When we introduced stacks, we called it a rethink of how layout works in Sketch. With our Florence release, we’re building on that foundation with a set of updates that make stacks more flexible and useful in more scenarios.
None of these updates are as big a leap as stacks itself was. But add them together, and you’ve got a much more capable layout tool. Here’s everything you can do with stacks in Florence.
Overlap items with negative gaps
First up, gap values can now go below zero. This was one of the most popular stacks requests by far, and it’s essential for things like overlapping card designs.
Negative gap is ideal for components like this where you want avatars to slightly overlap
Negative gaps also work on the cross axis when you set your stack to wrap. This opens up some neat effects for grids and tiled layouts.
There’s no limit on how negative a gap can go, since that gives you the most freedom to set up a stack exactly how you want it. If you push it far enough, items can wrap around themselves and spill outside the stack’s bounds. This is intentional, and if you’ve gone that far, you probably know what you’re doing.
Choose how items overlap
By default, the first item in the layer list appears above the ones below it in a stack, but now that negative gaps let items overlap, it’s time to make layer order something you can easily change.
Open the new stack settings panel (via the 
next to the Stack heading the Inspector) and choose between First on top (the default, and how stacks has always worked) or Last on top, which puts whichever item appears last in the layer list at the front.
You’ll find the option to flip the layer order within a stack in the new stack settings panel
This only changes how layers stack visually on the canvas — it doesn’t touch their order in the layer list. Items you set to ignore the stack’s layout are also affected by it.
Give stack items relative sizing
You can now give an item inside a stack a relative size, making it even easier to build complex layouts that scale predictably.
Unlike relative sizing outside of stacks, you set this as a percentage, not an absolute value. Stack items with a relative size will fill out remaining space in the stack (the stack’s overall size minus any fixed-size items), relative to their percentage size.
As an example, if you have a 100-point-wide horizontal stack with one 50-point fixed item and two 50%-wide items, those two items will each end up 25 points wide — 50% of the 50 points remaining once the fixed item has taken its share.
When give a stack item a relative size, it fills out remaining space in the stack, relative to its percentage size.
If you drag a relative layer from a non-stack into a stack, it will keep its relative sizing. We automatically give it a percentage based on the previous size of the layer and the size of the stack. Likewise, when you drag a relative layer out of a stack, it will retain its size from within the stack.
Set min/max sizes for stacks and stack items
You can now give stacks and their items a minimum and maximum size per axis. You’ll find the new toggle for this next to the sizing options in the Inspector and you’ll only be able to enable it if at least one axis has a non-fixed size.
Setting a maximum size for this text layer makes sure the text itself never feels unreadable at larger window sizes
If you turn off min/max sizing, we’ll clear any values you’ve entered — but if you switch to a sizing mode that doesn’t support it, your values will stick around, just hidden, and reappear if you switch back. We only support absolute min/max values, not percentages.
One more detail: when a max size constrains an item along the stack’s cross axis, you can use the alignment controls at the top of the Inspector to decide how that item aligns within the extra space. If you don’t set one, it falls back to the stack’s own cross-axis alignment.
Choose if stack layouts include borders
Up until now, we haven’t included borders that extend beyond a layer’s bounds (outside or center, specifically) in a stack’s layout calculations. That meant adjusting a stack’s layout settings every time you adjust an item’s borders.
Now, we give you the option to take those borders into consideration. You’ll find this option in the new stack settings panel via the next to the Stack heading the Inspector.
You’ll find the option to include or exclude borders in the new stack settings panel
It’s worth knowing that the size fields in the Inspector still reflect the size of the stack item itself, not the border box now affecting layout. There’s one exception to this — relative sizes — where the percentage includes borders, which we think feels more intuitive.
Work with clearer Canvas overlays
We’ve tweaked the stacks overlays on the canvas to reduce visual noise while still giving you all the information you need.
The fills that indicated padding and gaps are gone, and handles are smaller and less intrusive. We’ve also introduced a consistent color for stack-specific overlays, so it’s always clear what they’re affecting.
The new overlays and controls (top) vs. the old overlays and controls (bottom) when adjusting the gap inside a stack
Also, as you drag a padding or gap handle, it now stays pinned right under your cursor, rather than disappearing completely.
Reorder items with ease
Reordering items in a stack — especially across rows or columns — used to require dragging to a fairly specific, not-always-obvious spot to get the result you wanted, and that spot didn’t necessarily line up with where your cursor was. That wasn’t good enough — so we fixed it.
Rearranging items — even across rows and columns, and even with negative gaps in play — is now much more predictable. You simply drag that layer into the position you want it. That’s it. The same improvement applies when you’re drawing a new layer inside a stack.
Have items fill space more predictably
Layers that you set to fill the available space now correctly get an equal share of that space, unless a min or max size constrains it otherwise. This fixes a couple of annoying issues, including text layers in the same row that you set to fill not ending up the same width.
If you’re updating an existing document: stacks affected by the old behaviour won’t automatically update when you open your document in Florence. If something looks off, try nudging an affected stack (by increasing or decreasing a size value, for example) to trigger a relayout.
Beyond these larger updates, we’ve squashed plenty of stacks-related bugs, refined how we handle stacks in the Inspector, exposed all the new stack properties in our web inspector, and made sure our Figma importer — fig2Sketch — supports all of the new features.
Everything we’ve covered here is available right now in our Florence release — you can open Sketch and follow the prompts to update, or download the 2026.3 build directly.
As always, we’d love to hear what you think — you can talk stacks (or any other Sketch feature) with us over in the Discord.
