There are two types of design systems in Sympli Handoff - local project libraries and global design systems.

As its name suggests, local project libraries are local, limited to a specific project, and are not visible outside of it. A local project library can be edited and, later on, if needed, turned into a global design system. Project libraries are created automatically when you create a project, although you’ll still have to export the design system to populate the styles, they’re not uploaded automatically.

A global design system is shareable between your teammates and can be linked to any number of projects. They need to be created, either from upgrading a local project library, from the web app, or when exporting styles from the Sketch or Figma plugins.

To create a Design System from a project library, open your project and go to the new Design System tab. Click on the Save as Design System button, give it a name, and click on Create Design System. Then, click on Open Design System to manage and edit tokens.

Go to the Design Systems main page and click on the “New Design System” button. You can manually input tokens, sync them using our Figma or Sketch plugin, or add them from a linked project’s design inspector.

When syncing a project using the Sympli Handoff plugin for Figma or Sketch, you can also sync your design tokens. Refer to our Figma plugin or Sketch plugin tutorials to learn how to create a new Global Design System from there.

To link a Design System to a project, open the project and go to the Design System tab. Click on the dropdown arrow and select an existing Design System to link it with this project.

Note: You can also unlink an already linked Design System, follow the same steps and click on the Unlink option at the top of the dropdown options.