I’ve always had a personal habit when evaluating UI layouts: squinting my eyes just enough to blur out micro-copy, iconography, and flashy imagery. Stripping away the polish reveals whether the core visual hierarchy and information flow actually align with user intent.
To turn this intuitive check into a fast, repeatable tool, I built this Figma plugin: Design Review Assistant.
The feature set focuses on two deliberate workflows:
- Squint Test Blocks (Low-Fi Structural Abstraction): Automatically extracts selected Figma frames or layouts and simplifies them into minimalist colored wireframe blocks. By eliminating micro-level noise, you instantly see the geometric density and visual rhythm of the canvas.
- Visual Audit: Evaluates spatial relationships across Information Hierarchy, Proximity, Alignment, and Whitespace cadence, outputting actionable, concrete tuning suggestions.
I experimented with several versions and deliberately chose not to slap AI on top. I honestly hate shoving AI into software just for the sake of ticking an AI buzzword checkbox. When deterministic code solves the problem with zero latency, zero cost, and rock-solid consistency, there’s no reason to force a model into the loop until it can truly deliver 10x value.
Repository: GitHub - KhalilHsu/Figma_Plugin