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Changelog

All updates and improvements

v3.7.0

LatestJune 13, 2026

Reusable Components & a Sharper Studio

Components land in Efecto the React way: turn any selection into a master, drop instances anywhere, and edit the master once to update them all — exports inline the real markup, not empty divs. Text layers now edit like Figma (the box grows and shrinks as you type), Jules stopped looping and runs redesigns on Opus 4.8, free accounts get a real taste of Jules before paying, and a top-to-bottom consistency pass made the whole studio denser and calmer.

  • Reusable components — turn any selection into a component, then insert instances from the new Components tab in the layers panel. Edit the master in an isolation view and every instance updates live, the way React components actually work. Detach an instance back to plain layers anytime (CMP-00)feature
  • Exports include component content — Copy Code, Open in v0, and ZIP now expand instances into real markup instead of empty divs, with per-instance overrides appliedfeature
  • A free taste of Jules — signed-in free accounts get 8 Sonnet prompts plus 1 Opus build before any paywall, so you can design with the AI before deciding to payfeature
  • Latest Claude models — the model picker now runs Opus 4.8, Sonnet 4.6, and Haiku 4.5feature
  • Alt+hover measurements — hold Alt and hover any element to measure spacing to that specific element, not just nearest neighbors. The contextual toolbar fades so the labels stay readablefeature
  • Editable text spans — AI-built headings with inline accent or mixed-size words keep every span as its own editable layer. Click a word to edit just that word, and the layers panel names spans by their contentfeature
  • Pixel-art loaders — new pixel-art sprites (jellyfish, invader, ghost) join the loading spinner pool alongside the original abstract onesfeature
  • Studio consistency pass — one density and type scale across panels, menus, and floating toolbars: 32px rows, unified section labels, and consistent ⌘ shortcut notation everywhere. The whole tool reads tighter and more professional (SUI-01, SUI-02)improvement
  • Brand system polish — brand templates now appear in the Components tab to click or drag in, CSS and Tailwind exports include your mono font, AI generation validates its output before saving, and copy throughout is clearerimprovement
  • Jules stays on task — fixed a loop where Jules re-read the canvas over and over instead of designing; full redesigns now route to Opus 4.8 for the best results (JUL-05)improvement
  • Faster canvas — panning and zooming no longer re-render the layer tree every frame, so heavy artboards stay smoothimprovement
  • Jules composer grows up to 10 lines as you type, with a hairline scrollbar past thatimprovement
  • Layers panel tabs aligned with the inspector for a consistent headerimprovement
  • Text layers edit like Figma — the box grows as you add lines and shrinks as you remove them, in real time, and line breaks persistfix
  • Artboard layout reliability — fixed-size artboards stay fixed (1080×1080 social squares no longer collapse to content), the inspector reports real frame sizes, Fill and Hug behave predictably, and clipped content shows a clear cue (SZF-10)fix
  • Canvas padding drag — fixed a stuck pointer and an inverted drag direction when adjusting padding on the canvasfix
  • Make Component no longer crashes when created from multiple nodes, and fixed a ghost-insert bug in the components flowfix

v3.6.0

May 28, 2026

Animation, Video Export & Your Own Models

Efecto moves. A native animation timeline lets you keyframe motion on any artboard — 42 presets, an easing picker, text that staggers by word or character — then export the whole thing to video. Bring-your-own-key lands too: drop in your Anthropic or OpenAI key and design with your own models, off the usage meter. Figma import got a fidelity pass (paste any file/page/frame URL, absolute positions and SVG shapes survive), FX now applies to image, video, and frame layers, the brand Fonts tab became a real typography editor, and you can export to PDF and multi-scale images. Underneath: a faster canvas, leaner Jules threads, and a more honest MCP.

Efecto — robots and designers animating and shipping together in a glowing late-night studio
  • Animation timeline — author motion on any artboard. Drop in keyframed presets, scrub the playhead, hit play. Built on the Web Animations API so it runs at native frame rates (ANIM-23)feature
  • 42 animation presets — fade, scale, slide, blur, tilt, spin, bounce, pop, plus mask-based reveals (iris, linear, and diagonal wipes), and an -out for every -infeature
  • Easing picker with thumbnails — 12 curves including spring and the back/quad family, previewed as little motion graphs so you pick by feelfeature
  • Text stagger — animate a heading by block, line, word, or character. Per-token delays derive automaticallyfeature
  • Export to video — render an animated artboard to MP4 (H.264, up to 4K60) or WebM (VP9). Three quality tiers, 24 / 30 / 60 fps, optional looping, cancellable mid-export. Triggered from the timeline or the Settings tabfeature
  • Jules animates too — the AI authors motion natively: list presets, apply an animation plan across nodes, or clear it all. Same timeline you edit by handfeature
  • Bring your own key — add your Anthropic or OpenAI key and design with your own models. Pick from Claude (Opus 4.7, Sonnet 4.6, Haiku 4.5) or GPT (4o, 4-turbo, 4, 3.5) right in the chat composerfeature
  • Model picker — two groups in chat: Efecto AI on platform credits, or Your keys billed to your own account. Your-key chats skip the usage limits entirelyfeature
  • Keys live in your browser only — stored in localStorage, sent per request, never saved on our servers and never logged. The upgrade modal now offers 'use your own key' as an escape hatchimprovement
  • Paste any Figma URL — file, page, or frame. Efecto routes you to the right place: a file picker for bare files, a page picker for multi-page files, or straight into import for a frame linkfeature
  • Frame picker — lazy-loaded thumbnails, searchable by name, ordered the way they sit on the Figma canvas. Batch-import several at once with per-frame progress, cancellable mid-runfeature
  • Figma fidelity pass — absolute-positioned layers stay absolute instead of flattening to flow, auto-layout gaps come through as real Tailwind gap, and SVG shapes import with their stroke and fill intactimprovement
  • FX on any layer — drop ASCII, dither, halftone, glitch, or art effects onto image, video, and frame layers, not just shader nodes. Same effect catalog, same post-process stack (scanlines, bloom, grain, vignette…)feature
  • FX moved to its own inspector tab — effect-family picker plus per-effect settings, with icons, split out from the rest of the panelimprovement
  • Dither is a first-class shader effect now — ported into the same pipeline as every other effect, so normal-layer dither matches shader-node dither 1:1improvement
  • Typography editor in your brand system — the Fonts tab sets heading, body, and mono families with live previews and 8 curated pairings. Tune the type-scale ratio with a slider and every size regeneratesfeature
  • Per-style controls — size (down to arbitrary [Npx]), weight, line-height, letter-spacing, case, and italics for each text rolefeature
  • Black, Thin, and Extra Light font weights exposed in the inspectorimprovement
  • PDF export — pick artboards, a paper size (US Letter, A4 / A5 / A3, Legal, Tabloid, B4 / B5), orientation, fit-or-fill, and margins. Or export at native artboard size. Order by slides, layers, or canvas positionfeature
  • Multi-image export presets — export PNG, WebP, or JPEG at 1x–4x and SVG at 1x. Build a preset ladder once, reuse it on every exportfeature
  • Drag to reorder artboards in the Layers panel — which also reorders your slides (POL-04)feature
  • Multi-select positioning — flip any number of nodes between Flow and Absolute in one move, from the inspector or the command palettefeature
  • Compact context — long Jules thread? Compact it to the last few messages plus a summary note, so the chat stays fast without losing the plot. Clear chat wipes a file's history outright; both ask before they act (JUL-04)feature
  • Min/Max width and height are editable inputs now, not read-onlyimprovement
  • Drag a frame onto the canvas and it promotes to a real artboardimprovement
  • Image picker stays open after you pick — swap through a few without reopening itimprovement
  • Big canvases are snappier — off-screen artboards are culled while you pan, snap candidates are cached at drag start, and label/viewport subscriptions were trimmed so unrelated changes stop re-rendering everything (PERF-01/02/03/05)improvement
  • Your viewport survives a refresh — pan and zoom restore where you left themimprovement
  • Faster, more resilient dashboard thumbnails — sized previews with a skeleton until the image loadsimprovement
  • MCP 0.9.0 — get_document takes outline, artboardId, and maxDepth so agents read a slice of a big doc instead of the whole thing, and every response reports its token cost. speakerNotes is now a first-class artboard field (SLD-11)improvement
  • Truthful MCP errors — a failed tool call now says whether the browser never paired, left, or went unresponsive, instead of a generic 'is the browser connected?'. create_session refuses to silently overwrite a live oneimprovement
  • Geist and other Google Fonts actually load now — in brand systems, design tokens, and the font picker. Arbitrary font-[Name] picks render on the canvas instead of silently doing nothingfix
  • Large Jules chats no longer 413 — the wire payload is clamped under Vercel's limit so long sessions keep sending (JUL-03)fix
  • Tailwind color alpha matches between the inspector and the rendered class — opacity is dual-written so the two never driftfix
  • Video export restores the timeline after it finishes — playhead, scale, and sync flags all return to where they werefix

v3.5.0

May 18, 2026

Slides, Code Panel & Themes

Three big surfaces and a pile of fixes. Slides turns any file into a presentation — Play opens fullscreen, Present + Control gives you presenter notes on this screen and the audience view on the other. The Code Panel lets you click any element and edit its className or inline style live, so the canvas becomes a real code editor. App-wide themes ship two looks — Efecto and Dieter Rams — that recolor every surface, not just the studio. Plus Project ZIP for full-project downloads, Comment tool that pipes notes into Jules, Figma import that finally pulls real images and vectors, and a fresh wave of GitHub, realtime, and publish polish.

Efecto — a robot and a designer working side by side at a desk in a cozy night-time studio, screens showing progress charts and code
  • Slides / Presentation mode — every artboard is a slide. Hit Play, drop into fullscreen, press → to advance. The order matches the layers panel by default; toggle to visual (y, x) order in the controller (SLD-03)feature
  • Present + Control — opens two windows. Audience view at /present/[id] on one screen, presenter controller with notes + next-slide preview on the other. Synced via BroadcastChannel so a click on one moves both (SLD-05)feature
  • Presenter notes — per-artboard speakerNotes editable from View → Presenter Notes or inside the controller. Plain text, saves with the doc (SLD-04)feature
  • Play dropdown — single toolbar entry point with Prototype / Present / Present + Control. Old Prototype button merged infeature
  • Code Panel — click any element, edit its className or inline style, watch the canvas update live. The studio is now a code editor (CODE-36)feature
  • Contextual toolbar shortcut — open the Code Panel from the floating toolbar above any selection. No menu trip (CODE-37)feature
  • App-wide theme styles — two named looks (Efecto and Dieter Rams) that retheme every surface: dashboard, docs, studio chrome, all of it. Picker lives in settingsfeature
  • Theme default = system — light follows your OS instead of slamming into dark. Respect the user's actual preferencefeature
  • Comment tool — drop pinned annotations on the canvas. Each one stacks into the Jules input so you can review a design as if you were a creative director, then hand the whole pile off in one promptfeature
  • Project ZIP — download the whole Next.js project (components, brand tokens, globals.css, package.json, README, image-proxy route). `pnpm install && pnpm dev` runs locally with zero edits (ZIP-01..15)feature
  • ZIP @theme inline — exported globals.css ships @theme inline so brand-utility classes resolve in Tailwind v4 (ZIP-01)feature
  • ZIP bundles remote images — Lummi / Unsplash images route through the same image-proxy in the exported project, no broken URLs (ZIP-04)feature
  • ZIP ships opengraph-image.tsx — every exported project has a working OG card scaffold (ZIP-12)feature
  • Figma import resolves real images — image fills download from Figma and upload to Vercel Blob during import, instead of going blank (FIG-09)feature
  • Figma vector + icon SVGs — vectors and icons come through as actual SVG nodes, not flattened blanks (FIG-10)feature
  • Figma named account + Switch Account — the import dialog says which Figma account you're connected with and offers Switch Account inline when a file lives under a different account (FIG-12)feature
  • Figma root-frame styles inherit onto the artboard — corner radius, shadows, and blurs from the root frame now apply to the artboard itself (FIG-13)feature
  • Import from Figma on the canvas empty state — empty file? One button to pull a frame in. No more hunting through menusfeature
  • Public file URLs that just work — toggle public_access and the bare design URL loads for everyone, no auth, no token in the link (MP-38)feature
  • Hand-off emits globals.css from your brand kit — colors, typography, radii compile into a single Tailwind v4 globals.css that the exported project consumes (HO-09)feature
  • Shadows go full Tailwind v4 in the inspector — full scale, plus text-shadow and inset-shadow as first-class options (CODE-39)improvement
  • Publish dialog polish — favicon row, clickable live URL, unified row labels, p-4 rhythm. Reads like one panel instead of three sections (PUB-05)improvement
  • Snappier nav between Home / Templates / Brand — prefetch + lighter shell, the dashboard no longer feels like a page reloadimprovement
  • Random verb captions on full-page loaders — 'wrangling', 'tuning', 'untangling' — calmer than a generic spinnerimprovement
  • Dark-mode auth hero swapped to cafe-night2 — warmer evening tone on the sign-in screenimprovement
  • Import from Figma moved to the root menu — accessible without selecting an artboard firstimprovement
  • Open PR no longer 413s on large designs — payload chunked, repo link surfaced in the popover, disconnect lives where you'd look for itfix
  • Realtime: cursor broadcasts that arrive before presence sync are buffered instead of dropped — peers no longer go invisible for a beat on joinfix
  • Realtime: awaitable flush() during teardown — last-mile broadcasts make it out before the channel closes (MP-44 final)fix
  • Open in v0 — SDK files path restored, placeholder-tab regressions fixedfix
  • Code export drops malformed style blobs from node.style and escapes JSX text — exported code compiles cleanfix
  • Studio stops deleting inline width/height on document load — sizes survive a refreshfix
  • Share dialog truncates long user names — no more rows that blow out the layoutfix
  • AI no longer leaves literal 'Text' placeholders and stops wrapping heading text in spansfix
  • Handbook sidebar — right border removed on /wiki + /roadmap so the panel reads as one surfacefix

v3.4.0

May 12, 2026

Multiplayer + Hand-off

The biggest collaboration pass since multiplayer launched. Real names and avatars on every cursor, press / for quick chat, Cmd+Shift+1..9 for floating reactions, follow mode by clicking a peer's avatar, Pull everyone here for presenter snaps, Jump to peer for one-shot teleports, and a live-typing composer where the input IS the message. Then ship: download as ZIP, publish to Vercel, open as a PR on GitHub, or send to v0 — all without leaving the file. The dashboard got universal search with design thumbnails, and Efecto now has a public roadmap at /roadmap so you can see what's next.

Efecto — a robot and a designer collaborating on a blueprint titled "Idea Lab v3" in a cozy spacecraft workshop
  • Real names on multiplayer cursors — peers now show your actual display name, not a generated handle (MP-01)feature
  • Avatar images on cursors + collaborator toolbar — see who's in the file at a glance (MP-02)feature
  • Quick chat — press / near your cursor and type. Bubbles float above the pointer for everyone in the file (MP-03)feature
  • Live-typing composer — the input IS the message. Peers see each keystroke as you type, no Send button required (MP-31)feature
  • Floating reactions — Cmd/Ctrl+Shift+1..9 drops a reaction at your cursor. Travels with you across the canvas (MP-04)feature
  • Follow mode — click any peer's avatar to spectate their viewport. Wheel or pan-drag to exit (MP-06, MP-13)feature
  • Pull everyone here — presenter snap that brings every peer's viewport to yours in one click (MP-07, renamed from 'Bring everyone here')feature
  • Jump to peer — one-shot teleport to a peer's current view without entering follow mode (MP-33)feature
  • Anonymous viewer doc-sync — mutations now reach view-only peers without auth. Public files stay live for guests (MP-27)feature
  • Deterministic peer colors — same hash for every receiver, so 'the green pointer' is the same person on every screen (MP-08)improvement
  • Pan + zoom no longer kills cursors — viewport moved off presence onto broadcast (MP-28)improvement
  • Per-peer receive throttle for chat, reactions, and summon — keeps a noisy peer from drowning out the room (MP-09)improvement
  • Awareness channel hardening — public-channel mode, CLOSED-status retry, single-bind broadcast listener, rename-aware follow toasts (MP-21, MP-23, MP-25, MP-30)improvement
  • Hand-off side panel — one surface for all four ship paths: ZIP, Publish to Vercel, Open as PR, Send to v0 (HO-03)feature
  • Project ZIP packager — download the full project (components, tokens, package.json, README) and `npm run dev` locally (HO-02)feature
  • Publish to Vercel — wire Efecto to Vercel directly from the studio. Live URL in one click (HO-04)feature
  • Open as PR — push your design to a real branch on GitHub and open a pull request without leaving Efecto (HO-06)feature
  • Repo + branch comboboxes — pick the repo and branch your PR targets, with autocomplete and 'create new repo' inline (HO-14, HO-17)feature
  • v0 chats.init({ files }) — sending a design to v0 now ships the full file tree, not just a pasted snippet (HO-05)feature
  • Prettier-formatted JSX export — code dropping out of Efecto is now formatted like a human wrote it (HO-01)improvement
  • Friendlier GitHub connect onboarding — clearer copy, actionable error links, surface 503s inline, security hardening (HO-07, plus polish PRs)improvement
  • Open in v0 routes chats to your own v0 account — no more shared anonymous chatsimprovement
  • Public roadmap at /roadmap — one page, one source of truth. Search, filter by status, collapse notes, deep-link to anythingfeature
  • Internal /wiki handbook — Roadmap/Wiki tab nav, sidebar, scrollspy. The Efecto playbook in one URLfeature
  • Universal search — Cmd+K across designs, templates, brand systems, and docs. Design thumbnails come straight from IndexedDBfeature
  • Dashboard restructured around design — your designs lead, FX is demoted to its own sectionfeature
  • OG metadata at publish — title, description, share image, and favicon baked into the published filefeature
  • Private-file landing UX — friendly robot illustration instead of falling through to the Acme template (MP-36)feature
  • On-canvas drag handles — drag padding, gap, and border-radius directly on the artboard, no inspector trip neededfeature
  • Resize hardening pass — one inspector W/H per node mode, axis-scoped grow clear, flex container detection tightened, NaN guards (SIZE001..SIZE005)improvement
  • Studio chrome tokenized end-to-end — light-mode chrome obeys the design system, no hardcoded grays leftimprovement
  • Cmd+. now actually toggles sidebars — was bound but didn't fireimprovement
  • Smoother UI — press-scale + popover open/close zoom removed for a calmer feelimprovement
  • Brand empty-state icon shrunk + zoom HUD spacing tightenedimprovement
  • Studio artboard background respects theme tokens — no more flash of the wrong color on theme switchfix
  • Chat input strips Unicode bidi + zero-width characters — pasted formatting tricks no longer survive into the canvas (MP-11)fix
  • Realtime perms no longer refetch on every URL slug change — fewer spurious permission flickers in long sessionsfix
  • FX media object-fit + zoom-out now produce a true letterbox — no stretched fillsfix
  • Spacing-handles rAF loop drops forced layouts — smoother drag while sizingfix

v3.3.0

May 5, 2026

Instagram Carousels, 9 New Templates & Brand System

Efecto crosses into social. Three Instagram carousel starters ship today (each 9 slides, light + dark, ready to fork) on a new social-media template kind that knows about platform sizes, slide counts, and multi-artboard layout. Six new landing templates round out the 2026 trend slate — terminal brutalism, riso zines, soft maximalism, bento dashboards. And Brand Kit became Brand System everywhere — same idea, sharper name, every preset now ships distinct light + dark tokens.

Efecto — Instagram carousel templates: ig-statement, ig-studio, ig-zine, plus 6 new landing templates
  • Social-media template kind — templates can be carousels now, not just landing pages. Discriminator on meta union (`landing | social | poster | deck | document`) with platform, slide count, and slide dimensions baked infeature
  • ig-statement — Instagram carousel, 9 slides, founder voice. Anton condensed + Inter Tight on cream + safety orange. Hook · story · twist · stat · framework · proof · action · manifesto · CTAfeature
  • ig-studio — Instagram carousel, 9 slides, minimal monochrome studio intro. Fraunces italic + Inter Tight on off-white. Cover · about · services · process · work · testimonial · availability · manifesto · contactfeature
  • ig-zine — Instagram carousel, 9 slides, tabloid magenta trend report. Archivo Black + Inter Tight on plum + hot magenta. Cover · hook · 3× listicle · photo · spread · manifesto · CTAfeature
  • Slide dimension presets — every common platform size baked in (IG square / portrait / story, TikTok cover, Pinterest pin, Twitter card, LinkedIn slide, YouTube thumb, Facebook cover)feature
  • Template gallery groups by kind — Landing pages and Social media sections. Cards adapt aspect ratio (landing 3:2, social 4:5) and show slide count badgesfeature
  • kernel — terminal core / dev brutalism. JetBrains Mono everywhere, ASCII borders, neon-green accent. SaaS · AI · Startupfeature
  • aero — refined editorial studio. Instrument Serif italic, single magenta spot accent, cream paper. Studio · Agency · AIfeature
  • konkret — brutalist Swiss. Inter Tight 800, harsh grid, safety orange, b&w industrial photography. Studio · Designer · Agencyfeature
  • paloma — risograph zine. DM Serif italic + Atkinson Hyperlegible, riso-pink overprint, halftone grain. Studio · Blog · Designerfeature
  • prism — bento dashboard. Bricolage Grotesque, mixed col-span tiles, mock-UI inside cards. SaaS · AI · Productfeature
  • mochi — soft maximalist Gen-Z. Familjen Grotesk, lower-case copy, sticker collage, pastel palette. DTC · Beauty · Wellness · Lifestylefeature
  • Brand Kit is now Brand System — renamed across every user-facing surface (sidebar, dialogs, dashboard, studio, docs). Same architecture, sharper namefeature
  • Every Brand System preset now ships distinct light + dark tokens — no more flat-inverted dark mode. Each preset carries hand-tuned theme pairsfeature
  • Templates render through a real HTML preview route — banners and slide thumbnails captured from the live render, not hand-mocked PNGsfeature
  • All template imagery mirrored to public/ via Lummi — Unsplash hot-linking dropped. `pnpm check:public-imagery` enforces it. Fewer broken images, cleaner license trailfeature
  • Dialog now ships an outside close-button variant — for full-bleed dialogs where an inset X would compete with contentfeature
  • Unified BaseHeader — AppHeader, DocsHeader, AnglesHeader, /canvas, and /fx all route through one header primitive. One padding, one rhythm, one place to fix anythingimprovement
  • Softer chrome across sidebars and topbars — default elevation dropped on form + chrome primitives, border-border token replaces hardcoded grays, top-nav padding tightened to px-3improvement
  • Hardcoded grays replaced with theme tokens across studio + admin surfaces — light-mode chrome now obeys the design system end-to-endimprovement
  • Home polish — wider HomeContent, 3-column templates grid, subtler Recent thumbnails, tighter sidebar gaps and typography. Verbose subtitles dropped on /template and /brandimprovement
  • Template card refactored — preview thumbnail leads, icon buttons replace word labels, snappier hover transitions, subtler border treatment that matches the dashboardimprovement
  • Template detail pages reuse the app shell — same header and width as the rest of home. Tighter detail layout, top-aligned card thumbnailsimprovement
  • Social template preview chrome polished — preview route reads like a real Instagram post, not a screenshot harnessimprovement
  • PillButton + PillFrame extracted from brand-system-controls — shared across studio surfacesimprovement
  • ContextMenuShell extracted from interaction-overlay — easier to reuse and reason aboutimprovement
  • Captured artboard thumbnails now preserve the artboard background instead of rendering on a transparent canvasfix
  • Dashboard sidebar controls fixed — buttons no longer drift out of alignment on narrow viewportsfix
  • Inkwell template — drop-cap layout, responsive archive grid, and mono font load all correctedfix

v3.2.0

April 28, 2026

Templates, Unified Home & Contextual Toolbar

Start from a real design instead of a blank artboard — pick from 12 hand-built templates spanning portfolios, cafes, SaaS, AI studios, editorial, and more. The home page got a single shell across /dashboard, /template, and /brand so switching views feels like one app, not three. And every selection now floats its own toolbar — text, frame, button, image, icon — with the right controls in reach.

Efecto — 12 landing-page templates: Atelier, Aura, Bayou, Inkwell, Florence, Lumen, Pulp, Dispatch, Studio Nord, Onda, Quill, Vector
  • 12 landing-page templates — Atelier (photo portfolio), Aura (beauty), Bayou (cafe), Dispatch (newsletter), Florence (designer portfolio), Inkwell (editorial), Lumen (AI studio), Onda (object store), Pulp (cold-press cafe), Quill (design agency), Studio Nord (design studio), Vector (SaaS)feature
  • Template gallery at /template — browse, preview, and fork. Detail pages are SEO-friendly and prerenderedfeature
  • One-click fork — "Use this template" duplicates the file into your dashboard so you can edit safely without touching the sourcefeature
  • Light + dark variants on every template — designs ship with proper theme tokens, not just inverted colorsfeature
  • Each template ships with its own brand kit — colors, typography, identity. Apply, fork, or remixfeature
  • Unified home shell — /dashboard (Recent), /template (Templates), and /brand (Brand Kits) now share one sidebar, one header, one width. Switching feels like one app instead of threefeature
  • Sidebar Search — ⌘K opens the start dialog from any home viewfeature
  • Contextual toolbar — a single floating toolbar appears above your selection. Text, frame, button, image, and icon nodes each get their own controls in reachfeature
  • Text controls — color, size, alignment, bold/italic/underline/strikethrough, and link, all live-value swatches that show the current state at a glancefeature
  • Frame controls — fill, border (color + width + radius), and padding (uniform or per-side) without opening the inspectorfeature
  • Button, image, and icon controls — variant, object-fit, opacity, color, size — picked up from the right node type automaticallyfeature
  • Remove fill / remove border buttons — clear properties in one click instead of digging through the inspectorfeature
  • AI working indicators on artboards — see exactly which artboard agents are touching while they buildfeature
  • Contextual toolbar reuses inspector sections — color picker, border, link, and spacing controls share one implementation, so they look and behave identically everywhereimprovement
  • Properties panel padding toggle layout refined — cleaner per-side editingimprovement
  • Spacing side controls shared across studio surfacesimprovement
  • Animated team avatars in the agent panelimprovement
  • Light-mode border color softened from oklch(0.88) to oklch(0.93) — bordered elements no longer feel heavier than the surrounding chromefix
  • Solid fill controls placed below tabs in the contextual toolbar (was overlapping)fix
  • Contextual toolbar popovers softened — less visual weight on hoverfix
  • Chat markdown message font size normalizedfix
  • Jules agent message font size normalizedfix
  • New team creation in settings now persists correctlyfix
  • Team review action loop no longer gets stuck mid-revisionfix
  • Design CLI sessions bind to documents correctlyfix
  • SSE bridge connects without waiting for documentRolefix
  • Upstash env vars are trimmed of whitespace to prevent UrlError on connectfix

v3.1.0

April 19, 2026

Team Memory & You

Agents ship better work when they know what's landed before. v3.1 gives your team shared memory (brand guidelines, project decisions, past critique) and a sense of who you're designing for via the new About You profile. Everything syncs to the cloud so your team's context travels with your account.

  • Team Memory — shared brand, user, and project knowledge the swarm reads before every buildfeature
  • Team Memory panel — view, edit, and curate what your team remembers. Facts, decisions, preferences, and the why behind themfeature
  • Automatic memory extraction — agents pick up facts from chat as you design. No manual entry requiredfeature
  • About You profile — tell agents who you are, what you build, and who your work is for. Persona flows into every promptfeature
  • About You form — fill it once and every agent knows your context going forwardfeature
  • Cloud sync for memory + profile — context follows you across devices. IndexedDB stays as the local fast path; Supabase keeps the canonical copyfeature
  • Shared agent identities — custom Pixabot IDs now propagate consistently through chat, the team panel, and swarm outputfeature
  • @designteam/core integration — agent roster, personalities, and skill content consumed from the shared npm package. Your Efecto team and the standalone Design Team app speak the same languageimprovement
  • Button press feedback — subtle scale on mouse click, respects reduced-motion, skips the effect on touch devicesimprovement
  • Tooltips and dropdowns scale from the trigger edge, not the center — smoother, more physical feelimprovement
  • Chat message typography normalized to text-xs — cleaner, denser, easier to scan long threadsimprovement
  • Panel edge padding tightened from 16px to 8px — more canvas, less frameimprovement
  • Changelog timeline no longer extends past the final entryfix
  • Feedback dialog link field now points to /design (was /canvas, pre-rename)fix

v3.0.0

April 16, 2026

Agent Teams & Web Search

The biggest AI update since Jules launched. Instead of one assistant, you now get a whole team — creative director, designers, copywriter, researcher — each with their own personality, emotions, and memory. They critique each other's work, build in parallel, and learn from every session. Plus agents can now search the web and you can attach images to your prompts.

A human and two robots eating ice cream together at a table
  • Agent Teams — toggle "Use a team" in the chat to launch a multi-agent design crew that works in parallelfeature
  • 16 specialist roles — Creative Director, UX Designer, UX Writer, Graphic Designer, Editorial Designer, Social Media Designer, Motion Designer, Print Designer, Design Engineer, Copywriter, Content Strategist, Researcher, Brand Strategist, Marketing Strategist, SEO Specialist, and Accessibility Specialistfeature
  • Parallel swarm execution — agents build simultaneously on separate artboards, not one after another. Dependencies auto-schedule.feature
  • 4-phase pipeline — research → build → revise → polish, with the Creative Director coordinating critiques and directionfeature
  • Living state — each agent has 5 emotions (energy, confidence, enthusiasm, frustration, inspiration), XP that grows over sessions, and persistent memoryfeature
  • Personality system — 5 trait axes with a 25-point budget. Pick from presets like Bold Pioneer or Meticulous Craftsman, or dial in your own mixfeature
  • Inter-agent messaging — agents send critique, handoff, review, and direction messages to each other during the buildfeature
  • Team presets — curated team compositions for single-page sites, multi-page projects, social campaigns, and brand workfeature
  • Auto-assemble — describe your task and Efecto picks the right team composition automaticallyfeature
  • Revision with conviction — agents respond to Creative Director critiques but defend choices they believe infeature
  • Peer awareness — agents can see what other agents are building and coordinate in real timefeature
  • Agent panel redesign — see each agent's mood, XP bar, emotion levels, personality traits, and skills at a glancefeature
  • Web search — agents can search the web during design tasks for reference, inspiration, and current informationfeature
  • File attachments — attach images to your AI chat prompts as visual reference (up to 5MB, auto-compressed)feature
  • Memory extraction — agents remember past sessions and learn from experience. Memories persist in IndexedDB with optional Supabase cloud syncfeature
  • Emotion detection — mood shifts tracked during design work and reflected in agent behavior and prompt stylefeature
  • New + button in chat input — popover with team toggle, web search, and file attach optionsfeature
  • Upgrade modal redesign — ice cream illustration, Efecto logo, cleaner layoutfeature
  • Agent Teams documentation — full architecture guide at efecto.app/docsimprovement
  • Docs updated across all pages for v0 export, web search, agent teams, and brand system featuresimprovement
  • 90+ new tests covering swarm execution, emotion detection, personality interactions, and team assemblyimprovement
  • Team mode gated to Pro/Max tier with proper upgrade flowimprovement
  • Swarm stability — 4-phase pipeline runs reliably with crash guards, prompt boundaries, and usage loggingfix
  • Builder agents actually call design tools now instead of describing what they'd dofix
  • Artboard isolation — each agent works on their own artboard without stepping on othersfix
  • Image uploads accept up to 5MB with client-side compression before sendingfix
  • SSE validation and accessibility improvements across the agent team panelfix

v2.5.0

April 1, 2026

Brand System, v0 Export & Sound Design

A massive design infrastructure drop. Build a full brand system — colors, typography, moodboard, component library — and let the AI enforce it as you design. Export any artboard to v0.app as React + Tailwind. Every studio interaction now has sound. Shaders from FX are in the design tool. New typography controls, redesigned fill system, collapsible layers, and 8 LICA-informed design skills.

Efecto — Brand System, v0 Export & Sound Design
  • Brand System — complete design infrastructure with brand systems, moodboards, AI compliance audits, component library, and template systemfeature
  • Brand editor — full visual editor with tabs for colors, typography, imagery, identity, and moodboard. Edit without leaving your filefeature
  • 8 starter brand presets — each with unique logos, font pairings, color palettes, and curated imageryfeature
  • Moodboard — 12-column CSS grid layout with logo, typography samples, color palette, brand photos, and badgesfeature
  • Brand violations — real-time design linting in the properties panel, like ESLint for design. "Fix with Jules" button auto-repairs issuesfeature
  • Public brand portals — shareable pages where anyone can download your CSS, Tailwind config, and Figma tokens without logging infeature
  • WCAG contrast matrix — accessibility scores for all brand color pairsfeature
  • Color tuner — global hue, saturation, and brightness adjustments with Cmd+Z undofeature
  • Cross-mode color sync — brand colors auto-derive dark and light counterpartsfeature
  • AI brand enforcement — audit_brand_compliance MCP tool with auto-fix. 17 new brand-related MCP tools (64 total)feature
  • Brand components — save, browse, and insert branded components from the sidebarfeature
  • Open in v0 — export any artboard or selection as React + Tailwind and open it in v0.app. Available from menubar, export dialog, and right-click menusfeature
  • Sound design — Web Audio synth for 14 interaction types. Musical progressions for undo/redo, scrubbing tones, color picker Kaoss pad, celebration chimesfeature
  • Drag between artboards — move nodes across artboards with automatic coordinate conversionfeature
  • Shaders in design tool — brought shader effects from FX with per-effect settings controlsfeature
  • Floating elements on the infinite canvas — place nodes outside artboardsfeature
  • Typography inspector — italic toggle, text decoration, text case, and tighter leading controlfeature
  • Text-shadow for text nodes, box-shadow for frames — with full inspector controlsfeature
  • Collapsible layers panel + separate floating chat panel — layers and Jules no longer fight for spacefeature
  • search_images MCP tool — AI agents can search Lummi stock photos during designfeature
  • 8 LICA design skills — business card, resume, flyer, menu, infographic, invitation, newsletter, and document. Context-aware guides for each formatfeature
  • Theme editor redesign — saved styles library and style picker dialogfeature
  • Template spotlight — inserted templates highlight on canvas so you can see exactly what was addedfeature
  • Welcome card replaces the old welcome overlay with quick-start optionsfeature
  • Custom 404 page with illustration and helpful actionsfeature
  • Celebration moments — tiny confetti and chimes on publish, save, and other milestonesfeature
  • Skills.sh installation — run `npx skills add pablostanley/efecto-plugin` for one-command setup across Claude Code, Cursor, and moreimprovement
  • Homepage refresh — tighter copy, better CTAs, social proof section, scroll-based product benefitsimprovement
  • Docs overhaul — better search, restructured navigation, AI-discoverable metadata, setup guides for Cursor, Windsurf, Copilot, Codex, and Gemini CLIimprovement
  • Layers panel context menu now matches the canvas context menu — same actions everywhereimprovement
  • MCP tool count up to 64 with Brand System docs page and updated tool referenceimprovement
  • Fill system redesign — Figma-style color picker, clear fill, opacity slider, and consistent UIfix
  • Flex child resize, padding side edits, and inspector dimension interactions all work correctlyfix
  • Font flash on reload eliminatedfix
  • Brand fonts apply to canvas immediately when changed from sidebarfix
  • Artboard inspector no longer crashes when brand system context is missingfix

v2.4.0

March 17, 2026

AI Actions, 38 Templates & Fresh Dashboard

Select anything and a quick AI menu appears — make variations, simplify, or rethink your design in one click. The command palette now suggests smart actions based on what you've selected, and you can ask Jules anything right from it. 38 new section and component templates (hero, auth, pricing, FAQ, and more) bring the total to 62. The dashboard got a full redesign with file thumbnails, actions menus, and better empty states. Plus a big wave of rendering fixes so AI-generated designs look right every time.

Efecto — AI Actions, Templates & Fresh Dashboard
  • Contextual AI menu — select anything and a robot icon appears with quick actions: make a variation, simplify it, rethink completely, or type a custom promptfeature
  • Command palette upgrade — smart suggestions based on your selection, "Ask Jules" mode for quick prompts, and all 62 templates searchable from one placefeature
  • Jules chat polish — suggestion chips to get started, animated messages, thinking indicator, inline undo after AI edits, and a cleaner inputfeature
  • AI agent avatars — when Claude, GPT, or other AI agents join your session, they show their logo in the collaborator bar and live cursorsfeature
  • Smarter model picking — Jules uses the most powerful model for blank-canvas creation, and faster models for quick editsfeature
  • 12 creative hero section templates — bold typography, gradient backgrounds, feature grids, and social proof layoutsfeature
  • 10 auth/login templates — social login, split-screen, glassmorphism, dark mode, and more creative patternsfeature
  • 16 new component templates — masonry grid, dashboard layout, timeline steps, comparison table, FAQ accordion, pricing table, testimonials, app shell, and more (62 total)feature
  • Template search — find templates by name, description, or tags directly in the templates panelfeature
  • Redesigned dashboard — file cards with hover actions menu (duplicate, rename, delete), compact time format, and cleaner metadatafeature
  • Design file thumbnails — local thumbnail previews on dashboard cards so you can see your designs at a glancefeature
  • Better empty states — canvas shows a launcher with quick-start options, Jules chat is visible to all users (gated on send), and every empty panel has helpful recovery actionsfeature
  • Inline artboard renaming — double-click any artboard name to rename it directly on the canvasfeature
  • Auto-repair for AI designs — Jules can now clean up its own work in one pass: fix spacing, colors, touch targets, and missing contentfeature
  • Custom CSS variables — the theme system now supports your own custom properties beyond the built-in color tokensfeature
  • Design API — formal OpenAPI spec for all design endpoints, MCP updated to v0.5.0 with smarter search and navigationfeature
  • Jules panel is taller by default and always visible alongside layers — no more switching tabsimprovement
  • Quick-start prefills the prompt instead of auto-sending, so you can edit before Jules starts workingimprovement
  • Quieter save indicator — less visual noise while you designimprovement
  • Layout components ship with background tokens for consistent theming out of the boximprovement
  • More reliable AI agent connections — hardened the bridge between MCP agents and the browserimprovement
  • Onboarding emails rewritten — clearer steps, more actionable, less jargonimprovement
  • AI-generated designs render correctly — gradients, filters, transforms, and backdrop effects that were invisible before now show up as expectedfix
  • AI layout and typography — spacing, padding, and font sizes from Jules now apply correctly instead of being silently droppedfix
  • Jules no longer defaults to gradients everywhere — cleaner, more intentional color choicesfix
  • Jules no longer loops — execution caps and stop signals prevent runaway AI editsfix
  • Opening a design always loads the right file — fixed a race condition that could show the wrong projectfix
  • Recent files sort correctly by last-modified time on the dashboardfix
  • Empty state buttons are clickable again — no longer hidden behind the canvas overlayfix
  • FX posters no longer silently deleted during cleanupfix
  • AI agent sessions connect instantly — no more dead zone when pairing MCP agents to the browserfix

v2.3.0

March 12, 2026

Icons, Links & Smarter AI

Browse 9,000+ icons from Phosphor, Lucide, Heroicons, and Radix with a visual picker and search. Link any element to URLs, pages, sections, emails, or phone numbers. Responsive Tailwind classes now resolve per-artboard width, so mobile and desktop layouts render correctly side-by-side. Jules gets design quality rules and a new audit tool, plus 10 MCP improvements driven by real-world agent testing.

Efecto — Icons, Links & Smarter AI
  • Multi-library icon support — 9,000+ icons from Phosphor (6 weights), Lucide, Heroicons (3 variants), and Radix, rendered as real SVGs via server-side Iconifyfeature
  • Icon tool in the toolbar — click or press O to draw icons directly on the canvas, just like frames and textfeature
  • Visual icon picker — search, browse, and switch between icon libraries with live SVG previews in a popover gridfeature
  • Icon inspector controls — change icon, library, weight, and size from the properties panel with smart cross-library fallbackfeature
  • Link any element — attach URL, page, section, email, or phone links to any node (not just <a> tags), with a new Settings tab in the inspectorfeature
  • Page links navigate between artboards in browser preview mode, section links scroll to anchor targetsfeature
  • Artboard-aware responsive classes — sm:, md:, lg:, xl:, 2xl: Tailwind prefixes now resolve based on artboard width, so a 375px artboard shows mobile styles even next to a 1440px desktop artboardfeature
  • Design quality rules — Jules now follows measurable design foundations: 5-size type scale, 2-stop weight contrast, 4pt spatial grid, and morefeature
  • audit_design MCP tool — programmatic design validation that checks typography, color usage, spacing, WCAG contrast ratios, touch targets, and layout monotonyfeature
  • Placeholder images — use src="placeholder" to mock layouts with visible colored rectangles showing alt textfeature
  • Advanced node search — find_nodes gains hasClass, tag, and styleContains filters for precise queriesfeature
  • Thumbnail export — export_image supports thumbnail mode (JPEG, 0.25x) and arbitrary scale values from 0.1x to 4xfeature
  • duplicate_artboard now accepts optional width/height overrides for responsive variantsfeature
  • API docs overhauled — 12 previously undocumented endpoints added (icon search, image proxy, publish, sharing, permissions, AI chat, and more) with auth requirements and error format referenceimprovement
  • Docs restructured — MCP and Claude Code split into dedicated pages with per-tool setup guides for Cursor, Windsurf, Copilot, and Gemini CLIimprovement
  • Docs SEO — AI-discoverable metadata, llms.txt rewritten for agent parsing, banner images added to Claude Code, Tools, and API pagesimprovement
  • MCP updated to v0.3.1 — new tool params, better descriptions, icon support, link property, audit_design, and section ordering guidance across all 44 toolsimprovement
  • Dashboard cleanup — theme switcher moved to user menu, Templates renamed to FX Templates, posters section clarified as FX toolimprovement
  • Billing UX improvements — all users see plan status, lifetime license holders see clear status, payment failed banners, and manage billing linksimprovement
  • AI section ordering — Jules now builds pages top-to-bottom (nav → hero → content → footer) instead of reverse orderfix
  • MCP session looping — agents no longer create endless new sessions when the browser isn't connectedfix
  • Shift+click multi-select works correctly beyond 2 siblings (previously selected the parent container)fix
  • SVG icon extraction — AI-pasted SVGs now extract icon names from Lucide/Heroicons data attributes instead of rendering as invisible divsfix
  • <br/> tags in AI content now render as actual line breaks instead of broken spansfix

v2.2.0

March 10, 2026

Publish to Vercel & Smarter Jules

Turn any artboard into a live website hosted on Vercel — free on efecto.app subdomains or connected to your own Vercel account. Jules now picks the right AI model for each task, remembers your conversation, and has new design skills for layout and typography.

Efecto — where humans and robots design together
  • Publish to Vercel — turn any artboard into a live website with one click, hosted free on *.efecto.app subdomainsfeature
  • BYO Vercel — connect your own Vercel account to publish to custom domains with your own deployment pipelinefeature
  • Smart model routing — Jules picks the right AI model for each task (powerful models for complex layouts, fast models for quick edits)feature
  • Design skills — Jules now has specialized skills for layout, typography, color, and component patternsfeature
  • Chat persistence — Jules remembers your conversation history across sessionsfeature
  • Nesting workflows — Jules can now create deeply nested component hierarchies with proper parent-child relationshipsfeature
  • Unified tier system — Free, Starter, Pro, and Max plans with clear AI usage capsfeature
  • Terms of Service and Privacy Policy pages at efecto.app/terms and efecto.app/privacyfeature
  • Getting started tutorials rewritten for beginners — clearer steps, less jargonimprovement
  • MCP sessions now start with a blank document instead of the demoimprovement
  • Better MCP tool descriptions and more forgiving JSX parsing for diverse agent stylesimprovement
  • Toolbar renders above transform handles so buttons are always clickablefix
  • Two-finger swipe on the canvas no longer triggers browser back navigationfix
  • MCP timeout regression fixed — sessions stay connected reliablyfix

v2.1.0

March 4, 2026

Real-Time Multiplayer & Color Variables

Design together in real time with live cursors and avatars, switch between light and dark modes with CSS color variables, preview artboards in a responsive viewport, and let AI agents manage your design system with new MCP theme tools.

Efecto Design — real-time multiplayer and color variables
  • Real-time multiplayer — see live cursors, avatars, and selections as collaborators edit the same document. Note: multiplayer sessions don't have auth yet, so anyone with the URL can view and edit — don't share session links with strangersfeature
  • Document sync — every mutation broadcasts between peers so changes appear instantly across all connected browsersfeature
  • MCP pairing — AI agents join multiplayer sessions, so you can watch Claude design alongside you in real timefeature
  • Multi-mode theme system — every document gets light, dark, and custom modes powered by CSS custom properties (--background, --primary, --foreground, etc.)feature
  • 8 built-in theme presets — Default, Zinc, Slate, Rose, Blue, Green, Violet, Orange — each with light + dark variantsfeature
  • Bring your own design tokens — import CSS variables from any source: your repo's globals.css, shadcn themes, Radix colors, or hand-crafted valuesfeature
  • Theme editor — visual token editor in the properties panel with live preview and a project colors pickerfeature
  • Semantic color classes — bg-primary, text-foreground, bg-muted, and friends auto-adapt when you switch themes or modesfeature
  • Frame tool — draw artboards directly on the canvas by clicking and dragging, just like Figmafeature
  • Browser preview mode — preview artboards in a live viewport with Desktop, Tablet, and Mobile breakpointsfeature
  • 4 new MCP theme tools — get_theme, set_theme (preset, CSS, or token objects), set_theme_mode, and reset_theme — bringing the MCP to 43 tools totalfeature
  • Updated MCP skill documentation — agents now use semantic theme classes instead of hardcoded colors, with guidance for importing your own design tokensfeature
  • UI component library — reusable shadcn-style components (buttons, cards, inputs, badges) available in the add-node panelfeature
  • Images auto-upload to Vercel Blob storage for reliable sharing and export across devicesimprovement
  • All 26 section templates converted to semantic theme tokens — they auto-adapt to any themeimprovement
  • Project colors integrated into the color picker for quick access to your theme paletteimprovement
  • Image export caches data when local server shuts downfix
  • Artboard name labels clamped to artboard width instead of overflowingfix
  • Inline images on root elements during export, not just descendantsfix
  • Multiplayer stability — reconnection handling, presence timing, chunked document sync, and Strict Mode compatibilityfix

v2.0.0

March 3, 2026

Efecto Design — Where Humans & Robots Design Together

The biggest release in Efecto's history. Efecto Design is a complete web-based design tool where humans and robots design together. Create artboards, add frames/text/images/buttons, lay out with flexbox, snap with smart guides, and export to code. Plus a 43-tool MCP that lets Claude Code (or any AI agent) design in real time.

Efecto Design — where humans and robots design together
  • Efecto Design — a complete web-based design tool at efecto.app/design with artboards, layers, text, images, buttons, and morefeature
  • Efecto MCP (@efectoapp/mcp) — 43 tools that let AI agents like Claude Code create and edit designs in real timefeature
  • Smart guides, snapping & distance indicators — Figma-style alignment helpers that appear as you dragfeature
  • Flexbox auto-layout — row/column direction, gap, padding, alignment, wrap, and per-child hug/fixed/fill sizingfeature
  • Code export — generate production-ready HTML or React from any artboard with one clickfeature
  • Multi-file persistence — create, rename, and switch between design files stored in IndexedDBfeature
  • Artboard-based canvas — create Desktop (1440x900), Tablet (768x1024), and Mobile (375x812) artboardsfeature
  • Rich node types — frame, text, image, button, link, icon, input, video, and componentfeature
  • Layers panel with hierarchy, drag-to-reorder, group/ungroup, and icons on hoverfeature
  • Properties inspector — edit size, position, fill, typography, border radius, opacity, and morefeature
  • Multi-selection editing — select multiple nodes and update shared properties at oncefeature
  • Alt-drag to duplicate nodes, Shift-drag to constrain to axisfeature
  • Gradient editor — solid, linear gradient, radial gradient, and image fill tabsfeature
  • Tailwind CSS styling — all nodes use Tailwind className with automatic inline style fallbacksfeature
  • Tailwind color picker with named color families and hex autocompletefeature
  • Custom font sizes and leading with nudge/drag controls in the inspectorfeature
  • Flex child controls — hug, fixed, or fill sizing independently per axis with flex-grow supportfeature
  • Absolute positioning mode for flex childrenfeature
  • Align-self overrides for individual flex childrenfeature
  • Deferred flex drag with insertion line indicatorsfeature
  • Image export — export artboards or individual nodes as PNG, JPEG, WebP, or SVGfeature
  • Component templates panel with wireframe thumbnails for quick starting pointsfeature
  • One-command MCP install — npx @efectoapp/mcp install sets up Claude Code automaticallyfeature
  • MCP session management — create sessions, connect to browser, and design in real timefeature
  • MCP tools for reading state — get_document, get_selection, list_artboards, find_nodes, get_node_treefeature
  • MCP tools for creating content — create_artboard, add_section, add_node, replace_sectionfeature
  • MCP tools for modifying — update_node, update_class, batch_update, set_fill, update_artboardfeature
  • MCP tools for organizing — move_node, duplicate_node, group_nodes, align_nodes, distribute_nodesfeature
  • MCP social media design skill — guided Instagram, Twitter, and LinkedIn content creationfeature
  • Command palette (Cmd+K) — search nodes, artboards, and actionsfeature
  • Comprehensive keyboard shortcuts — Save, Open, Toggle Sidebars, zoom, undo/redo, and morefeature
  • Floating draggable toolbar with edge snap and smooth morph transitionsfeature
  • AI chat panel with working indicator and node fade-in animationfeature
  • Animated sidebar open/close with 150ms slide transitionsfeature
  • Complete docs rewrite at efecto.app/docs — getting started guide written for AI agents and Claude Codefeature
  • Redesigned homepage with illustrated beach herofeature
  • Redesigned auth pages with cafe illustration and Google OAuth sign-infeature
  • SEO metadata across all pages with theme-aware hero imagesfeature
  • Sign-in nudges for uploads and file limits with redesigned auth dialogfeature
  • Google OAuth sign-in on login and signup pagesfeature
  • Password change and reset in account settingsfeature
  • Rebranded from Studio to Efecto across the entire codebase, docs, and MCP toolsimprovement
  • MCP backward compatibility — old studio_* tool names auto-retry as efecto_*improvement
  • Video upload limit increased to 20MB (login required)improvement
  • Switched email provider from Loops.so to Resend for better deliverabilityimprovement
  • All illustrations re-exported at higher resolution and qualityimprovement
  • Copy Code available in all context menusimprovement
  • Hard timeouts prevent blank screen if IndexedDB gets stuck on startupfix
  • IDB migration no longer blocks app startupfix
  • Cloud sync runs reliably after storage timeoutfix
  • Zoom-to-fit button no longer produces NaN when passed a MouseEventfix
  • Hero image no longer flickers during theme togglefix
  • Error boundaries and crash recovery for corrupted localStoragefix
  • Flex fill children correctly stretch across cross-axisfix
  • Hug groups stay synced to child boundsfix

v1.7.0

February 7, 2026

Jules AI, MCP Server & Text Overhaul

A massive update packed with new tools. Jules AI is an early alpha experiment that can generate poster layouts from a text prompt — designs aren't great yet, but it's a fun starting point to iterate from. Plus: MCP server for AI agents, a complete docs site, interactive text tools, auto-layout groups, and a mountain of polish.

Jules AI design assistant generating a poster layout from a text prompt
  • Jules AI (early alpha) - describe a poster and Jules takes a shot at building it. Designs still need work, but it's a fun starting point to riff onfeature
  • MCP server - any AI agent (Claude Code, Cursor, etc.) can create Efecto posters programmaticallyfeature
  • Interactive text tool - click to create point text, drag to draw text frames (like Figma)feature
  • Flex groups with auto-layout - group layers with flexbox direction, gap, padding, and alignmentfeature
  • Full documentation site at efecto.app/docs with interactive API explorerfeature
  • Animated text layers - 12 animation types including wave, typewriter, glitch, neon, and morefeature
  • Smart model selection - Sonnet 4.5 for first drafts, Haiku 4.5 for fast iterationsfeature
  • Jules uses flexbox layouts, groups, and design recipes to structure postersfeature
  • Live streaming transcript so you can watch Jules think and build in real timefeature
  • One-command MCP install - `npx efecto-mcp` sets everything up automaticallyfeature
  • MCP text animations - all 12 animation types available via MCP toolsfeature
  • MCP group support - create and manage grouped layers with auto-layout via AIfeature
  • Docs search with Cmd+K and copy-page button on every pagefeature
  • Complete effect documentation - every ASCII, dither, halftone, glitch, and art effect with parametersfeature
  • Public API - state encode/decode, validation, async image rendering, and JSON schema endpointsfeature
  • Text frame model - area text with auto-wrap and vertical alignment, separate from point textfeature
  • Centralized typography engine - single source of truth for text measurement across canvas, renderer, and APIfeature
  • Figma-style layer arrangement - drag to reorder, group/ungroup, and local-axis resize handlesfeature
  • Duotone color presets for mono halftone - choose from curated ink + paper combinationsfeature
  • Visual shape selector for halftone dots - circle, square, diamond, and line shapesfeature
  • 3:4 aspect ratio - new portrait format option across canvas, URL sharing, and APIfeature
  • 23+ new video samples added to the media libraryfeature
  • Variable font support with proper Google Fonts loadingfeature
  • Cmd+. keyboard shortcut to toggle sidebarsfeature
  • User-friendly sliders - all effect and post-process controls now show human-readable values (degrees, percentages, whole numbers)improvement
  • Editable slider values - click any slider value to type an exact numberimprovement
  • NumberInput with stepper - shift+arrow for fine control, tab between fieldsimprovement
  • Media browser performance - virtualized grids, image caching, skeleton loading, and static video thumbnailsimprovement
  • Halftone tab moved before glitch in the effect panel for better discoverabilityimprovement
  • Dither palette navigation with arrow keys and increased max point size to 20improvement
  • Glitch art blog post with tips and techniques at efecto.app/blogimprovement
  • MCP landing page at efecto.app/mcp with install instructions and docs linksimprovement
  • Animated text now handles line breaks, emojis, spaces, and special characters correctlyfix
  • Font loading race conditions resolved - fonts load reliably with proper fallbacksfix
  • URL encoding fixes - background media, text defaults, and post-process settings all persist correctlyfix
  • Better glitch defaults - Digital block opacity at 0, Weird chance at 66%, Chromatic shape squarefix
  • Panel scrollbars hidden while keeping scroll functionalityfix
  • Video play/pause race conditions and media reset on mouse move resolvedfix
  • Comprehensive parameter validation and clamping across MCP server and APIfix

v1.6.0

January 30, 2026

GIPHY & Media Browser Upgrades

Browse millions of GIFs from GIPHY, enjoy smoother scrolling in the media browser, and try 6 new templates. Plus avatar customization, API endpoints, and lots of polish.

GIPHY integration showing cat GIF search results in the media browser
  • GIPHY integration - search millions of GIFs directly in the media browserfeature
  • Avatar customization - upload profile pics with Efecto effects, crop, and zoomfeature
  • 6 new templates - Celestial, Retro Game, and 4 more creative presetsfeature
  • Border radius for image and video layersfeature
  • Google Fonts - 1000+ fonts with live preview while browsingfeature
  • Virtualized media grid - smooth scrolling with hundreds of itemsimprovement
  • Larger thumbnails in input panel and media browserimprovement
  • Faster media loading with parallel fetching and cachingimprovement
  • Share links no longer create duplicate posters on refreshfix
  • Layers persist correctly on page refreshfix
  • Fixed race conditions in media browser when switching tabsfix
  • GIFs now animate properly in canvas and background layersfix

v1.5.0

January 23, 2026

Dashboard & Pro Accounts

A proper home base for Efecto with your recent posters, templates, and updates. Sign in to sync your work across devices.

Efecto dashboard showing recent posters and effect templates
  • Dashboard page - your home base at efecto.app/dashboard with recent posters, templates, and updatesfeature
  • User accounts - sign in with email or GitHub to save your workfeature
  • Cloud sync - your posters sync across all your devices automaticallyfeature
  • Pro subscriptions - $4.99/month or $49.99 lifetime, with a 7-day free trialfeature
  • 3 new templates - Pulsar, Painted Glass, and Misprint (12 total)feature
  • 8 new media samples - 4 videos and 4 portrait imagesfeature
  • New from Template - create posters from templates right in the editor (File menu or Cmd+K)feature
  • Surprise Me button - randomize everything with one clickfeature
  • New Efecto logo with happy face used throughout the appimprovement
  • Auth stability improvements - faster login, no more stuck spinnersfix

v1.4.0

January 18, 2026

Artistic Sketch Effects

Transform your visuals into artistic styles with oil painting effects, sketchy pencil lines, hatching patterns, and clean contour extraction.

Kuwahara painterly effect applied to a portrait, creating an oil painting style
  • Kuwahara effect - painterly oil painting filter with adjustable radius for smooth, artistic renderingfeature
  • Scribble effect - sketchy pencil-style lines that follow image contoursfeature
  • Crosshatch effect - classic hatching and cross-hatching patterns for engrave-style visualsfeature
  • Line Art effect - extract clean contour lines for cartoon and illustration stylesfeature
  • New Art category tab grouping all artistic effect stylesfeature
  • New halftone tutorial blog post at efecto.app/blogimprovement

v1.3.0

January 17, 2026

Motion Blur & Halftone

Add cinematic motion blur with linear, radial, and rotational modes. New Halftone effect tab, layered Warp distortion, expanded video library, and SEO improvements.

Halftone effect showing dot pattern rendering on a portrait
  • Motion Blur effect - linear (directional), radial (zoom), and rotational (spin) blur modes with intensity up to 200%feature
  • Position picker for Motion Blur - set the center point for radial and rotational blurfeature
  • Halftone effect tab - RGB halftone shader with separate dot controls for each color channelfeature
  • Warp post-process effect - layered sinusoidal distortion with bump mapping and specular highlightsfeature
  • 37 new videos added to the media libraryfeature
  • SEO improvements - structured data (JSON-LD), canonical URLs, and better accessibilityimprovement
  • Motion Blur samples slider goes up to 48 for smoother blur qualityimprovement

v1.2.0

January 15, 2026

Light Beams & Weird Glitch

Volumetric light scattering with animated dust motes, a new chaotic glitch effect, and major mobile improvements.

Digital glitch effect with block artifacts and color distortion
  • Light Beams effect - volumetric light scattering with animated dust particles floating in the beamsfeature
  • Position picker for Light Beams - click and drag to set the light origin pointfeature
  • Weird Glitch effect - chaotic slicing, color flashes, screen shake, and local warpingfeature
  • Lummi image filters - filter stock photos by spatial/depth data availabilityfeature
  • Randomize button in post-process popovers - quickly shuffle settings for any effectfeature
  • Mobile gesture support - pinch to zoom, two-finger pan on touch devicesimprovement
  • Mobile bottom toolbar stays visible above browser UI on iOSimprovement
  • Toast notifications repositioned to avoid blocking mobile controlsimprovement
  • Chrome iOS viewport height now correct on first loadfix
  • Spatial cache collision handling improved for reliable 3D conversionsfix

v1.1.0

January 11, 2026

Spatial 3D and Pan Controls

Turn photos into explorable 3D scenes with Apple SHARP, pan around with spacebar, and enjoy new effect templates.

Spatial 3D mode showing 2D to 3D point cloud conversion with ASCII effect
  • Spatial 3D - convert any image into a 3D point cloud using Apple SHARP modelfeature
  • Spacebar pan mode - hold spacebar to pan around 3D models and spatial viewsfeature
  • Scale and pan controls for 2D images and videosfeature
  • Vaporwave and Cyberpunk post-process templatesfeature
  • CRT Monitor preset now includes NES color palettefeature
  • Renamed Black Hole shader to Abyssimprovement
  • Upload thumbnails now show delete confirmation dialogimprovement
  • Increased file upload limit from 2MB to 5MBimprovement
  • Improved toggle button contrast in light modefix

v1.0.0

January 3, 2026

Unified Media Library & Lummi Integration

A huge update! Browse stock photos, search 1,500+ icons, and use them as 3D input. Plus mobile support, new toolbar, and tons of polish.

Unified media library showing Lummi stock photos with filter tabs
  • Unified Media Library - one searchable dialog for all input sources (3D models, photos, videos, icons)feature
  • Lummi stock photo integration - browse and search thousands of free, high-quality imagesfeature
  • Phosphor Icons as 3D input - search 1,500+ icons by name or keyword, they extrude into 3D shapesfeature
  • Responsive header with mobile menu - Efecto now works great on phones and tabletsfeature
  • 3D canvas toolbar - play/pause animation and reset camera with one clickfeature
  • Searchable color palettes - type 'green' or 'retro' to find matching palettes instantlyfeature
  • Randomize actions - shuffle settings, post-processes, or add random effect stacksfeature
  • New blog posts - in-depth dithering tutorial and Codrops collaboration articlefeature
  • New media samples - beard portrait, motorcycle, and more video optionsfeature
  • Simplified input panel from 3 tabs to 2 (Media + Shader)improvement
  • Icon search uses official Phosphor metadata with synonyms ('home' finds 'House', 'settings' finds 'Gear')improvement
  • Color palettes now work properly with all dither effectsimprovement
  • Smart post-process handling - palettes auto-disabled when dither effect already has colorsimprovement
  • URL parameters now correctly save and restore dither settingsfix
  • Fixed memory leaks and improved performance across the appfix
  • Animation accordion tooltip now wrapped in TooltipProviderfix
  • Command dialog positioning fixed to prevent layout shiftfix

v0.9.0

December 30, 2025

Color Palettes & Blog

Multi-color palettes for dithering, new media samples, and a brand new blog.

Floyd-Steinberg dithering effect with black and white color palette
  • Multi-color palettes for dither effects - use 2-6 colors with presets like Game Boy, Synthwave, Cyberpunkfeature
  • Drag to reorder palette colors - creates trippy inverted/gradient effectsfeature
  • New blog at efecto.app/blog with tutorials and articlesfeature
  • 2 new video samples - Manga and Panda animationsfeature
  • Improved command search - type 'dith' to find all dither effectsfeature
  • Effect tabs now sync correctly when loading posters or URLsimprovement
  • Better WebGL error handling with fallback UIimprovement
  • SEO improvements - sitemap, robots.txt, Google Analyticsimprovement
  • Uploaded videos now display correctly (was showing black)fix
  • 4 new 3D models with improved thumbnailsfix

v0.8.0

December 28, 2025

Command Menu & Search

Navigate everything from the menubar or search with Cmd+K.

Command palette showing searchable effects, inputs, and actions
  • Command palette - search all effects, inputs, models, and actions (Cmd+K or Cmd+/)feature
  • Effects menu - browse ASCII, Dither, Glitch, Special effects and all post-processesfeature
  • Input menu - access 3D shapes, models by category, SVGs, media, and shadersfeature
  • 160+ searchable items indexed for quick accessfeature
  • Recent commands - quickly re-access your last used itemsfeature
  • Adding post-process effects now auto-opens settings popoverimprovement
  • Submenus appear on hover for faster navigationimprovement
  • Renamed 'Weird' effect tab to 'Special' for consistencyimprovement

v0.7.0

December 27, 2025

Glitch Effects & Stackable Post-Processing

New VHS and Digital glitch effects, plus a powerful post-processing system with 12 stackable effects.

VHS glitch effect with RGB color shifting and scanlines
  • VHS Glitch effect - grain, RGB shift, scanlines, noise, distortionfeature
  • Digital Glitch effect - block corruption, displacement, line tearsfeature
  • Stackable post-processing - add multiple effects on top of any base effectfeature
  • 16 post-process effects: Scanlines, Vignette, Chromatic Aberration, CRT Curvature, Film Grain, Noise, Pixelate, Wave Distortion, RGB Glitch, Color Adjust, Color Palette, Jitter, Bloom, Dot Screen, Sepia, Gridfeature
  • Grid effect with color presets, cell size, line width, rotation, noise, glow, softness, and perspective controlsfeature
  • Post-process presets - quickly apply curated effect combinationsfeature
  • Code export for all effect types including glitch and post-processingfeature
  • Enhanced Film Grain with size, speed, and color grain controlsimprovement
  • Chromatic Aberration now supports 0-360° angle controlimprovement
  • Shareable URLs now include glitch settings and post-process stackimprovement
  • Redesigned 4-tab effect layout (ASCII, Dither, Glitch, Weird)improvement
  • Consistent UI across Input Source tabsimprovement
  • Post-process settings now update in real-time when changedfix

v0.6.0

December 25, 2025

Posters & Expanded Model Library

Save multiple compositions with Posters and explore 32 new cartoon models.

  • Posters system - save, rename, duplicate, and organize multiple compositionsfeature
  • 32 new cartoon models - rockets, ghosts, fruits, animals, tools, and morefeature
  • New Cartoon category in model libraryfeature
  • Copy and paste effects between postersfeature
  • Camera state persistence per posterfeature
  • IndexedDB storage for larger file uploads (50MB+)improvement
  • Character models now properly centeredimprovement
  • Better thumbnail brightness and consistencyimprovement
  • Metallic and glass materials now render correctly on all modelsfix
  • Fixed GPU memory leak when switching modelsfix
  • Error recovery for failed model loads with click-to-retryfix

v0.5.6

December 16, 2025

Shareable Links & New Shaders

Share your creations with URL parameters and explore new shader effects.

  • Shareable URLs - link directly to any shader or effectfeature
  • New Chrome shader - liquid metal with purple, silver, gold presetsfeature
  • New Pulsar shader - Joy Division style waveformsfeature
  • New Black Hole shader - gravitational lensing effectfeature
  • What's New modal shows latest updates on launchfeature
  • Cleaner shader UI - only shows relevant color controls per shaderimprovement
  • Per-shader color defaults (white/black for Pulsar, colorful for gradients)improvement
  • Single-color shaders can now use just one colorfix

v0.5.5

December 7, 2025

UI Refresh & New Effects

Major UI improvements with new font, icons, and interactive shader effects.

  • New Particles shader - floating particles that follow your mousefeature
  • New Fireworks shader - sparkler effects with mouse interactionfeature
  • Switched to DM Sans font for better readabilityfeature
  • New Phosphor icons throughout the appfeature
  • Improved font weights and label consistencyimprovement
  • Aligned dropdown menus with slider controlsfix
  • Pulsar shader now centers vertically and prevents wave cutofffix

v0.5.4

December 5, 2025

Firefox Support & Security

Better browser compatibility and security updates.

  • Added Canvas 2D fallback for dither effect on Firefoxfix
  • Updated Next.js and React to patch security vulnerabilitiesfix

v0.5.3

December 2, 2025

Animated GIF Support

Now supporting animated GIFs with a unified media experience.

  • Animated GIF support as inputfeature
  • Unified Media tab combining videos, images, and GIFsfeature
  • Static thumbnails for shape gridimprovement

v0.5.2

December 1, 2025

Expanded Model Library

70 new 3D models to choose from.

  • Expanded model library to 70 modelsfeature
  • Static thumbnails for faster browsingfeature
  • Fixed selection state in model gridfix

v0.5.1

November 29, 2025

Video Recording & UI Polish

Record your creations and enjoy a more polished interface.

  • Native MP4 recording for Chrome 126+ and Safarifeature
  • Integrated recording with Three.js render loopfeature
  • UI polish and consistency improvementsimprovement
  • Fixed video recording capture issuesfix
  • Graceful fallback for WebGPU recordingfix

v0.5.0

November 28, 2025

3D Model Library

Browse and select from a curated library of 3D models.

  • 3D model library with cached thumbnailsfeature
  • Enhanced grain and vignette overlay effectsfeature

v0.4.0

November 25, 2025

Shader Backgrounds

Use animated shaders as your background instead of 3D models.

  • New Shader input type with 4 variantsfeature
  • Liquid Metal shader with chrome reflectionsfeature
  • Glass shader with refractive effectsfeature
  • Redesigned Mesh Gradient shaderfeature
  • Better color controls for shadersimprovement

v0.3.0

November 19, 2025

State Persistence

Your settings are now saved between sessions.

  • State persistence across sessionsfeature
  • Improved preset managementfeature
  • Major performance and quality improvementsimprovement
  • Symmetric dither color picker labelsfix

v0.2.1

November 18, 2025

Dithering Overhaul

Complete rewrite of the dithering system.

  • Proper error diffusion algorithmsfeature
  • Multiple dither pattern optionsfeature
  • Better color quantizationimprovement

v0.2.0

November 12, 2025

Screenshot & Recording

Capture and share your creations.

  • Screenshot capture functionalityfeature
  • Video recording with MP4 conversionfeature
  • Credits section in sidebarfeature
  • Screen capture working in dither modefix

v0.1.1

November 4, 2025

Upload System

Upload your own models, videos, and images.

  • Upload custom 3D models (GLTF/GLB)feature
  • Upload custom videos and imagesfeature
  • SVG extrusion supportfeature
  • Accessibility improvements for screen readersfeature
  • Design system updatesimprovement

v0.1.0

November 3, 2025

Initial Release

Efecto is born. Apply visual effects to 3D models, videos, and images.

  • ASCII art effect with customizable charactersfeature
  • Dithering effect with multiple algorithmsfeature
  • Halftone effect with pattern optionsfeature
  • Support for 3D models, videos, and imagesfeature
  • Code export for developersfeature