Abstract vs. Virola Messenger

• Large teams with dedicated design operations support
• UX managers that want a facilitated workflow for their teams
• Disciplined teams of individual contributors that want to adopt a process in their UI workflow
• Cross-discipline teams that want a central collaboration space for reviewing and critiquing UI artifacts
• If your files are named "FOR-REALS_FINAL_FINAL_FINAL_Super-Important-Project (copy).sketch"
• If you're managing multiple pattern libraries

Incentivized

This is fantastic for offices that have employees working from home. It is a much cleaner and easier way to discuss projects or even have informal conversations. However if all employees are working from the same office, the features are limited as conversation, screen sharing, and task management are less valuable.

Incentivized

• Versioning for desginers
• Collaboration between team members

Incentivized

• Secure chatting
• Chatrooms
• File transfer/ sharing

Incentivized

• Asset exports are not as great as Zeplin and others.
• Filtering within files.

Incentivized

• A cleaner interface.
• More intuitive for older generations.
• Customizable notification tones

Incentivized

Abstract has a difficult learning curve. If a feature-branch workflow is new to you, then it will take some getting used to. They make a lot of updates to the interface and these feature releases get ahead of their documentation. They rely heavily on an excellent customer support team and are present on various Slack channels to help design professionals with issues.

Incentivized

Abstract by nature is complex and has to respond to whatever changes in Sketch. So there are frequent issues. Support can be slow to respond and are not always helpful, but they are quick to find and patch the bugs. Overall, it's not the best support, but it hasn't been detrimental.

Incentivized

I purchased and administer Abstract. It was requested by our design department who evaluated it.

Incentivized

It's really early to judge Virola's capabilities with other offerings or tools in the marketplace but with the set of features the tool offers at the moment at the negligible price it can surely be counted as a dark horse to make its way through to be one of the best. Provide that it has the ability to support larger teams, it can really be successful in the future.

Incentivized

• Single source of truth for the team.
• Could quickly get expensive with corporate accounts.

Incentivized

• Kept everyone in the loop
• Allowed for seamless project discussions from inside and outside the office.
• Great way to share screens which was very important.

Incentivized