How to free up hours of work with the new Figma feature
An introduction to multi-editing
I like Figma the most because they facilitate the life for the designers.
Certainly, there is a long way to perfection, but every new feature coming out is really well thought out and useful.
The recent feature of Multi-edit is not an exception and will so accelerate the work for those with 100500 almost identical mockups and need to make a small (or no) modification on every screen.
Before, this pleasant task could easily take a couple of hours. Now, everything can be done at once.
And even if copy-pasting is not difficult, it’s better to avoid the feeling that your life is passing by uselessly.
So, here is a video explanation about how Multi edit works compared to the functionality we had before.
How to select the matching layers
To multi-edit objects across a series of frames, you can use the shortcut ⌥ ⌘A or Ctrl+Alt+A on Windows to select matching objects across multiple frames. Select an object and use the shortcut. You can also click the “Select all matching” icon in the top toolbar.
Note that Figma will select all objects considering their position and name.
Therefore, in some cases, may need to check the names of the objects you want to modify. If necessary, rename them to have the same name to ensure they are treated as a group (let’s admit that the people who name their layers from the start are UI Gods)
How to edit multiple text fields simultaneously
Before, I used the Find/Replace function in Figma when I needed to modify text on multiple screens.
The disadvantage of this method is that in the result, you have a long list of the “findings” that include literally every screen on your Figma page with matching text. You can imagine the mess if on the same page you keep your drafts, Version 1/2/3, etc.
Anyway, the new feature of multi-edit text should facilitate the task.
So, you select the text objects, press enter, and edit the text fields across frames with matching text fields.
You can use the same shortcut as for the objects ⌥ ⌘A or Ctrl +Alt+A on Windows, then press Enter or click on the multi-edit text icon on the top tool bar.
More about that in the video below:
Another good point — there are no limits in using multi-editing if your objects are in Auto layout (which I hope is the case for many designers) — Figma will replace/modify the objects inside the Auto-layout frame
If you want to try it out and see the functionality in more detail, go to the Figma playground — there are a lot of exercises with good explanations of how it works.
Let me know in the comments your thoughts about that.
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