The best design tutorial websites for improving your skills

Graphic design is one of those careers that is always changing, improving and transforming. There are always new upgraded tools, trends to stay up to date with and different styles to try and master. Thankfully the amount of online design tutorials for is vast and varied. From “how to” videos of Photoshop effects to easy step by step tutorials on how to make icons, the options are constantly expanding.

With this amount of resources, there is no excuse to not be improving your skills a little every day. Try to do the ones that challenge you and seem too difficult, those are the ones you will learn the most with.

In this guide, we’ve put together our favorite online tutorials for graphic designers, specially designed to improve your skills. Most of the tutorials are for the Adobe programs, Illustrator and Photoshop but in some cases, there are tuts for other programs too.

Like all things in life, some are free and some are paid. Look through and find out what your favorites are. Most sites have both options; a free tutorial section and then a premium paid section.

Envato Tuts+

With over 20 thousand tutorials, Envato is like the mega resource for Creative Art tuts. In regards to design tutorials, there are plenty to choose from, starting at total beginners to advanced professionals. Most of the design programs, apart from Adobe ones, have lots of tuts available. Finding the one you need might involve some serious browsing but there are so many that you’ll probably be inspired to try one as soon as you see it.

One of my favorite Envato Tuts is: How to create your own font

Source: https://design.tutsplus.com/tutorials/how-to-create-your-own-font–cms-29019

Digital Arts

The graphic design resources on Digital Arts have always been pretty amazing. From the articles, product reviews and of course the tutorials, everything is top notch. The tuts are organized by either technique or program. Once in a while they make collections of the best tuts for easier browsing.

Like this one for example: 86 Best Photoshop Tutorials

Source: https://www.digitalartsonline.co.uk/features/illustration/best-photoshop-tutorials/

Spoon Graphics

Chris Spooner has an amazing collection of Illustrator and Photoshop tutorials. He made them all himself so they are about his own interests. But he has a really good style so there’s something for everyone here, even if it’s mostly retro and vintage inspired.

One of my favorites is: How to make a geometric pattern with Illustrator

Vectips

Vectips is a purely vector graphics tutorial repository. All the tuts are for Illustrator. The majority are for beginner and intermediate designers. Good practice for designers when they are starting out. The tuts here are quite fun and easy to follow.

This is one of their latest tuts: How to create unique vector sunbursts

Source: http://vectips.com/tips-and-tricks/sunburst/

PHLEARN

This premium YouTube channel is mostly for Photoshop and Lightroom, so mainly geared towards photographers. But there are also plenty of design tuts for Photoshop, like vintage effects for posters and how to add realistic text on any object. These are all video tuts.

This is my favorite design tut on PHLEARN: How to create a packaging design mockup on Photoshop

Source: https://phlearn.com/tutorial/create-packaging-design-mockup-photoshop/

Yes, I’m a designer

The design tutorials on Yes, I’m a designer are only for Photoshop, Illustrator, and InDesign. They are mostly geared towards intermediate designers with a good set of skills already. The tuts are mostly videos of seminars and are fast-paced.

This is one of their latest Illustrator tutorials: Learn to draw anything on illustrator CC

Source: https://yesimadesigner.com/learn-to-draw-anything-with-adobe-illustrator-cc/

Creative Bloq

The Creative Bloq website is full of amazing design resources and if you look deep enough, you can find some really great tutorials. They are hiding under the “how to” tab. There are all sorts of tuts here but they look like they are mostly for intermediate and advanced designers, illustrators and web designers.

For example check this one out: How to create epic environment designs

Source: https://www.creativebloq.com/illustration/how-create-epic-environment-designs-51620543

Tasty Tuts

Another site for some fun and creative tutorials is Tasty Tuts. This is another one that only offers tuts for the main three Adobe programs geared towards designers. Illustrator, Photoshop, and InDesign. There are all levels for designers starting out to designers with advanced skills.

This is my favorite tutorial on Tasty Tuts: Create the Obama Hope Poster Style on illustrator

Source: http://www.tastytuts.com/create-the-obama-hope-poster-style.html