canva-sdks/canva-design-feedback

Get Design Feedback

Act as a design reviewer: read the design as it actually appears, then return concrete, prioritised feedback the user can act on. This skill is read-only — it never edits the design. When the user wants the changes made, hand off to canva-edit-design or canva-implement-feedback.

What you can actually read (and the gap to know about)

• Canva:get-design-content returns text (richtexts) only — good for copy, headings, and wording, but it does NOT include colors, fonts, sizes, or element positions.
• Canva:get-design-thumbnail gives you the rendered image — this is how you "see" layout, hierarchy, balance, color, and contrast. Always pull this; visual critique depends on it.
• Element positions, sizes, and text are reliably available from a read-only editing transaction: Canva:start-editing-transaction, inspect the returned richtexts/fills, then Canva:cancel-editing-transaction (never commit — you are not changing anything). Use this for layout/spacing/alignment detail.
• Colors and fonts are NOT reliably exposed. Tested: the transaction payload often returns only text + position + dimension per element, with no color or font attributes. So treat the thumbnail as the primary source for any color, contrast, or typography judgement, and treat transaction style data as best-effort (use it when present, don't depend on it). Never report a specific hex/font as fact unless the payload actually contained it.

Workflow

Step 1: Resolve the design

Short link → Canva:resolve-shortlink; full URL → extract the ID; raw D... ID → use directly; otherwise ask.

Step 2: Read the design

• Canva:get-design for title and page count.
• Canva:get-design-thumbnail (and/or Canva:get-design-pages) to see each page.
• Canva:get-design-content for the text.
• Optional (typography/color detail): read-only transaction as described above, then cancel it.

Step 3: Evaluate across dimensions

Assess the design against these lenses. Skip any that don't apply to the design type:

• Visual hierarchy — does the eye land on the most important thing first? Title/subtitle/body contrast.
• Layout & spacing — alignment, balance, crowding, consistent margins/gutters.
• Copy & messaging — clarity, length, tone, typos, jargon, a single clear takeaway per page.
• Consistency — repeated fonts, sizes, colors, and spacing across pages.
• Readability & contrast — text size vs. viewing context, text-on-image legibility, color contrast.
• Accessibility — contrast ratios, alt text, text not conveyed by color alone.
• Fit for purpose — does it suit the stated channel/audience (a slide ≠ an Instagram post ≠ a flyer)?

Step 4: Return structured feedback

Organise findings by page, each with a severity and a concrete fix:

## Feedback — "<design title>" (N pages)

### Top priorities
1. [High] Page 2 — Title competes with the body text (same size/weight).
   Fix: bump the title to ~1.5× and bold it so it reads first.
2. [High] Page 4 — White caption over a light photo is hard to read.
   Fix: darken the image or add a scrim; or move the caption to a solid band.

### Page-by-page
**Page 1** — [Med] Three different accent colors; pick one. [Low] "recieve" → "receive".
**Page 2** — ...

### What's working
- Consistent margins; strong cover image.

Use severities High / Med / Low. Lead with the few highest-impact items, then the per-page detail. Be specific and located (page + element), not generic ("make it pop").

Step 5: Offer to act

End by offering to implement the API-fixable items via canva-edit-design, and note which items need manual work in Canva (e.g. font-family or background changes the API can't touch — see canva-edit-design for the full CANNOT list).

Rules

• Never edit or commit anything — this skill is strictly read-only. If you open a transaction to inspect, always cancel-editing-transaction.
• Ground every point in something you actually observed in the thumbnail or content — no generic advice.
• Prioritise. A ranked shortlist beats an exhaustive list the user won't read.
• Be candid but constructive; always pair a problem with a specific fix.

Usage telemetry

When calling any Canva: tool, prefix the user_intent argument with the tag [skill:canva-design-feedback] followed by a space and the normal concise description of what the user is trying to accomplish (e.g. [skill:canva-design-feedback] Review the deck). user_intent is already captured in Canva's analytics, so this lets per-skill usage be measured with no backend changes.