Inked Colibri — Realtime Colors to Variables & APCA Design System Tools

About this plugin

Inked Colibri is a Figma plugin for streamlining design system creation through structured color management, accessibility validation, and variable-based workflows.

It converts Realtime Colors palettes into Figma variables, helps you generate and explore color schemes, and validates contrast using APCA standards — so you can build accessible, consistent color systems instead of managing colors manually.

The plugin focuses on three main areas: color exploration, accessibility validation, and structured variable management — all connected to support design system work from exploration to implementation.

Core Features

Color Scheme Management

Explore and generate color systems before committing them to your design system.

1. Generate color schemes such as monochromatic, analogous, complementary, and more.
2. Randomize palettes with support for multiple harmony models.
3. Update and synchronize colors across your system.
4. Perform APCA contrast calculations and validation.

Documentation:

https://inked-colibri.narek.ch/docs/color-management

APCA Matrix Generation & Exploration

Validate accessibility and explore combinations visually.

1. Generate contrast matrices in three formats: huge, compact, and slim.
2. Generate shade-on-shade APCA matrices to explore contrast across tonal ranges.
3. Generate alpha-based (transparent) matrices to test overlays on base shades.
4. Adjust contrast thresholds (from 15 to 106) based on your requirements.
5. Interactively explore and validate all possible color pairings.

Documentation:

https://inked-colibri.narek.ch/docs/color-management/color-scheme-apca-explorer

Token Commander (Advanced Variable Tooling)

Automate large variable systems and structured token architectures.

1. Generate hundreds of variables in minutes instead of days.
2. Bind variables to variables and styles to variables.
3. Support for both color styles and text styles.
4. Use predefined JSON token architectures or create your own.
5. Use AI-assisted prompts to generate and structure variables consistently.

Documentation:

https://inked-colibri.narek.ch/docs/figma-var-management/token-commander

JSON schemes & AI prompts:

https://inked-colibri.narek.ch/docs/json-schemes

Why Inked Colibri

Inked Colibri is designed for teams and designers who:

1. Build and maintain design systems.
2. Care about accessibility from the start, not as a last step.
3. Want a structured, variable-driven workflow instead of manual color management.
4. Need to explore and validate color combinations before implementation.
5. Want to keep design and development aligned through shared tokens.

Resources

Full documentation:

https://inked-colibri.narek.ch/

Video overview:

https://youtu.be/H7M28NFhJ14