As a collaborative design tool, Figma allows you to invite multiple people to work on projects. While this is useful for speeding up your work and improving collaboration, it can also lead to problems. Conflicting access rights and inadvertent changes can cause you to be unable to edit text in your Figma projects.
This article covers two of the most common reasons why you may not be able to edit text in Figma. It also offers some solutions that can restore editing functionality.
Another editor moved the file
Improved collaboration is brilliant until another editor on the project makes a change that restricts your access. In some cases, your inability to edit text may be due to another editor moving the Figma file to your drafts or another team or project. Although you will still have access to a read-only version of the file, you will no longer be able to edit it. There are two ways to solve this problem.
Method No. 1: Duplicate the file
Duplicating a file that you can access but not edit allows you to restore your editing privileges. However, it is not a perfect solution. Duplicate files lose version history data, so you don’t have a record of who made changes or when.
To duplicate a file, you must first create a team and a project to work on by following these steps.
- Open File Explorer and navigate to the “Create New Team” button in the left sidebar.
- Click the button and name your team.
- Select “Create Team.”
- Invite any collaborators you want to be a team member by entering their email addresses. Alternatively, select “Skip for now.”
- Choose a plan for your device from Starter, Professional, and Education options.
- Click on the team page and click the “New Project” button in the menu bar.
Set up the new project for your team and you’re ready to duplicate the file you currently can’t edit.
- Enter the file explorer and locate the file that you cannot edit.
- Right-click and select “Duplicate” to generate a copy of the file.
- Drag the file into your team project to transfer it.
You should now have full ownership and editing capabilities of the duplicate file.
Method No. 2: Transfer the file back to your computer
Another editor may have accidentally transferred the file to your computer, limiting your editing capabilities. This method assumes that you can contact the publisher and that they are willing to transfer the file to your computer. A transfer restores the file and preserves any previous editing data that you lose if you duplicate it.
- Click on an empty spot on the canvas to deselect the selected layers.
- Select the project file name in the toolbar.
- Click “Move to Project.”
- Type your project team name into the search bar and select “Team Project” under the team name.
- Click “Move” to complete the transfer.
The file uses a font you don’t have
Figma provides users with a catalog of Google Web Fonts for their projects. These fonts are standard in Figma, meaning they can be accessed and used by all users. However, Figma also allows users to purchase and use other fonts, in addition to using fonts that they have stored locally on their computers.
The local storage feature may also cause you to be unable to edit the text.
If Figma can’t access a font that you have in local storage that was also used in the document you’re editing, you won’t be able to change the text. You can fix this problem fairly quickly on both the Figma desktop app and the browser-based version of the platform.
Figma Desktop App
He Figma Desktop App It is available for Windows PCs and devices running macOS. Once you’ve installed it, follow these steps to access your local fonts in the platform’s font selector.
- Select your text layer or a part of the text within the layer.
- Navigate to the text properties in the right sidebar.
- Click the drop-down arrow to the right of the source in this sidebar.
- Select the font family you want.
Browser-based figma
To access local fonts in the browser-based version of Figma, you need to manually install the platform’s font service.
- Go to Figma download page.
- Scroll down to the “Font Installers” p and select the installer for your operating system.
- Open the download file.
- Click “Install.”
The executable will run and install the Figma font service on your desktop. Restart Figma and you should be able to access your local sources. This allows you to edit the text in your Figma document again, assuming you use a font that you have stored locally.
Recover your text editing skills
Losing the ability to edit text in Figma is a frustrating experience that can cause delays in project completion. Often the problem arises due to font conflicts or confusion in document ownership. The solutions in this article will help you solve both problems so that you can start working without restrictions in Figma again.
Now we want to know your experiences with Figma. Do you think Figma could alert document editors if something happens that prevents them from changing their documents? How has losing the ability to edit text affected your work schedule? Let us know in the comments below.
