head to head · open source
open-design vs design-tokens
open-design has 107,548 GitHub stars, 12,225 forks, 1,090 open issues and last shipped today. design-tokens has 1,130 stars, 148 forks, 41 open issues and last shipped 9 months ago. open-design leads on adoption by 9,418% (107,548 vs 1,130 stars). open-design is written in TypeScript under Apache-2.0; design-tokens is written in TypeScript under MIT. open-design has attracted 11% as many forks as stars, design-tokens 13%. open-design was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee.
Two open source projects, one decision. Both are free and self-hostable — the differences are community size, license terms, language stack and release pace.
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Side by side
| open-design | design-tokens | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 108K | ★ 1.1K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | MIT |
| Written in | TypeScript | TypeScript |
| Last push | 2026-11-14 | 2026-02-16 |
| Forks | ⑂ 12K | ⑂ 148 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick open-design if
- You weight community size — 108K stars and counting
- You want the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick design-tokens if
- You want the design-tokens feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You evaluated both and design-tokens fits your workflow better
About open-design
OpenDesign: The open source Claude Design alternative ⚡ OpenDesign Cloud — the official model service. One recharge to use both agent and image models inside OpenDesign: GPT, Claude, and DeepSeek for agents; GPT Image 2.0, Seedream 5.0 Pro, and Nano Banana 2.0 for images. 🚀 DeepSeek V4 Flash and V4 Pro are now available. Put top tier intelligence to work across prototypes, decks, design systems, and everyday agent tasks. OpenDesign members can use both models without limits for two weeks, directly inside the app. 🧩 DeepSeek Harness is now supported. Connect DeepSeek's official dsh agent harness to OpenDesign…
read the full open-design overview →
About design-tokens
[!WARNING] This plugin is only partially supported! This means: I don't have capacity to add any features or really improve stuff. Bugfixes may be added if time allows. I am also happy to discuss and merge PRs. I personally have changed my opinion a long time ago to favor the source fo truth for design tokens to be in a json file. Figma should be a consumer so you only import tokens into figma. This is why I don't use plugins like this one anymore in my work. → Read more about the a better setup Design Tokens The Design Tokens plugin for Figma allows you to export design tokens into a json format that can be…
read the full design-tokens overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is open-design or design-tokens more popular?
open-design has 107,548 GitHub stars and design-tokens has 1,130. open-design has the larger community by that measure.
Are open-design and design-tokens free?
Both are open source. open-design is licensed under Apache-2.0 and design-tokens under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between open-design and design-tokens?
open-design is written in TypeScript and design-tokens in TypeScript. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, open-design or design-tokens?
Choose open-design if you want the larger community (107,548 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose design-tokens if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.