In 2011 a team designing a web or mobile application drew its screens in Photoshop and showed them to clients and colleagues as static images, attached to email or pasted into documents IV1 IV10. Reviewers could not click through a flow, so they misread the design or judged it only when engineering was nearly finished, and changes requested that late cost budget and schedule IV1 IV9. Agencies that wanted agreement earlier built working prototypes in code, which took several times as long as drawing the screens IV18. The editing tool was not the problem. The gap was in showing the work to everyone who had to react to it.
InVision
InVision grew large as the place where a whole company clicked through and commented on designs made in other tools, charged each commenting colleague, and spent four years on a rebuild that never shipped while Figma put the file itself in the browser and let reviewers in free.
Why InVision lost to Figma
- 1 · 2011–16Review layer on other tools' filesScreens drawn in Photoshop or Sketch became clickable links anyone could comment on.Drop-In Adoption
- 3 · 2015–18Charged for every commenterColleagues spread it through companies, and each non-designer paid $8 a month to comment.Product-Led Sales
- 4 · 2016–19Overtaken for prototyping by 2019Teams that moved their files to Figma no longer needed a separate place to review them.
Versus Figma: Figma owned the file itself, then let everyone into it free FG1 IV24. InVision owned the review layer on top of other companies' files and charged for each colleague who commented IV4 IV9.
Arena: Market Conditions Before InVision
How each step happened
Step 1 of 5 · 2011–16
Review layer on other tools' files
A tool that asked designers to change nothing
InVision came out of client work. Clark Valberg and Ben Nadel ran a New York software agency and spent years trying prototyping methods on client projects IV20. Coded prototypes worked but were slow, so the agency linked screens exported from Photoshop into a clickable simulation in a browser, which Valberg says took about an eighth of the time IV18. In 2011 it launched as an $8 monthly subscription IV4. Designers kept drawing in Photoshop, and later in Sketch, then brought the screens into InVision, where anyone with the link could click through and comment at their own pace IV4 IV9.
The choice made InVision fast to adopt: it sat after the design tool and in front of everyone who had to approve the work. Craft, a free set of InVision plugins inside Sketch, synced Sketch files with InVision IV1 IV12. The same choice left InVision dependent on files made in other companies' tools, which Valberg later called a "companion platform" IV4.
Selling design, not the product
Valberg built demand by hand. A launch video drew about 10,000 sign-ups, and he emailed designers he recognized with personal tours and free licenses IV1. The content program grew into a weekly email with about two million subscribers, and Design Disruptors, a documentary about design-led companies that did not show the product IV1 IV4. It sold the idea that design belonged at the executive table, with InVision as its voice. Kiely, VP of product design, says the marketing spending was visible while the product work "didn't make it to the stage" IV4. By July 2015 InVision had one million registered users IV16.
Rivals Figma spent three years building its own browser renderer so the working design file, not an exported copy, opened from a link, and launched it in December 2015 FG19 FG1. Sketch was the tool InVision's customers drew in IV1.
Step 2 of 5 · 2015–19
Comments, never the file
InVision saw the limit of the companion role early. In 2015 the product team began V7, meant to turn InVision from a review tool into a full design tool and to move it off its old ColdFusion code IV4. Only a small team stayed on V6, the version customers used; Kiely says a large share of staff worked on something that was not yet customer-facing IV4. In October 2017 InVision announced Studio, a desktop design app for Mac and Windows promised for January 2018 IV15. Valberg's aim was to be "the Salesforce of the design world", with InVision's cloud review product holding the pieces together IV2.
The bet was aimed at the wrong rival and cost the product customers used. Valberg says he feared Adobe more than Figma, and asked Sketch's co-founder for "any level of commitment" to fight together; Sketch declined IV4. The rebuild "went on for four years. You couldn't back out of it", Valberg says, and V7 never reached the market IV4. Studio came years late and never gained market share IV10. Meanwhile, Kiely says, "customers saw a product that remained stale and fell behind" IV4. InVision spent four years trying to own the file, and the review job it was paid for stood still IV10 IV4.
Rivals Figma put creating, prototyping and commenting in one shared browser file, and shipped simultaneous editing in its 2016 public release although designers said they hated the idea IV22 FG21 IV4. A content strategist could change copy in a designer's live Figma file, work a Sketch setup routed through branching and merging FG3.
Step 3 of 5 · 2015–18
Charged for every commenter
InVision's growth came from people who were not designers. Valberg treated design as an organization's work: large customers had 1,000 to 2,000 seats, few of them held by designers IV1. The design team started the relationship, then people such as a CFO commenting on a payment flow joined IV17. In July 2015 InVision raised money partly to expand enterprise sales, with more than 500 enterprise customers, many deployed company-wide IV16. By November 2017 more than 70% of its users were not on design teams IV8.
Pricing charged for that spread. In 2018 a team paid about $100 a month for up to five designers; anyone could open a link, but a non-designer paid $8 a month to use comments, so revenue grew with how widely a design was shared IV9. It worked while InVision was the only place to review. In December 2018 it reported $100 million in annual recurring revenue (ARR), five million users and a $1.9 billion valuation IV7. Megan Quinn of Spark Capital, who led that round, credited a freemium "flywheel" inside companies IV7. The same price turned every new reviewer into a purchase decision, and former staff say InVision came to be seen as less flexible and more expensive IV4.
Rivals Figma charged only editors; viewers and commenters were free, so its sales team could go into companies paying for both Sketch and InVision across their whole user base and offer a lower total price IV21 IV24.
Step 4 of 5 · 2016–19
Overtaken for prototyping by 2019
The colleagues who made InVision spread were attached to the review link, not to InVision itself. Designers invited product managers and executives because the design needed their approval IV7. Once a team drew its screens in Figma, the same people could open the working file and comment there for free, and the separate review step InVision served was no longer needed IV4 IV21. The reviewers InVision had recruited moved with the file.
The change was fast. In a UXTools survey fewer than 10% of respondents used Figma in 2017, against 60% for InVision; by 2019 more designers used Figma for prototyping IV4. Benjamin Goldman, who ran InVision Films, recalls a senior account executive warning that he was losing more and more deals to Figma, and a sense that leadership did not fully appreciate the threat IV4. With much of its engineering still tied up in V7, InVision had little new to offer the customers it was losing IV4.
Rivals Figma found scattered clusters of its users inside companies such as Microsoft and Google, sold through the champions already there, and in 2019 added company-wide shared libraries IV24 FG18 FG5.
Step 5 of 5 · 2019–24
Design services shut in 2024
The companion role from step 1 also meant little held customers in place. InVision kept prototypes and the comments on them; the editable screens lived in Sketch or Adobe tools IV4. A team moving its design work to Figma had nothing hard to carry out of InVision. By 2021, Goldman says, most staff thought the design business was "game over" IV4.
InVision moved its effort away from design review. Freehand, an online whiteboard, became a free standalone product in June 2021, marketed to marketing, HR and management teams, where Miro was already far larger IV14 IV13. In November 2023 Miro bought Freehand's technology, customers and team, including InVision's chief executive IV13. On January 4, 2024, InVision announced that its design collaboration services would end with the year; sales staff helped enterprise customers move IV3 IV4. The review layer that made InVision easy to adopt in 2011 was just as easy to leave.
Rivals Figma held teams' editable files and shared libraries, which the UK CMA found costly to migrate and retrain on, and in April 2021 launched FigJam, a whiteboard that works with those files FG8 IV23. Miro served more than 60 million users when it bought Freehand IV13.
Key dates
- 2008An agency tries prototyping on client work
- 2011The agency's tool becomes an $8 subscription
- 2012Inside Design starts the content program
- 2015The V7 rebuild begins
- 2015-071 million registered users More than 500 enterprise customers IV16
- 2016-01First acquisition: Macaw
- 2016-03Prototyping inside Sketch
- 2016-062 million registered users Used at 70% of the Fortune 100 IV17
- 2016-09Figma opens signup with simultaneous editing IV22
- 2017-10Studio announced as a desktop design app
- 2017-113 million users More than 70% not on design teams IV8
- 2018-03Non-designers pay $8 a month to comment
- 2018-12$100M ARR 5 million users; valued at $1.9 billion IV7
- 2019Figma overtakes InVision for prototyping
- 2021-06Freehand, free, for teams beyond design
- 2023-11Freehand sold to Miro
- 2024-01Design collaboration services to end with 2024
Sources
Oldest first.
- IV16 InVision raises $45M in Series C funding to become the platform powering the entire creative process. Company announcement
- FG1 Design: Meet the internet. Primary source
- FG19 Building a professional design tool on the web. Engineering post
- GFC-11 Design Disruptors: The Story Behind One Startup's Decision to Produce a Feature-Length Documentary. Participant interview
- IV11 Prototyping suite InVision is acquiring design tool Macaw. Contemporaneous report
- IV12 InVision acquires Silver Flows, a tool for prototyping inside Sketch. Contemporaneous report
- IV17 InVision raises $55M in Series D funding to make product design collaborative. Contemporaneous report
- IV1 A guide to InVision's lean growth hacking. Founder interview
- IV22 Multiplayer editing in Figma. Rival announcement
- IV15 InVision takes on Sketch and Adobe XD with its new Studio design app. Contemporaneous report
- IV8 InVision picks up $100 million Series E. Contemporaneous report
- IV5 Announcing the Design Forward Fund by InVision. Founder account
- IV6 InVision launches Studio Platform, challenging Adobe with an open ecosystem. Contemporaneous report
- IV9 How Clark Valberg accidentally discovered the weakness in Adobe's empire. Founder interview
- FG3 My switch to Figma. Primary source
- IV2 InVision CEO Clark Valberg to talk design at Disrupt SF. Contemporaneous profile
- IV19 This software company has a $1 billion valuation, 800 employees, and zero offices. Contemporaneous profile
- IV7 InVision, valued at $1.9 billion, picks up $115 million Series F. Contemporaneous report
- FG5 Introducing Figma Organization: our first enterprise-grade offering. Primary source
- FG21 How Figma's multiplayer technology works. Engineering post
- IV18 Episode 14: InVision CEO Clark Valberg on distributed design. Founder interview transcript
- IV23 Introducing FigJam. Rival announcement
- IV14 InVision's transformational Freehand collaboration product now available as a free standalone offering. Company announcement
- IV24 The 5 phases of Figma's community-led growth: from stealth to enterprise. Operator interview
- GFC-12 Figma Vs Invision: 3 Lessons For Start-Up Founders Following Adobe's Big Acquisition. Outside commentary
- FG18 An inside look at Figma's unique GTM motion: Claire Butler (Lenny's Podcast transcript). Podcast transcript
- IV13 Miro acquires Freehand app from InVision. Company announcement
- FG8 Adobe / Figma merger inquiry: provisional findings. Primary source
- IV3 InVision, a UX trailblazer, is shutting down in the era of Figma. Contemporaneous report
- IV10 What actually popped InVision's billion-dollar bubble (hint: it wasn't Figma). Outside analysis
- IV4 The unraveling of a unicorn: why InVision failed. Participant accounts in a retrospective report
- IV20 InVision App, Inc, co-founded by Ben Nadel in 2011. Co-founder account
- IV21 Inside Figma's early days: how to build a world-class sales org. Operator interview transcript