From Figma to a Live .com: Publish Your Design

To get a Figma design onto yourname.com, you need three things: your design turned into real HTML/CSS (or a WordPress theme), somewhere to host those files, and a domain pointed at that host. Figma doesn't publish websites — it's a drawing tool. The bridge is export, hosting, and DNS, in that order.

This is the part nobody teaches in a design course. You learn auto-layout and components, then you're staring at a finished mockup with no idea how the pixels become a page someone can actually load. Let's close that gap properly, with no builder subdomain and no "powered by" badge at the bottom.

Here's the honest truth first: Figma's own export options are limited, and that shapes everything downstream. So let's start there.

What Figma can and can't give you

Figma exports images and design specs — it does not export production-ready websites. The "Export" panel gives you PNG, JPG, SVG and PDF. That's assets, not a site. For actual code you need a plugin or a separate build step, and the output quality varies a lot.

Your realistic paths out of Figma:

• Hand-code it yourself — use Figma as the reference and write the HTML/CSS by hand. Slowest, but you get clean, lightweight code you fully control. Best for a one-page portfolio or landing page.
• A Figma-to-code plugin — tools like Anima, Locofy or Builder.io generate HTML/CSS or React from your frames. Good for a head start; expect to clean up messy divs and over-specific CSS afterwards.
• Rebuild in WordPress — use the design as a visual spec and recreate it with a block theme or a builder like Bricks or a lightweight page builder. Right call if you need a blog, contact forms, or a client who'll edit content later.

Whatever route you pick, grab your assets cleanly before you leave Figma: export images at 2x for sharpness on retina screens, use SVG for logos and icons, and run raster images through Squoosh or convert them to WebP so your page isn't dragging a 4MB hero photo around.

Static or WordPress — pick based on who edits it

Choose static HTML if the content rarely changes and you're comfortable editing files; choose WordPress if someone needs to update text, add posts, or use a form without touching code.

A portfolio, a one-page agency site, an event page, a simple brochure — these are perfect as static files. They load fast, there's nothing to update or patch, and nothing to get hacked. You built it, you upload it, it's live. If you used a plugin like Astro, 11ty or even plain hand-coded pages, this is your lane.

WordPress earns its keep the moment a non-technical person needs to change things, or you want a real blog, bookings, or an online shop. The trade-off is maintenance: updates, plugins, backups. Don't reach for WordPress just because it's familiar — a five-page static site on WordPress is more work than it's worth.

Where to host it — and why a real host beats a builder

Host your site on a plan that lets you point your own domain at it and serves over HTTPS — a shared hosting plan does both, and so do static-only platforms, but with different trade-offs. The key thing you're buying is control: your files, your domain, no subdomain and no vendor logo.

Your main options:

• Shared hosting — upload static files or run WordPress, point your domain, done. One place for everything, and you can start static and add WordPress later without moving house. This is where TPC Hosting fits: EU-hosted, GDPR-friendly, with free migration if you've already got something half-built elsewhere.
• Static hosts (Netlify, Cloudflare Pages, GitHub Pages) — great for pure static sites, often free for small projects, deploy from a Git repo. The catch: no WordPress, and if your needs grow you'll be migrating.
• A page builder's own hosting — convenient, but you're renting their platform. Export is often painful and you rarely get clean code out.

For most people reading this — one site, their own domain, maybe a blog someday — shared hosting is the sensible default. You're not locked into one technology, and if something breaks you can reach a human. On TPC you get AI on chat at any hour with real engineers following up in business hours, which matters a lot the first time DNS confuses you at 11pm.

Uploading your files

Getting files onto your host takes one of two routes: drag-and-drop through the File Manager in your hosting panel, or SFTP with a client like FileZilla. Both put your files in the right folder; SFTP is faster for anything more than a handful of files.

The one folder that matters is your web root — usually public_html (or sometimes www). Your homepage file must be named index.html and sit directly in there, not in a subfolder. If you upload a folder called my-site containing index.html, your site will live at yourname.com/my-site/ instead of the root — a classic first-timer trap.

Quick upload checklist:

• index.html goes straight into public_html
• Keep your CSS/JS/image paths relative (css/style.css, not C:/Users/...)
• Upload the whole assets folder, not just the HTML
• Check it in an incognito window so you're not fooled by cached files

For WordPress, you usually don't upload files at all — install it in one click from the hosting panel, pick a theme, and rebuild your design there. Importing a Figma-plugin WordPress theme is possible but fiddly; recreating it with a block theme is often cleaner.

Wiring the domain to your host

Pointing your domain at your hosting means updating two DNS records — or, cleaner, switching the domain's nameservers to your host's. Once that propagates, typing yourname.com loads your site instead of a parking page.

Two ways to do it:

• Change nameservers (recommended) — in your domain registrar, replace the nameservers with the ones your host gives you (e.g. ns1.yourhost.com, ns2.yourhost.com). Your host then manages all DNS for you. Simplest if the domain and hosting are in different places.
• Point the A record — if you want to keep DNS at your registrar, set the A record for @ to your host's server IP, and a CNAME (or second A record) for www. Your host's welcome email lists the exact IP.

DNS changes take anywhere from a few minutes to a few hours to spread — occasionally up to 48, though that's rare now. Check progress with a tool like dnschecker.org rather than refreshing your browser a hundred times and trusting a cached result. Buy the domain and the hosting in the same place if you can; it removes a whole category of nameserver confusion, and TPC's pricing on both is plain with no first-year bait-and-renewal games.

Last step: make sure HTTPS is on so the address shows the padlock. On shared hosting a free certificate is typically a click or already enabled — turn on "force HTTPS" so visitors never land on the insecure version.

A realistic order of operations

Do it in this sequence and nothing trips you up: finalise the design, export clean assets, build or convert the pages, buy the domain and hosting, upload, point DNS, then enable HTTPS. Skipping ahead — buying a domain before you know what you're building, or uploading before you've compressed images — is where weekends disappear.

If you get stuck halfway, that's normal, and it's fixable. The whole point of hosting with people who answer questions is that "my CSS isn't loading" or "the domain still shows a parking page" gets sorted the same day. TPC Hosting gives you 30 days to back out if it's not right, so there's no pressure to get every decision perfect on day one.

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