There’s a weird pattern with AI design tools right now — they all want to generate screens for you, but none of them bother to understand what you’re actually building first. That’s exactly the gap [Figr AI](https://figr.design/) is trying to close, and honestly, the approach makes a lot of sense.
Figr just hit [#1 Product of the Day on Product Hunt](https://www.producthunt.com/products/figr-design-research-simplified) with over 350 upvotes, and it also made the rounds on [Hacker News](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46724567) as a Show HN post. The buzz isn’t surprising once you see what it does differently.
Here’s the deal: instead of throwing you into a blank canvas and asking “what do you want?”, Figr starts by learning your product. It comes with a [Chrome extension](https://chromewebstore.google.com/detail/figr-capture/bejnddahceggaeogmedenhaccoiikjmj) that can parse your live webapp — not just screenshot it, but actually read the HTML structure, layout, spacing, and component hierarchy. You can also feed it Figma files, screen recordings, or competitor screenshots. It builds a persistent memory of your product so every suggestion it makes is grounded in your actual context.
What I find most interesting is the dual-agent architecture. There’s a thinking agent and an execution agent working together. The thinking layer maps out user flows, identifies edge cases you probably missed, runs UX reviews, and even generates PRDs before a single pixel gets pushed. It’s less “AI that designs” and more “AI PM that also happens to design.” All of this is backed by over 200,000 real-world UX patterns, which means the recommendations aren’t just technically sound — they’re based on what actually works in production.
The practical upside is pretty clear for product teams. Need A/B design variations? It generates those in your existing design language. Want an accessibility audit? It handles that too. The [docs](https://docs.figr.design/) walk through most of these workflows if you want to dig deeper.
Is it perfect? Probably not — no AI tool is right now. But the core idea of “understand first, design second” feels like the right direction. Most competing tools skip the hard thinking part entirely, and that’s exactly where the real design problems live.
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