InVision vs Marvel

Quick verdict

In 2026 this is not a live product duel. InVision’s design collaboration services shut down on 31 December 2024—prototypes, Design System Manager (DSM), boards, and related cloud assets were scheduled for deletion after that date. Freehand, its whiteboard, had already been sold to Miro in November 2023. You cannot pick InVision as a new stack; you can only learn from the failure and recover leftover exports.

Marvel (marvelapp.com) is still shipping: browser wireframe → prototype → handoff, built-in user testing, Sketch sync, iOS apps, a free forever plan, and Enterprise controls (SSO, EU hosting, IP locks). Published list pricing sits around Pro $12/user/month yearly ($16 monthly) and Team $42/month yearly for three seats. For most product orgs the default design home is still Figma, not either name in this pair.

Pick Marvel if you need a simple hotspot prototype, student or nonprofit pricing, or lightweight user tests without a full research suite. Do not pick InVision—it is offline. Treat Freehand history as a Miro path, and treat old InVision prototypes as archive/export problems, not a subscription choice.

Side-by-side

What each product is in 2026

InVision was the default “make Sketch clickable and shareable” layer for a generation of UX teams: Craft plugin sync, Inspect handoff, LiveShare reviews, Design System Manager (DSM), and later Freehand whiteboarding plus the Studio design-app bet. Funding stories peaked near a $1.9–2B valuation (Series F era). Product stagnation, Craft Manager friction, and Figma’s multiplayer canvas erased the Sketch + InVision + Zeplin chain. In January 2024 leadership announced full design-collaboration discontinuation at year-end. Freehand customers were already on a Miro track after the November 2023 acquisition. By mid-2026, “using InVision” means reconstructing history—not opening a subscription.

Marvel (London-based marvelapp.com) markets an all-in-one path for teams who want speed over deep design systems: wireframe, design, interactive prototype (hotspots, containers/carousels, video embeds, timers), shareable reviews, developer handoff specs, and first-party user testing. Official materials claim on the order of 2 million users and Fortune-100-friendly Enterprise controls (SSO, IP restriction, invite-only projects, activity logs, EU hosting). The same company family pushes Ballpark for broader product research—surveys, Figma prototype tests, AI interviews—so research capability is splitting between classic Marvel UT and Ballpark rather than living only inside the prototype editor.

Pricing and real cost (TCO)

Only Marvel has a live price list. InVision is $0 forever for the wrong reason: the product is gone. Figures below reflect published rates and mid-2020s reviews; always re-check marvelapp.com/pricing on the day you buy.

Marvel (live)

• Free — $0, no time limit: suited to a single-user / single-project trial; branding and project caps apply.
• Pro — about $12/month billed yearly ($16 monthly): unlimited projects for one user, prototype downloads, removes Marvel branding, limited active user tests (reviews commonly cite ~3).
• Team — about $42/month billed yearly ($48 monthly): starts at three Team Members, more concurrent user tests (~10 commonly cited), premium support. Pricing FAQ distinguishes Team Members (full account access, per-seat charge) vs Contributors (invited to specific projects, included).
• Enterprise — custom: unlimited scale, SSO, invite-only projects, advanced security, invoice/bank pay, dedicated experience managers; Marvel positions EU-hosted infrastructure and a 99.98% uptime SLA.
• Education / nonprofit — up to 70% off yearly for verified students/teachers; 50% off yearly for verified nonprofits.

TCO sketch: Solo Pro annual ≈ $144/year. Team list for three seats ≈ $504/year before extra seats. Additional members are pro-rated; downgrades are immediate without unused-time refunds per FAQ. Ballpark research is a separate product decision if you outgrow Marvel’s built-in UT caps.

InVision (historical only)

• During the wind-down, remaining users were pushed to monthly paid access until 31 Dec 2024; free long-term use of the suite was not the end-state.
• Enterprise contracts historically bundled prototyping, Freehand, and DSM; those contracts do not transfer to a living InVision cloud in 2026.
• Freehand survivors sit under Miro commercial terms, not InVision SKUs.

TCO notes: (1) Migration labor from InVision archives often exceeds any subscription you would have paid—export early, do not depend on dead cloud links. (2) Marvel’s Team “starts at 3 users” model differs from pure per-seat freemium; count Contributors carefully for freelancers. (3) If your real need is multiplayer UI design systems, price Figma, Penpot, or UXPin instead—Marvel is not that category.

Feature depth that still matters

Prototyping model. Both tools historically excelled at hotspot linking: upload artboards (or draw simple frames), define click targets, share a URL. Marvel still ships that flow plus containers/carousels, scrolling sidebars, video embeds, and timers. InVision’s equivalent is historical only. Neither matches specialized high-fidelity tools (ProtoPie, advanced Figma interactions) for complex micro-interactions—reviews have said so for years.

User testing. Marvel’s first-party tests capture video, voice, and screen as people walk a prototype, with basic analytics on where people stuck. That is enough for a first pass without buying enterprise UserTesting seats. Serious research programs usually outgrow caps and methods; Ballpark (same company family) and full UXR suites cover preference tests, surveys, and deeper study types better than the classic Marvel UT layer alone.

Handoff. Marvel generates CSS, Swift, and Android XML-style specs from designs built in Marvel or synced via Sketch. That is useful when engineers still want inspectable tokens without a full Figma Org. InVision Inspect played a similar role in the Craft/Sketch era; it is gone with the platform.

API and integrations. Marvel advertises a GraphQL API and integrations (Sketch, Jira, and others) for custom internal tooling—an unusual pitch for a lightweight prototype product. InVision’s DSM/API world ended with the shutdown.

Mobile. Marvel’s App Store presence covers design and prototype on iOS/iPad. Independent reviews note Android as weak or discontinued—plan desktop/iOS-centric demos if mobile is critical.

Community sentiment (Reddit / HN / reviews)

InVision’s shutdown felt inevitable. UX Reddit and Hacker News threads describe a textbook failure: Craft Manager sync bugs, dependence on Sketch without owning the design surface, and slow response while Figma shipped real multiplayer design + prototype in one file. Designers who were “forced” onto InVision years after Figma’s rise called it outdated for day-to-day work. Earlier “rise and fall” threads already tracked valuation versus product reality. Startup forums noted hundreds of millions in funding against a product that stopped winning.

What people still missed. Simple client presentation—share a link, click through screens, leave comments—was a genuine strength; some teams looked for equally dumb-simple replacements when Freehand/InVision went away. Freehand lo-fi fans struggled to find the same wireframe feel elsewhere; Miro community posts show Freehand→Miro often degraded to screenshot pastes rather than perfect board conversion.

Marvel’s reputation is “easy, limited.” Independent reviews praise near-zero learning curve, asset libraries, and quick mobile prototypes; they ding collaboration depth versus modern multiplayer canvases and note weak/no Android app. SitePoint-style comparisons long framed Marvel as the friendlier alternative for non-designers, with user testing and handoff as differentiators versus classic InVision. Timed head-to-heads years ago found Marvel faster for basic prototype assembly. HN even recalled Marvel as a pre-Figma rival that InVision once outran—before both were eclipsed.

Research tooling split. Ballpark gets interest as a lightweight UserTesting alternative for preference tests and quick prototype feedback, while specialists warn it is shallower than full UXR suites (card sort/tree test depth, etc.).

Third-party alternative roundups (2025–2026) consistently list Figma first after InVision’s death, with Marvel appearing as a rapid-prototyping/testing option alongside UXPin, Framer, ProtoPie, Zeplin, and Balsamiq—not as the universal default.

When InVision “wins” (it doesn’t—legacy cases only)

• Never for new work in 2026. The cloud is retired; files were on a deletion clock after 31 Dec 2024.
• Historical archive recovery: If you still hold local exports, Sketch sources, or Freehand→Miro migrations, treat that as data archaeology—not product selection.
• Case-study value: Use InVision’s arc (Craft dependency, Studio lag, Freehand sale, full shutdown) when teaching platform risk and single-vendor concentration.
• Freehand lineage: Whiteboard workflows that lived in Freehand belong in Miro evaluation, not Marvel vs InVision.

When Marvel wins

• You need a clickable prototype in minutes from uploads or simple in-browser frames—students, PMs, marketers, founders—not a full design system.
• Built-in user testing (video/voice/screen) on the same prototype without buying UserTesting.com enterprise seats for a first pass.
• Budget and education: free forever plan, Pro ~$12 annual, 70%/50% education and nonprofit discounts.
• Handoff + API: CSS/Swift/XML-style inspect, Sketch integration, and GraphQL customization for internal tools.
• Enterprise constraints that like EU-hosted data, SSO, IP restriction, and predictable seat math over tool sprawl.
• Leaving a dead InVision account: Marvel actively markets migration help and positions itself as an InVision alternative for prototype + UT + handoff workflows—still evaluate Figma first if you design every day.

Risks and failure modes

• Buying ghosts: Procurement or training catalogs that still list InVision will burn calendar time. Confirm shutdown sources before any pilot.
• Incomplete migration: Reddit and Miro community posts show Freehand→Miro often degraded to screenshots; InVision→Figma prototype portability was never seamless. Budget re-build time, not “import and done.”
• Overfitting Marvel as “the Figma replacement”: Limited multiplayer design depth and collaboration relative to modern canvases; reviews flag collaboration as a weakness versus peers.
• Platform gaps: Android app effectively gone; iOS-centric mobile story.
• User-test quotas: Free/Pro test limits force upgrades or a jump to Ballpark/UserTesting for serious research programs.
• Vendor concentration lesson: InVision’s Craft/Sketch coupling and failed Studio bet show how a “workflow glue” product dies when the canvas product eats the glue. Do not rebuild the same dependency chain with any niche prototype tool as your sole design system of record.
• Security diligence: Marvel’s public claims (EU host, GDPR, SSO, SLA) are procurement inputs, not a substitute for your own questionnaire and DPA review.

Recommendation by profile

Migration playbook (if you still have InVision residue)

1. Inventory: List prototypes, Freehands, DSM tokens, and external links still in tickets or Notion. Assume cloud originals may already be gone after late 2024.
2. Recover local sources first: Sketch/Figma files, PNG/PDF exports, Craft leftovers on designer machines beat dead share URLs.
3. Whiteboard path: Freehand work → Miro evaluation; expect imperfect conversion (screenshots were a common community workaround).
4. Prototype path: Rebuild hotspots in Figma (default) or Marvel if the team is non-designer-heavy and only needs click-through + light UT.
5. Design system path: DSM concepts map to Figma libraries/variables or another system tool—not to Marvel.
6. Retire links: Replace InVision URLs in Jira, Confluence, and sales decks so stakeholders stop hitting 404s.

FAQ

Is InVision still available in 2026?
No. Design collaboration services (prototypes, DSM, and related products) were discontinued at the end of 2024. Freehand had already been acquired by Miro in November 2023. Treat InVision as historical.

Is Marvel a full replacement for InVision?
Only for a slice of the old workflow: simple prototypes, comments, basic handoff, and built-in user tests. It does not replace Freehand whiteboarding (→ Miro) or a modern multiplayer design canvas (→ Figma). Marvel markets itself as an InVision alternative with migration support for that slice.

How much does Marvel cost?
Free forever for limited solo use; Pro about $12/month yearly ($16 monthly); Team about $42/month yearly for three seats ($48 monthly); Enterprise custom. Education up to 70% off yearly; nonprofits 50% off yearly. Confirm on marvelapp.com/pricing.

Should I choose Marvel or Figma?
Choose Figma for day-to-day product UI design and multiplayer collaboration. Choose Marvel when you specifically want a simple prototype + user-test path, education pricing, or a non-designer-friendly click-through tool—and you do not need a full design system home.

What happened to Freehand?
Miro acquired Freehand from InVision in November 2023, including technology, brand assets, customers, and talent. Whiteboard work that lived there belongs in a Miro evaluation, not in Marvel vs InVision.

Does Marvel do user testing?
Yes—native tests with video, voice, and screen capture on prototypes, plus analytics. Deeper research (surveys, broader panels, Figma prototype tests) is pushed toward Ballpark, the sibling research product from the Marvel team.

Is Marvel secure enough for enterprise?
Marvel publishes EU-hosted infrastructure (GCP Belgium/Germany), GDPR commitment, SSL/TLS in transit, Enterprise SSO, IP restriction, project passwords, activity logs, a 99.98% SLA claim, Stripe for payments, and a bug bounty. Run your own security review before trust-boundary decisions.

Can I still export from InVision?
If you did not export before late 2024, cloud recovery is likely impossible. Search local disks, shared drives, and email attachments for Sketch sources and static exports. Rebuild rather than wait for a resurrection that will not come.

Sources

Research for this comparison drew on 117 unique primary and secondary URLs: Marvel official product, pricing, security, help, and API pages; InVision shutdown and Freehand/Miro acquisition announcements; TechRadar and other independent pricing/feature reviews; Reddit and Hacker News threads covering praise and complaints; alternative roundups; and video walkthroughs. Full list: research_cache/invision-vs-marvel_sources.json. Pricing and plan limits change—verify on vendor sites before purchase.

Bottom line

InVision vs Marvel in 2026 is a postmortem vs a niche survivor. InVision taught the industry how quickly a glue layer dies when a multiplayer canvas ships the same jobs end-to-end. Marvel remains a competent, affordable path for clickable prototypes and light user testing—especially for students, freelancers, and teams that refuse a full design-tool commitment. For shipping product teams, start with Figma (or a peer canvas), use Miro for Freehand-class whiteboards, and add Marvel only when its free tier, UT, or education economics clearly win a narrow use case.