Figma and Adobe are down in the dumps through the first half of 2026. But investors should only consider buying Figma, which has a better foundation to withstand the artificial intelligence boom, says BofA Securities.

Analyst Tal Liani assigned Figma a Buy rating and a $30 price target and gave Adobe an Underperform rating and a $190 target in a research note Tuesday. BofA paused coverage earlier this year after the departure of an analyst; at the time, the stocks had Neutral and Buy ratings, respectively.

Figma, which entered Tuesday down 44% this year, was up 9.8% to $23.18 in afternoon trading. Adobe rose 4.6% to $228.01, having tanked 38% in 2026.

The potential for artificial-intelligence tools to weaken demand for design software has weighed on both names. Those fears are warranted for longtime design leader Adobe, Liani argued. But Figma, which went public less than a year ago, could be an AI winner.

The difference comes down to why enterprises use the two software platforms. Let's start with Adobe, which makes apps like Photoshop, video editor Premiere, and PDF manager Acrobat. Creatives and marketers continue to rely on these tools, but the less advanced users in that group may flee to AI.

"Rapid improvements in [large-language models] and AI-native tools increasingly deliver 'good enough' creative output at low or zero cost," Liani wrote.

Even at the professional level where standards tend to be higher, some users only turn to Adobe for one or two apps. Adobe could be vulnerable to losing these professionals to lower-cost AI solutions, too, BofA said. Any exodus would weigh on pricing power and limit the expansion of seats -- or available paid users -- at enterprise customers.

Adobe didn't reply to Barron's requests for comment.

The company has responded by introducing consumption and outcome-based pricing and unveiling its own AI apps. But per-seat subscriptions continue to be the "foundation for revenues," Liani said. And while Adobe's AI-focused tools may retain existing users and keep them engaged, BofA doesn't see a path to accelerating growth.

Why buy Figma instead? To start, the platform supports collaboration on complex projects like building web interfaces or refining user experiences. While AI can replace individual tasks at the start of a project, enterprises still need Figma to coordinate AI-generated designs into "production-ready products," Liani noted.

Figma has also integrated AI functionalities into its platform and monetized them through a usage-based model. Customers pay by the seat and get an allocation of AI credits, but they have to fork over more money if they exceed their credit limit.

"This structure allows Figma to introduce a direct pathway to monetize incremental AI usage as adoption scales, without disrupting or cannibalizing its core [software-as-a-service] model," Liani said.

Early returns look solid. Of the enterprise users that exceeded their AI credit limits in the first quarter, more than 75% kept purchasing credits. And on the subscription side, the company had 690,000 paid users at the end of the quarter, up 53% year over year.

Some of this optimism is baked into Figma stock already. Shares trade at 7.6 times estimated sales over the next 12 months, more than double Adobe's 3.2-times multiple. That premium makes sense for a stock positioned as an AI beneficiary, though.

"We acknowledge increasing AI-driven competitive risks across the design ecosystem, but believe these risks are already reflected in the current valuation," Liani wrote.

Write to Nate Wolf at nate.wolf@barrons.com

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July 07, 2026 13:35 ET (17:35 GMT)

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