore automates this layer.
What Pixlore Does
1. Converts a live webpage into structured Figma layers
Pixlore parses:
- DOM hierarchy
- CSS properties
- flex/grid layout
- spacing + padding
- components + nested groups
And rebuilds them as:
- Auto Layout frames
- component-like structures
- accurate spacing
- text styles & tokens
- color styles
So the output is not a screenshot — it’s editable, semantic, and predictable.
2. Works on dynamic or authenticated pages
With the Pixlore browser extension, you can capture:
- dashboard states
- login-protected pages
- infinite scrollers
- internal tools
- React/Vue/Next.js sites behind auth
Useful for audits, redesigns, and documenting flows.
3. AI Editing: Modify layouts with natural language
This is where Pixlore becomes more than a converter.
You can type commands like:
"Make this grid 4 columns with 24px gaps."
"Normalize spacing to an 8px scale."
"Replace images with placeholders."
"Apply a cleaner neutral theme."
The plugin updates the Figma layers accordingly.
It’s like ChatGPT — but it manipulates live design nodes.
4. Interaction logic extraction
Pixlore annotates:
- hover states
- click interactions
- accordion behavior
- scroll-triggered components
Developers find this helpful for quickly understanding the UX flow of unfamiliar interfaces.
Real Use Cases for Developers
UI refactor planning
Extract a current screen → analyze spacing, components, inconsistencies → plan a more scalable layout.
Design–Dev alignment
Start with accurate structural drafts so engineers can reference or rewrite components faster.
Reverse-engineering
Need to study a competitor’s UI? A landing page? A dashboard pattern?
Generate a clean model in minutes.
Rapid prototyping
Grab an existing webpage → modify via AI → create a quick proposal or variation.
New team onboarding
Give new engineers a visual, editable breakdown of your product screens.
Pricing & Access
Pixlore aims to be:
- more accurate
- faster
- more affordable
…than most tools attempting web-to-Figma extraction.
There’s a free tier to test the workflow before upgrading.
🔗 Try it here:
https://www.figma.com/community/plugin/1539894363172987323/pixlore
What’s Next
We’re exploring:
- exporting back to code
- deeper design token mapping
- accessibility annotations
- diff-based UI auditing
- multi-screen capture flows
If you’re a developer who cares about UI quality, I’d love your feedback.
If you'd like, I can also generate:
✅ A shorter dev.to version (under 700 chars)
✅ A “story-driven” version (how Pixlore was built)
✅ A technically detailed version (DOM parser → Auto Layout mapping)
Just tell me!
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