Developer handoff

Developer handoff is the step where a finished design passes from the designer to the person who builds it. A tool with this feature lets a developer open the design and read the spacing, colours, font sizes and image sizes directly, and export icons and images in the right formats. Some tools also produce code snippets for the selected element. Figma and Sketch are examples of design tools that list it.

Without it, designers write specifications by hand or answer the same questions repeatedly, and the finished page drifts away from the approved design. Handoff matters when design and development are done by different people, or when an outside agency builds your site. It matters much less if one person designs and builds everything, or if you use a template and change only the text.

• Ask whether developers need a paid seat to inspect designs, or whether a free viewer is enough.
• Open a real design in a trial and check that the measurements and colours can be read without the designer present.
• Ask which code formats are produced, and whether they match the way your site is built.
• Check whether the design can be marked as ready, so developers know which version to build.