Sketch is a visual design tool of use for application prototyping, coming with a wide variety of extensions, plugins, and an active user community.
$10
per month billed yearly per editor
Zeplin
Score 7.5 out of 10
N/A
Zeplin, from the company of the same name, is a platform supporting collaboration in application development by engineers and designers by providing an API with popular collaboration, development and prototyping tools and creating a space where productions can be shared and reviewed.
$15
per month
Pricing
Sketch
Zeplin
Editions & Modules
Standard Subscription
$10
per month billed yearly per editor
Standard Subscription
$12
per month per editor
Mac-only license
$12
per seat
Business Subscription
$22
per month billed yearly per editor
Free
$0
up to 1 project
Advanced
$15
per month per seat (up to 50 projects)
Basic
$15
per month per project
Enterprise
Contact sales team
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
Sketch
Zeplin
Free Trial
No
Yes
Free/Freemium Version
No
Yes
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
No
No
Entry-level Setup Fee
No setup fee
No setup fee
Additional Details
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More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
Sketch
Zeplin
Considered Both Products
Sketch
Verified User
Strategist
Chose Sketch
Although there's a lot of overlap, we use these different platforms for different purposes. InVision allows us to create more robust prototypes, Zeplin is a better tool for design/dev handoffs, and Marvel is great for basic wireframes. None of these tools beat Sketch when it …
Sketch had been great and improved a lot in the past, but so has Adobe. If you are going to start new, it's better to plan long term and based on needs see what suits more. Figma is relying a lot on new technologies which are not bug-free, but that may be the future of design.
Zeplin is used for us purely as a handoff tool. It keeps it clean and clear for devs and product managers what is completed. It has some good labels and other organizing features. The different levels of access are also super helpful to give the correct people the view they …
Zeplin is more focused on the handoff than in the creation itself. The other alternatives can do both, but Zeplin is an awesome tool for the handoff part. It depends in how big is your team and how the workflow is organized to understand whats the best tool for your team.
Out of all of the products that I have used to support design-to-development handoffs, Zeplin is my favorite. It’s pretty lightweight and easy to use (once you get the hang of it). Zeplin also has a smooth interface and is, generally, clearer to use than other tools, such as …
These other tools are really helpful products for creating and sharing wireframes / prototypes. However, Zeplin is the best tool for the actual hand off between the design and development teams once the design is actually ready to share. Zeplin fills this gap and improves the …
Zeplin is a really nice lightweight app, that is easier to use than InVision for sharing purposes. InVision does primarily handle prototyping, which Zeplin does not do. Abstract is my product of choice but is also a slightly different tool — almost a GitHub for design. It …
Here’s the proofread version: Sketch is a simple and lightweight tool for vector graphics, ideal for individuals. I would recommend it to anyone working alone on design tasks such as UI or website design. I have started and completed many projects in Sketch, ranging from simple websites to complex automotive UIs with extensive libraries.
I still have some issues, especially with color integration between the style guide and also project. When we update the colors, it's not automatically sync to every project. Aside from that, zeplin solves my problem for hand-off design from design to developer. I set zeplin is source of truth design file
Sketch is great for drawing and creating shapes, like buttons or icons. It lets you adjust every curve and line perfectly, so you can make your designs look exactly how you want. (All design tools can do that, though).
Sketch is built just for Apple computers, so it runs smoothly and uses all the special Mac features. If you’re already using Apple tools, Sketch feels like a natural fit. (The downside of this is that non-Apple users can't use it.)
If you make something, like a button, and need it in many places, Sketch lets you save it as a "Symbol." You can use it repeatedly, and if you change the Symbol, it updates everywhere automatically. (Figma can do this too.)
Ease in automatically building design style guides, saving time that might be spent on building style guides in another tool (such as InDesign).
Users can use Mac, PC, or web versions of this app to collaborate on a single project, enabling us to work with a wider pool of contractors.
Accelerates the design-to-development workflow, as it’s very easy to import Sketch or Photoshop files through plug-ins, and HTML/CSS codes are automatically created based on designs.
Provides cross-platform specifications for web, iOS, and Android, which can save developers time in figuring out specifications beyond the “main platform" on their own.
The software can be buggy right after a release. It appears that they do very little QA testing right after releasing a new version
The software can crash a lot. And when it does, I continuously have issues with it reloading my plugins.
Only available for Mac. If you have a cross platform team, it may not be the best.
Lack of features in the software, so you will have to use plugins for those additional features (Designs system management, accessibility, repository and live collaboration without paying a premium)
Sketch is a core tool for us and the cost to keep it going with our teams is low. It provides a good alternative to other screen design tools for our team members who prefer to use it.
At the end of the day, it's just simple. This goes a long way in design and goes even further when your talking productivity, intuitive design and turnover rate. It's not difficult to figure something out even if it's not something your directly familiar with, i.e. if you want to export in certain file formats or change the size of the canvas, you don't have to delay your end product trying to figure it out. Similar situations took me less than 30 seconds to solve without a Google search. That's Usability.
Zeplin's component management and style guide help us to be consistent across whole product and it so easy to use for non-technical person. It is now easy to collaboration for designes between different teams like stackholders, product owner, UI/UX, developers and testers. Now there is only one point of reference is Zeplin so it is so easy to get details without asking designer or developer again and again.
The support is relatively decent, and they are quick to respond. However, their releases are not great. Sketch could use more robust testing of their software before releases. Over the last four years, I have had many days lost while waiting for Sketch to patch issues with their releases. It's actually a running joke in our office. So, support, good. Releases in the first place? Not great.
Zeplin has classic support with a chat from the website. It's working fine, and we're also getting the support needed when needed. However, Zeplin is very good at closing the incidents and moving on. It was a while ago we had a case with their support so that it might have improved since then.
Sketch's approachable UI allowed those using outdated technologies to transition efficiently. Among its peers, Sketch performs comparably with most prototyping tools. It falls behind compared to those that can better handle movement, like InVision Studio, which combines animation and prototyping into a single platform. However, these types of programs have a steep learning curve, whereas Sketch is approachable immediately.
Zeplin is great to inspect and share user interfaces, specifications and assets, perfect for developers. Tools like InVision and Marvel are much better to create prototypes for both developers, coworkers and even stakeholders, but they don't have this kind of feature (inspection) as Zeplin does. So each of them can be used for different purposes, offering different approaches to share and interact with layouts for apps and websites.
Saved time -- Intuitive interface saves us lots of time/money because it is reliable and easy to use. Other programs have caused serious confusion, leading to project delays.
More captivating wireframes -- Stakeholders have been finding it easier to visualize potential “final products” with vector-based Sketch designs. Because of this, we’ve been able to have more targeted, focused discussions that lead to improved final products (with fewer immediate post-launch revisions!).
Increased productivity -- Because Sketch is so easy to use, our designers have had more time to do more work. Rather than finagling difficult tools in previously used products, our designers feel no hesitation with Sketch, and are producing more often and more creatively.
Development time has reduced as the design updates are communicated in real time to developers and they don't have to write the boilerplate code as it's already generated.
Employee engagement has improved as every stakeholder is aware about the design changes from the beginning and can give their inputs.
Designers save a lot of time as they don't to explicitly communicate when the update or publish their designs and also it just takes a couple of clicks to publish their designs. Also, lot of rework is saved as every stakeholder is involved right from the beginning.
