Variable mode inheritance in Figma helps maintain design consistency across light and dark themes, particularly when working with complex components. Here's how it works and what we learned while building a popover component.

Figma variables offer more flexibility than styles by storing multiple values (color, string, number, or Boolean) that can be assigned to different modes, enabling easy theme switching.

Three key lessons about variable mode inheritance:

1. Child elements inherit the parent container's mode

• Variable modes set at the parent frame level control all contained elements
• Setting the mode on the outermost frame affects all nested components

2. Child elements can override parent container modes

• Components can be scoped to specific modes independently
• This allows components to maintain their appearance regardless of parent frame settings

3. Nested frames enable advanced inheritance control

• External parent frames can handle specific properties (like borders)
• Internal frames can be scoped to different modes
• This structure allows automatic theme adaptation without manual intervention

Practical Application: Popover Component Example

Our popover component needed to:

• Maintain dark mode colors consistently
• Show a border only in dark mode parent frames
• Hide the border in light mode parent frames

Solution Implementation:

1. Create an external frame for the border without variable mode
2. Add an internal frame scoped to dark mode for content
3. Use a border variable with 0% opacity in light mode

Final Implementation Results:

This approach creates components that behave predictably across different themes while maintaining design consistency and reducing manual intervention.

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