View mode

At Penpot, the View mode is the best place to present your designs. You will also be able to share them and play the interactions.

View mode interface

Take a look at the anatomy of the View mode at this section: View mode interface.

View mode

Launch your designs in View mode

To view your designs from the workspace at View mode click the play button at the top right of the navbar or press G V.

Note: the View mode shows only boards and their contents. Anything outside an board will not be shown at the View mode.

viewmode

Features and options

From the View mode you can:

  • Navigate through boards pressing and keys.
  • Play the interactions (if there are any).
  • Change view settings for interactions: don’t show, show or show on click.

    viewmode

  • Click on the board name to see the boards list (with nice thumbnails).

    viewmode

  • Click on the page name to display the pages menu. At shareable links the available pages can be configurable.

    viewmode

  • Zooming options. Reset zoom Shift+0, Toogle fullscreen Shift+F, Toggle zoom style F, Zoom in +, Zoom out -.
  • Activate the browser fullscreen mode.
  • Activate the Inspect mode.
  • Activate the Comments mode.

Comments

You can activate comments at the View mode by pressing the comments icon at the top navbar.

At the View mode only boards are shown so the comments that are placed outside boards will not show here.

comments

Sharing prototype links

A "Share prototype link" is a public url that you can share so that someone can see the prototype regardless of whether they have a Penpot account.

Create and destroy link:

The Share prototype window can be found at the View mode.

  • To create a link press the button "Get link" and the link will be automatically created.
  • To copy the link you can copy the url or press the copy button.
  • To destroy a link press the button "Destroy link" and confirm the action. The link will cease to exist and will be no longer available, so be careful if you've already shared it. However, you will be always able to create a new one.

Tip: Add your desired "Interactions" setting (show / don't show / show on click) before creating the Share prototype link. This way the link will keep your selection.

sharing

Manage permissions:

Allowing to share a "view only" workspace is in our plans and will come soon.

You can create a different link for each set of permissions. Click on "Manage permissions" to edit the link permissions.

  • Pages shared: Select the pages that will be availble at the link.
  • Can comment: allow comments to users that are not in the team where the file belongs.
  • Can inspect code: allow code inspection to users that are not in the team where the file belongs.

sharing

Inspect designs

You can activate the Inspect mode from the View mode. Click the code button at the middle of the navbar. Then you will see two sidebars:

  • On the left sidebar you can see the layers tree. Select a layer to inspect it.
  • At the right sidebar: you can switch between Info and Code tabs to get design specifications or code.
More about inspecting designs

codemode