Somewhere in every website project there's a moment where a link to a Figma file lands in your inbox and you're expected to have opinions about it.
If design isn't your job, that's an uncomfortable position. You can tell something feels off but not why, or you like it but suspect that isn't a useful thing to say. So you end up commenting on the only things you feel qualified to judge, which is usually the colour of a button.
Here's how to review design work properly, without needing to be a designer.
First, get oriented
Figma is a browser tool, so you don't need to install anything. A few things worth knowing before you start:
- Zoom with Ctrl or Cmd and scroll. Shift + 1 fits everything on screen, Shift + 2 zooms to what you've selected.
- Pages are in the left sidebar. There may be several — wireframes, design, components. Ask which one you're meant to be looking at.
- Comment mode is the speech bubble icon, or press C. Click anywhere to leave a comment pinned to that spot.
- Prototype mode is the play button, top right. If the designer has linked the screens together, this lets you click through it like a real site.
Always ask whether what you're seeing is desktop, mobile, or both. Reviewing a desktop design and then complaining it won't work on a phone is the most common false alarm in this process.
What you are actually qualified to judge
You know your business, your customers and your market better than your designer does. That is exactly what your review should cover.
Is the message right? Read the headline on the homepage. Does it describe what you sell in words a customer would use? This is the single highest-value thing you can check, and it's a business question, not a design one.
Is anything missing? A service you offer, an accreditation that matters in your sector, a reassurance your customers always ask for.
Is the order right? Does the page answer questions in the sequence a real buyer asks them? If your customers always want pricing before anything else, and pricing is at the bottom, say so.
Is it credible for your market? You know whether your buyers are conservative or adventurous. If a design feels too playful for the people who actually sign contracts, that's worth raising — as long as you frame it that way rather than as "I don't like it."
Will the content work? Look at the longest realistic product name, the case study title that runs to two lines, the team member with the very long job title. If you know something won't fit, flag it now rather than after the build.
What to leave alone
Some things look like problems and aren't.
Placeholder content. Lorem ipsum, grey boxes and stock photography are almost always deliberate stand-ins. Ask what's placeholder before commenting on it.
Exact pixel positions. A design file is not the finished site. Small differences in spacing and alignment get resolved in the build.
Things that look unfinished at the edges. Hover states, error messages and empty states often live on a separate page or get handled in development.
Font rendering. Type looks slightly different in a browser than in Figma. Your designer knows.
Your personal taste, unexamined. You are allowed to dislike something. Just interrogate it first: is this wrong for my customers, or is it just not the colour I'd have picked?
How to give feedback that gets a good result
The difference between a fast project and a slow one is almost entirely in how feedback is written.
Comment in Figma, not in email. A comment pinned to the thing you're describing removes all ambiguity. An email saying "the bit near the top of the second section" costs someone twenty minutes.
Say what, and why. "Make it bigger" gives the designer one option. "This feels less important than the pricing below it, but it's the thing customers care about most" gives them ten, and they'll pick a better one than you would have.
Collect everyone's feedback first. One consolidated list per round. Feedback that arrives in three instalments over a week turns one revision into three.
Resolve conflicts internally. If your MD wants it bolder and your marketing lead wants it calmer, decide before sending. Designers cannot resolve your internal disagreements and shouldn't be asked to.
Separate must-fix from preference. Mark them differently. It lets the designer spend their effort where it matters.
Say what's working too. Not for morale — so nobody accidentally changes the part you liked while fixing something else.
Questions worth asking
If you're not sure what to say, these usually open up the useful conversation:
- What was the thinking behind this layout?
- What happens to this section on a phone?
- What does this look like when we have thirty of these instead of three?
- Which part of this are you least sure about?
- What did you consider and reject?
That last one is the best question in the list. It tells you whether your idea has already been tried.
Questions we get asked
Do I need a Figma account to review a design?
No. A view or comment link opens in any browser. You'll be asked for a name so your comments are attributed, but you don't need to pay for anything.
How many rounds of feedback should I expect?
Two is normal on a well-run project: one substantial round, then a smaller one to confirm the changes. If you're heading into a fourth, the problem is usually that feedback is arriving in pieces rather than that the design is wrong.
What if I genuinely don't like it?
Say so early and plainly, and try to say what it makes you feel rather than what to change. "This feels corporate and we're not" is far more useful than "can we try a different blue" — it gives the designer a direction rather than a task.
If you're about to review a design and would rather talk it through than write comments, we're always happy to walk clients through a file on a call — it's usually faster for everyone.