What went on during Figma Config 2024!
Another year, another Figma conference! Figma hosts an annual conference to bring together designers, developers, product managers, and all others for two full days of fun. I am fortunate enough to come back a 2nd time in a row to attend Figma’s conference that took place at the Moscone center once again. This year’s Config 2024, ALOT happened and I want to give you the scoop from my own perspective as a regular person with barely any design friends.
The welcome event
The day before the actual conference, Figma held a welcome event across from Moscone in the Yerba Buena Gardens from 12:00PM to 9:30PM. Anyone that wanted to get into the event had to grab their Config badges which was available to pick up until 7:30PM that day. It was jam packed with people when I arrived for the opening reception which didn’t feel like a reception at all. All activity and experience booths closed for the “opening reception” at 6:00PM and it was just food and drinks. There was no announcement or introduction on what was going on, but a figure it out type of thing. If I didn’t have at least one other friend with me, I wouldn’t know what to do with myself. It felt weird to insert yourself into conversations when groups were basically formed from the get-go. After staying a couple hours to see if there was any special activities, I left a little bit disappointed as it seemed better to go to the welcome event during the afternoon as that was actually filled with activities (screen printing, pins, and poem creating). The free food and drinks were great though! As part of going to the welcome event, you would receive two charm components to add to your collectible charm bracelet.
Day 1 — Sessions and figuring out the lay of the land
Since I was able to grab my badge and the tote bag swag the day before, I headed to the conference a little later around 8:30AM so that I’d be just on time for the opening keynote. I was super fortunate to have gotten my badge the day before because the morning lineup to even get into the conference was atrocious. There was 14,000+ attendees this year which is a couple thousand more than last year, which made all the difference. The lineup suffered and people waited in line for 2 hours to get their badge, this was due to the sheer amount of people and printer malfunctions. The opening keynote is always the best way to get excited for the day, with the new announcements on what the team has been working on. There is never a boring moment in the opening keynote and it was interesting to see the brand new UI3. Just when I thought that I was done learning Figma, Figma throws new features and layouts so I’m always kept on my feet. After the opening keynote, I was curious to see what activities or booth stations were happening this year: there was tote customization, capturing your aura, the FigJam wall, sponsor booths, the merch store, and a scavenger hunt to collect component charms. Fortunately, I got all the activities done on the first day, waiting in those lines on average 1–2 hours. In between those times, I attended a couple of sessions which has been handled in a better way. Prior to the conference, you had to add sessions to your agenda which “saved” your seat. Sessions were hosted in bigger rooms and there was sufficient room to listen in and gather all the knowledge from the speakers. I found that it was even more difficult to talk to others who wanted to meet new people this year for some weird reason, so unfortunately I didn’t get to connect with that many people. Everyone I knew that had was also not attending this year which made feel that this conference was less hyped. It’s truly the people that make a conference and community fun and enjoyable because others had a great time! Prior to the conference, I also signed up for the after parties, which I did not end up going to as I had other engagements. I definitely think they are a better way to network with people as people going to those have the intention of networking with new people. I was also on the scout for the collectibles component charms which became my ice breaker to other people. It was truly the hardest thing, I compared it to trying to collect Pokemon.
Day 2 — The ongoing chaos and lines
To start the day, I stopped by Yerba Buena for the Widgets, Whales, & Coffee event hosted by the Nearform Commerce design team. After grabbing some coffee and pastry, it was time to tackle another day. The energy levels on the second day seemed to match the first, people were chatting it up and getting in line for the activities they missed on the first day. This was a bad decision for those that lined up at the capture your aura booths. People waited 2–5 hours as the photo taking process was slow and there was a ton of people. It’s surprising to see how many people would wait in a line and spend half of the day like that. Respect to those who just waited in line during the entire conference. I was expecting to see more component charms being handed out but failed, I think I only secured one charm. On the Slack community, there was threads dedicated to finding the different charms and even a trading community. Sessions on this day was smooth sailing as well and I enjoyed the walk in the park process compared to last year. However, it looked like they were actually scanning your ID to get into the seminars so if you did not sign up for the session previously, you had to get in line and wait till the people who signed up got in first. The first day they didn’t scan our badges but it seemed like the second day they wanted to follow procedure a little more or I just missed that process. The ending keynote was a great way to end off the conference especially with Alexis Gay starting it off. When heading out of the doors, Figma staff members were giving away free merch, aka the pastel purple cap and patches. There was probably other things as well, but I only saw the one staff handing these out. Now it was time for the after parties, a chance for free food and drinks, and getting to meet random people! I ended up not attending any of the after parties as I spent the rest of the evening with my coworker for team bonding.
Farewell Config 2024
Config 2024 was not at all what I expected. The grand opening keynote was a surprise and seeing how the Figma team is innovating and improving the product is great to see. The structure of the speaker sessions are always inspiring, but some are a little boring and uninteresting. The team who organized the conference deserves recognition, but accommodating 14,000+ attendees was a little extreme and you can tell that it ruined a bunch of people’s experiences. This year, I focused less on networking and more on preserving my energy so I wasn’t dead at the end of it. I still met great designers here and there, and surprisingly two designers from my province, which is a shocker! Attending Config is a great opportunity to meet your designer friends in real life and to network if you are up for it. If you’re interested in attending and seeing what Config is all about, I say you have to experience it once in your life. The structure of the conference is the same throughout the years, but the different activities and people you meet will differ. After attending 2 Configs, I don’t feel like there is a need to attend another one for the next couple of years or we’ll see what happens! It was a great experience and I think it’s a great way to spark the motivation and inspiration within you as there are many many talented designers gathered.
The sessions I enjoyed:
- Walking the path: Prototyping game UI with focus-based navigation
- Redesigning BBC.com: Crafting a connected, contextual, and global experience
- Design system adoption addiction
- Building a human future with robots
Config 2024 wrapped!
- Attended Config Commons, a welcome event by Figma
- Attended Widgets, Whales, & Coffee (micro event by the Nearform Commerce design team)
- Polaroid photo snapped at Capture your aura booth
- 8 component charms collected for the charm bracelet
- Tons of stickers and patches collected
- Met and chatted with 5+ designers
- Figma socks and Figma pastel purple cap
- Decorated my tote bag with patches (credits to the guy I saw at the conference)
- Tried the Vision Apple Pro from a super great guy
- Attended opening and closing keynotes
- Attended 3–4 seminars total
