As of 28 Oct 2026, the panel rates Figma 2.5/5 and Sketch 3/5 in Design. Weighted by what each judge cares about, 0 of the 6 judges pick Figma and 6 pick Sketch. Figma scores higher on 4 of 7 criteria (Pricing transparency, AI features & rights to the work, Brand assets & governance, plus 1 more). Sketch scores higher on 3 of 7 criteria (Files, formats & portability, European sovereignty and Collaboration, review & developer handoff). Provenance — Figma: Rest of world; Sketch: EU-Made. Ratings are the AI panel’s opinion, formed from public evidence: how scores are made.
The two benches split along clear lines rather than settling on one verdict. Figma's means lead on pricing transparency (8.0 vs 6.3; 6–0), AI and content rights (5.0 vs 4.0; 6–0), design and prototyping (7.0 vs 6.7; 2–0 with four ties) and brand asset governance (4.0 vs 3.2; 3–0 with three ties). Sketch's means lead on file ownership and portability (8.0 vs 4.5; 6–0), sovereignty (3.7 vs 1.3; 6–0) and collaboration and handoff (6.8 vs 6.5; 3–1 with two ties). The weighted totals shown run to Sketch for five judges — product designer 6.1 vs 6, frontend engineer 6.8 vs 5.3, brand marketer 5.1 vs 5, data protection officer 5 vs 4.3, skeptic 5.6 vs 5 — with no totals shown for the agency owner. The attributes list Figma's data residency as US default and subprocessor exposure as US CLOUD Act; Sketch's entity jurisdiction is listed as NL, with ownership, data residency and subprocessor exposure as unknown.
Choose Figma if
You need per-seat euro prices published before purchase: pricing transparency leans 6 judges to 0 toward Figma (8.0 vs 6.3), with €16/mo for a Full seat at Professional, €55/mo at Organization and €90/mo at Enterprise stated on the pages.
You plan to use AI features and want AI credits stated per plan: the AI and content rights lean is 6 to 0 toward Figma (5.0 vs 4.0).
Your team's main need is design and prototyping, where Figma's mean leads 7.0 to 6.7 with 2 judges leaning Figma, 0 leaning Sketch and 4 ties.
You need a documented logo-to-brand-kit generator: brand asset governance leans 3 to 0 toward Figma (4.0 vs 3.2), with 3 judges tying.
Choose Sketch if
You need design files readable without the vendor's app: file ownership and portability leans 6 to 0 toward Sketch (8.0 vs 4.5); documents are ZIP archives of JSON with an independently versioned JSON Schema on npm.
Your procurement requires an EU legal entity: Sketch's legal entity jurisdiction attribute is NL, and the sovereignty lean is 6 to 0 toward Sketch (3.7 vs 1.3); Figma's data residency attribute is US default.
Your developers inspect files in the browser: collaboration and handoff leans 3 to 1 toward Sketch (6.8 vs 6.5), with free browser-based developer inspection documented.
Your team is frontend-heavy: the frontend engineer judge's weighted total is 6.8 for Sketch against 5.3 for Figma.
Your data protection officer must sign off: that judge's weighted total is 5 for Sketch against 4.3 for Figma.
Read this comparison as one judge. Each weighs the same scores by what they care about.
The Frontend Engineer
Turns the designs into code and gets the ticket when they disagree. Wants an inspect mode without a paid seat, tokens exported in a documented format, components mapped to the code ones, and an API that reads the whole file rather than a screenshot of it.
Figma
Sketch
This judge's pick
Criterion by criterion
Design, prototyping & design systems
Figma
Team-wide design libraries, resources publishable across teams, shared styles for colour, text, grids and effects, and design system theming and APIs on the top plan are all documented, and the AI generator builds full component sets with "real design tokens" in multiple sizes, states and themes. I still found no public information on versioned library publishing, prototype transitions or conditional logic, or a documented token export format — which is the part I need to wire into code.
Sketch
Team Libraries with Symbol overrides per instance, starred library versions controlling what teammates receive, and prototypes with animations, overlays, hover/press/toggle triggers and scroll areas put a real design system in the tool. We found no public information on variables or tokens with themes, component variants as such, or accessibility checks in the editor.
Collaboration, review & developer handoff
Figma
Viewers without a paid seat get real inspection — measurements, copy of CSS, iOS and Android code, asset export and comments — and Dev Mode with a code panel in CSS, Swift and XML is written up. But the panel is visual properties only with "no Javascript or other logic is exported", codegen appears only in a customer testimonial, and I found no public information on version history with restore, branching, or an API that reads full file structure; the MCP Server is named in a plan feature list with no detail.
Sketch
Developers inspect in the browser for free without the Mac app, guests can be granted the Can download and inspect permission, and comments run deep with threads, mentions, Markdown, resolution and scoped notifications. The handoff page names Inspect, Export and an MCP server, but we found no public information on restoring from version history, branching before changes reach the main file, or integrations named per issue tracker.
Brand assets & governance
Figma
The logo-to-brand-kit generator produces colour palettes, typography pairings and brand assets directly on the canvas, packageable into reusable skills, and a thousand-plus community templates exist. This is kit generation, not governance: I found no public information on a central brand library with locking, guidelines published in the tool, or rights and expiry metadata on licensed assets.
Sketch
The captured pages document team Libraries of Symbols with version control and edit permissions, which is a shared library of design components. We found no public information on a brand kit of logos, colours and fonts, published guidelines, locked templates for non-designers, or rights and expiry metadata on assets.
Files, formats & portability
Figma
Export as documented is asset-level — copy as CSS, SVG or PNG and an export panel for marked assets — and the terms state all customer content is retrievable for 30 days after termination with the customer keeping all rights in that content. I found no public information on a documented file format, whole-file export with structure, import from or export to other named tools, or bulk export for a team.
Sketch
The document format is openly specified as ZIP archives of JSON, published as JSON Schema on npm with auto-generated TypeScript types and versioned independently of the app, so any build script can read and modify the whole file rather than a screenshot of it. Figma import is documented and a Private Cloud plan with a choice of hosting locations exists; we found no public information on file ownership terms or a retention timeline after a contract ends.
AI features & rights to the work
Figma
The AI terms settle the two things I ask first: customer content trains Figma's models only when the Content Training toggle is on in admin settings, and the customer "retains all right, title, and interest" in inputs and outputs, with pay-as-you-go switchable and budget-capped from the admin dashboard. I found no public information on model providers or processing locations, content credentials on generated output, stock licences, or any indemnity — the terms instead disclaim responsibility for output accuracy.
Sketch
The privacy statement is concrete where it speaks: background removal runs on-device with images not sent to Sketch or any provider, and the local MCP server is disabled by default with a disclosure that a connected third-party provider's policy may allow model training on what you send it. We found no public information on commercial-use rights for generated output, indemnity, or organisation-wide admin switches for AI features.
European sovereignty
Figma
The terms are between the customer and Figma, Inc., and the privacy policy states all personal information is transferred to, processed and stored in the United States, with no EU residency option shown on the captured pages. A published data processing addendum with Standard Contractual Clauses and the Figma GmbH entity in the Berlin imprint are the European elements I can find; the sub-processor list the policy points to was not among the pages I could read, so hosting, support and other product providers stay unnamed.
Sketch
Sketch B.V. references Dutch civil and fiscal law, offers a Data Processing Addendum and a published subprocessor list, protects out-of-EEA transfers with the European Commission's Standard Contractual Clauses, and states its local AI features never send images off the device. We found no public information on where design files are hosted, and the subprocessor list gives categories rather than named locations.
Pricing transparency
Figma
A buyer can genuinely compute the bill: Full seats are listed at €16/mo on Professional and €90/mo on Enterprise with Collab and Dev priced too, the billing period is stated, viewers are free on paid plans, mid-term seats are prorated at a daily rate on Professional and invoiced quarterly on Organization and Enterprise, and monthly AI credit allotments per plan are listed with the consumption order and pay-as-you-go controls. The gaps that keep it from full computability: the per-credit price of extra credits and any storage pricing aren't shown, the View seat's price isn't shown, and the plan gate is named as Governance+ on Enterprise rather than stating where single sign-on begins.
Sketch
Standard, Professional and Enterprise are priced at € 11, € 22 and € 44 per Editor monthly billed yearly, with features listed per plan, SSO named on Professional, unlimited free viewers, 50GB per editor of storage, a € 108 one-time Mac license including one year of updates, and free developer inspect. We found no public information on VAT treatment or how and when added seats are billed, and Private Cloud is contact-for-pricing with a one-time setup fee.
Sovereignty, side by side
Dimension
Figma
Sketch
Legal entity
Not determined
Not determined
Ownership
Not determined
Not determined
Data residency
Not determined
Not determined
Subprocessors
US CLOUD Act reach
Not determined
Facts, side by side
Only facts both products carry under the same definition — anything else would not be a fair row.
As of 28 Oct 2026, the panel rates Sketch higher: 3/5 against 2.5/5. Weighted by what each judge cares about, 0 of the 6 judges pick Figma and 6 pick Sketch. Which one fits depends on the criteria that matter to you; the table on this page shows both side by side, and each judge’s reading has its own page. Both were scored by the same AI bench under the same rubric, from public evidence only, as the methodology describes.
Is Figma or Sketch European?
Figma is not European by provenance (Rest of world). Sketch is European (EU-Made). Provenance is read from each company’s own legal pages: who builds it and who owns it.
Do Figma and Sketch have a free plan?
As of 28 Oct 2026, Figma’s own pages state a free plan; Sketch’s pages as captured do not. Each product page links the pricing page it was read from.