Design is at the core of creativity and innovation, playing a crucial role in shaping how we interact with the world. Whether it’s crafting intuitive user experiences, developing stunning visuals, or creating functional products, design encompasses various fields that demand specialized skills.
Our top 10 design courses include a mix of UX/UI, graphic design, product design, and other creative disciplines, ensuring there’s something for everyone—from beginners to seasoned professionals. These programs are ranked based on real-time data, combining ratings and reviews to bring you the best resources to refine your craft. Let’s explore the courses that can take your design skills to the next level.
Foundations of User Experience (UX) Design is the first of a series of seven courses that will equip you with the skills needed to apply to entry-level jobs in user experience design. UX designers focus on the interactions that people have with products like websites, mobile apps, and physical objects. UX designers make those everyday interactions usable, enjoyable, and accessible. The role of an entry-level UX designer might include empathizing with users, defining their pain points, coming up with ideas for design solutions, creating wireframes, prototypes, and mockups, and testing designs to get feedback.
Current UX designers and researchers at Google will serve as your instructors, and you will complete hands-on activities that simulate real-world UX design scenarios.
Learners who complete the seven courses in this certificate program should be equipped to apply for entry-level jobs as UX designers. No previous experience is necessary.
By the end of this course, you will be able to:
– Define the field of UX and explain why it’s important for consumers and businesses.
– Understand foundational concepts in UX design, such as user-centered design, the design thinking framework, accessibility, and equity-focused design.
– Identify the factors that contribute to great user experience design.
– Review common job responsibilities of entry-level UX designers and teams that they work with.
– Explore job opportunities and career paths within the field of user experience.
– Explain why design sprints are an important and useful part of a UX designer’s work.
– Describe common UX research methods.
– Identify and account for biases in UX research.
Start the UX Design Process: Empathize, Define, Ideate is the second course in a certificate program that will equip you with the skills needed to apply to entry-level jobs in user experience (UX) design. In this course, you’ll complete the first phases of the design process for a project that you’ll be able to include in your portfolio. You will learn how to empathize with users and understand their pain points, define user needs using problem statements, and come up with lots of ideas for solutions to those user problems.
Current UX designers and researchers at Google will serve as your instructors, and you will complete hands-on activities that simulate real-world UX design scenarios.
Learners who complete the seven courses in this certificate program should be equipped to apply for entry-level jobs as UX designers. No previous experience is necessary.
By the end of this course, you will be able to:
– Empathize with users to understand their needs and pain points.
– Create empathy maps, personas, user stories, and user journey maps to understand user needs.
– Develop problem statements to define user needs.
– Generate ideas for possible solutions to user problems.
– Conduct competitive audits.
– Start designing a mobile app, a new project to include in your professional UX portfolio.
Graphic Design is all around us! Words and pictures—the building blocks of graphic design—are the elements that carry the majority of the content in both the digital world and the printed world. As graphic design becomes more visible and prevalent in our lives, graphic design as a practice becomes more important in our culture.
Through visual examples, this course will teach you the fundamental principles of graphic design: imagemaking, typography, composition, working with color and shape… foundational skills that are common in all areas of graphic design practice. I don’t just want you to watch a video of someone talking about design, I want you to MAKE design! If you want to be a designer you have to be a maker and a communicator, so this course will offer you lots of opportunities to get your hands dirty with exercises and with more practical projects.
At the end of this course you will have learned how to explore and investigate visual representation through a range of image-making techniques; understand basic principles of working with shape, color and pattern; been exposed to the language and skills of typography; and understand and have applied the principles of composition and visual contrast. If you complete the course, along with its optional (but highly recommended) briefs, you will have a core set of graphic design skills that you can apply to your own projects, or to more deeply investigate a specialized area of graphic design.
To succeed in this course you will need access to a computer. You can complete this course without one but it will be tougher. Access to, and a beginner’s level knowledge of Adobe Creative Suite programs, such as Illustrator, Photoshop and InDesign will help you, especially if you want to complete the optional briefs.
Web design is fun. It’s creative.
It gives you huge self-satisfaction when you look at your work and say, “I made this.“. I love that feeling after finishing something. When I lean back in my chair, look at the final result with a smile, and have this little spark joy moment.
It’s especially satisfying when I know I just made $5,000.
Wouldn’t you want to have that?
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Wouldn’t you want to be your own boss?
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Working 2-3 hours a day and earning more than people working full-time?
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Waking up whenever you want?
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Working from home? Or Starbucks? Or the bathtub—if that’s your thing. Or maybe somewhere awesome, like Bali?
I do! That’s why I got into this field. Not initially for the love of web design, though I do love it now. I got in for the lifestyle.
There are many ways one can achieve this lifestyle. This is my way—this is how I reached the life I dreamed about for years. And I’m going to teach you to do the same.
Often people think web design is complicated, that it needs creative talent or knack for computers. Sure, a lot of people make it complicated. People make the simplest things complicated—just like most subjects taught in universities.
But I don’t like complicated. I like easy. I like life hacks. I like taking the shortest, simplest route to my goal. I didn’t go to art school or get a computer science degree. I’m an outsider who hacked my way into this field, and somehow, I ended up as a sought-after professional.
That’s how I’m going to teach you web design—so you’re not discouraged by needless complexity. So you enjoy the process because it’s simple and fun. So you can become a freelance web designer in no time.
For example, this is a design course, but I don’t teach Photoshop. Why? Because Photoshop is needlessly complicated for web design, yet people still teach it to web designers. I don’t. I teach Figma—a simple tool that is taking over the design world. You will be designing a complete website within a week, while others are still learning basic layouts in Photoshop.
Second, this is a development course, but I don’t teach you how to code. Coding for web design is needlessly complicated and takes too long to learn. Instead, I teach Webflow, a tool revolutionizing web design. You’ll be building complex websites within two weeks while others are still learning HTML and CSS basics.
Third, this is a freelancing course. But I don’t just teach you how to write great proposals—I give you a winning proposal template. By the end of the course, you’ll have a stunning portfolio website, complete with portfolio pieces.
Enroll now and start whenever the time is right for you. I keep the course up to date, review every assignment, and answer every question in the Q&A.
John McWade, founder of Before & After and former senior staff author at LinkedIn Learning, presents a series that touches on all areas of design, helping designers new and old sharpen their skills and create more powerful work. This series covers a wide range of topics, from typography and layout to color and logo design, but each episode is a standalone technique that can be completed in just ten minutes or less.
Layout and composition are the building blocks of graphic design. A strong composition will attract attention, clarify understanding, and engage the viewer whether the project is a print- or screen-based project, a still or motion graphic, a 3D or 2D graphic. This course explains the elements, principles, and tools you will need to create a successful composition and layout. Author Sean Adams explains the elements of layout (from shapes to space), how to use principles such as scale and hierarchy, and teaches how tools like grids, proportions, and color can lead to more compelling compositions.
As you can see, this course is updated frequently with new lessons, projects and resources!
June 2024 – NEW Lesson! Artificial Intelligence in Design a Full Introduction!
January 2024 – NEW Section! Photoshop 2024 Updates – Artificial Intelligence Generative fill tool overview and mastery!
January 2023 – NEW Resources! Design Book Recommendations and Resource on Graphic Design Pay
November 2022 – NEW Section! The History of Graphic Design Styles!
August 2022 – NEW Section! Learn to Create a Custom Brand Presentation Mockup in Adobe Photoshop
January 2022 – NEW Section! Design Trends 2022! We will figure out how to predict future design trends and create three projects!
November 2021 – NEW Sections! Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator 2022 update lessons and Adobe Illustrator 3D class Project!
June 2021 – NEW Lesson! How to properly give and receive critiques and feedback
April 2021 – NEW! Section on how to create YouTube Thumbnails!
March 2021 – NEW! Video on How to Encourage and Spark Creativity
March 2021 – NEW! Section on The Double Exposure Effect in Adobe Photoshop 2021!
March 2021 – NEW! Section creating vector art in Adobe Illustrator 2021 using the new repeat tool and the blend tool.
February 2021 – NEW! Detailed section on Adobe Photoshop Photo editing basics – New projects added!
January 2021 – NEW! 2021 Design Trends Section with three new student projects!
November 2020 – NEW! 16 page History of Typography Guide, 16 Page Color Theory Guide and 8 Page Font Pairing Guide!
October 2020 – Updated Lessons! Photoshop 2021 Neural Filter and Liquify Tools
August 2020 – Updated Lessons! Logo Design and Branding Project
July 2020 – NEW! How to work with Photoshop Mockups!
June 2020 – NEW! How to Become a Graphic Designer 14 page Resource Guide and Lessons!
May 2020 – NEW! InDesign Portfolio Builder Template!
April 2020 – NEW! Entirely new Adobe InDesign Section including a cookbook project
April 2020 – NEW! Color Theory – Exploring Color Palettes Section
March 2020 – NEW! A Guide to My Favorite Fonts and Where to Download Them
Jan 2020 – NEW! Lessons: 2020 Design Trends: and how to create them
Nov 2019 – NEW! – Adobe Illustrator introduction and tools section (vector tracing worksheet)
Nov 2019 – NEW! – Photoshop section and Projects (including a new youtube thumbnail and book cover project)
Oct 2019 – NEW! 11 page downloadable resource – The Guide to Grids
Oct 2019 – NEW! Color Theory and Color Harmony Lessons + new Downloadable Resources
July 2019 – NEW! Affinity Designer Section! Learn The Basic Tools and Differences Between Adobe Illustrator And Affinity Designer
May 2019 – NEW! Downloadable Resources – the Anatomy of Typography poster and the Psychology of Color graphic!
April 2019 – NEW Lessons: Finding Your Graphic Design Niche and Focus!
Graphic Design Master Class – Learn GREAT Design
Do you want to learn all the skills and techniques you need to create incredible designs?
Do you want to know the process of creating logos and branding packages?
Are you intimidated by learning photoshop, illustrator or InDesign and want to learn through practical real world projects? Than This class will be for you!
We will extensively review Typography, color theory, layout and composition, how to use photos in design, photo manipulations and editing and magazine layout design, branding and logo design just to name a few.
We also learn the basics of Adobe Photoshop, illustrator and InDesign and do projects with real world applications. Every designer needs to know and master these programs and this course makes sure you know the essential tools to power through amazing projects.
In Adobe Photoshop, we will review photo editing and manipulation techniques like how to cut objects out, duotones, changing color on objects, the liquify tool and we will create a compelling YouTube thumbnail with our newly learned photoshop skills as well as an entire book cover design project.
In Adobe Illustrator, we will master the pen tool by hand tracing simple and complex shapes. We will explore the power of the shape builder tool and In the end of this section, we will design a complete logo design. There is an entirely new introduction and tools section that has been added where we work through a 7 page vector tracing worksheet and in the end create a complex vector illustration using our newly learned illustrator vector tools. Lastly, we will put together an event flyer to practice our layout skills, and even work through the branding process and create a logo, business card and letterhead for a business.
We will will create a magazine layout in InDesign and learn the master pages tool to drastically speed up your design workflow when working with multiple paged layouts.
We will talk about branding basics, what makes a good logo? How do you extend your logo or brand to other marketing materials?
I designed this extensive course to be gentle enough for new comers to design but detailed enough for everyone to get a TON out of this course.
New Mini-Course Added!
Discover Your Design Niche!
Do you want to find out what design niche you should concentrate on? This is an exploratory mini-class added to the Graphic Design Masterclass course on Udemy (Section 15) that helps you find your next focus and explore many wonderful options for budding and established designers.
We are going to review some main core design categories and talk about what types of projects you will do and also what you will need to learn to leap into those design niches.
There are always more niches to discover but we will focus on the following in this mini-class:
Logo Design
Print & Editorial Design
Pattern Design and Illustration
Package Design
Branding Design
UX/UI Design
Social Media/Digital Graphic Designer
By the end of this class you will have a solid grasp of what each design niche entails. You will have confidence in choosing your top three focal niches to kickstart or enhance your design offerings and know what to learn next.
This course will teach you everything you need to know about UX, including design, content, and coding. And you’ll learn from the ground up, so it doesn’t matter how much experience you have when you start.
You’ll be exposed to principles and strategies, but, more importantly, you’ll learn how to actually apply these abstract concepts by coding three different websites for three very different audiences.
Improve Your Website with UX Strategies
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Apply UX strategies to a site’s content & design
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Understand Information Architecture to enhance the content on your website
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Know what dictates how your website should look
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Design and code a B2B website, a B2C blog, and an ecommerce site
Understand UX and Learn How to Develop Winning Websites
This course will help you stand out as a web designer, teaching you how to apply User Experience (UX) strategies that will make every site you build useful, usable, and valuable.
Reinforce what you’re learning using the bonus 30-page downloadable UX Guidebook. Filled with exercises and activities, the UX Guidebook is a great tool to reference as you progress through the course, or while developing your own custom sites.
You’ll also get hands-on experience designing and coding three different types of sites. This will give you the confidence to pursue similar projects if you’re already a website designer, if you want to get into web design, or if you want to enhance your current business site.
Contents and Overview
Even if you’re a complete beginner, this course will show you how to make a website functional, attractive and successful. It will walk you through all of the steps required to enhance the User Experience on any site, right down to the code, content, and design.
You’ll begin by defining who your website users are and what they expect from the website. You’ll also learn how business goals — yours or your client’s — have to be uncovered and addressed for site success.
You’ll learn what questions to ask both groups, and you’ll use the answers to inform your content and design decisions.
Next, you’ll dig into Information Architecture (IA), which looks at the content on your website, how you should categorize it, what you should call it, and more.
This will lay the foundation on which you can further build out your website to make users flock to it, stay on it, and hopefully make purchases.
Plus, you’ll tackle how to design your website depending upon who your visitors are, whether your website is B2B (business-to-business), B2C (business-to-consumer), or an ecommerce site for selling products online.
Different audiences have different needs, so learning what your target user expects from your site means you’ll be able to design and build a site that meets those expectations and leads to greater conversions.
In addition to knowing what you need to put into your website to make it stand out from the crowd, you’ll also learn how to identify and remove UX- and UI-related obstacles.
The ability to see and solve these problems will ensure every website you build moving forward will be useful, usable and valuable to the people who use it.
Most importantly, you’ll then learn how to actually build and code these types of sites using HTML, CSS, WordPress, and more.
You’ll not only know how to effectively design B2B, B2C, and ecommerce sites, but you’ll also know exactly how to develop these sites, from start to finish.
By the end of this course, you’ll have an in-depth understanding of UX and web design, as well as the tools to develop a variety of sites with the right code.
You’ll know why UX is so important to both users and businesses, what content is needed on a site, what UI design is appropriate, and how to transform your vision into a fully functional website using the most effective tools available.
This hands-on course examines how content is organized and structured to create an experience for a user, and what role the designer plays in creating and shaping user experience. You will be led through a condensed process that acts as a roadmap for developing robust UI/UX design: from ideation and sitemapping, to the creation of paper and digital prototypes. Building on the design skills learned in Visual Elements of User Interface Design, you will apply this methodology to produce a digital prototype for a multi-screen app of your own invention.
By the end of this course, you will be able to describe and apply current best practices and conventions in UX design, and employ the fundamental principles of how UX design functions to shape an audience’s experience of a given body of content.
This is the second course in the UI/UX Design Specialization, which brings a design-centric approach to user interface (UI) and user experience (UX) design, and offers practical, skill-based instruction centered around a visual communications perspective, rather than on one focused on marketing or programming alone.
These courses are ideal for anyone with some experience in graphic or visual design and who would like to build their skill set in UI or UX for app and web design. It would also be ideal for anyone with experience in front- or back-end web development or human-computer interaction and want to sharpen their visual design and analysis skills for UI or UX.
Welcome to Graphic Design, the second course in the Effective Communications Specialization. Over 70 different companies have provided this specialization to their employees as a resource for internal professional development. Why? Because employers know that effective visual communication is the key to attracting an audience, building a relationship, and closing the sale.
This practical course gives you the tools to create professional looking PowerPoints, reports, resumes, and presentations. Using a set of best practices refined through years of experience, you’ll:
• make your work look fresh and inspired.
• apply simple design “tricks” to begin any project with confidence and professionalism.
• receive and respond to criticism and revise your project from good to great.
“This course is fantastic. It teaches a great amount of starter graphic design information but it is broken down into easily understood videos and quizzes. The quality was top notch and the interaction was as good as you would get in a brick and mortar school. I did not feel like I was missing anything by taking it online.” – a recent Graphic Design student
All of the course assignments can be completed with basic presentation software such as Microsoft PowerPoint, Google Slides, or Apple Keynote. You’ll also have opportunities to explore and apply more sophisticated tools, such as Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator, and InDesign.
This course can be taken for academic credit as part of CU Boulder’s Master of Science in Data Science (MS-DS) degree offered on the Coursera platform. The MS-DS is an interdisciplinary degree that brings together faculty from CU Boulder’s departments of Applied Mathematics, Computer Science, Information Science, and others. With performance-based admissions and no application process, the MS-DS is ideal for individuals with a broad range of undergraduate education and/or professional experience in computer science, information science, mathematics, and statistics. Learn more about the MS-DS program at https://www.coursera.org/degrees/master-of-science-data-science-boulder.
Why Design Skills Are Essential
In today’s digital-first world, design has become an integral part of business success. Strong design skills help:
- Create visually appealing and functional interfaces
- Enhance user engagement and satisfaction
- Drive innovation and problem-solving
By investing in a design course, you’ll gain the knowledge and tools needed to excel in this dynamic industry.
Market Outlook and Salary Potential
Growing Demand for Design Professionals
The demand for skilled designers continues to grow as companies prioritize user-centric and visually compelling solutions. From startups to established enterprises, businesses are seeking creative professionals to shape their brand and user experiences.
Salary Potential in Design Fields
Design roles offer competitive salaries that vary based on specialization and experience level. Here are some averages based on Indeed, ZipRecruiter and Glassdoor:
- UX/UI Designers: $70,000 – $120,000 annually, with opportunities to grow in senior roles.
- Graphic Designers: $45,000 – $75,000 annually, depending on the scope of work and expertise.
- Product Designers: $80,000 – $130,000 annually, reflecting the strategic nature of the role.
These figures highlight the lucrative potential of a career in design, making it an exciting field to explore.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
Design courses are perfect for aspiring designers, professionals looking to upskill, and anyone interested in UX/UI, graphic, product, or visual design.
Courses often cover user experience (UX), user interface (UI), graphic design principles, product design strategies, branding, and design software like Figma or Adobe Suite.
Yes, many online design courses are taught by industry experts and offer practical assignments to help you build a strong portfolio.
Course durations vary. Some programs are a few weeks long, while comprehensive courses can take several months to complete.
Benefits include improved design skills, a stronger portfolio, career advancement opportunities, and the ability to work on diverse creative projects.
Conclusion
Design courses are a gateway to unleashing your creativity and building a rewarding career. Whether you’re passionate about UX/UI, graphic design, or product development, our top 10 courses can provide the skills and inspiration you need.
Explore these programs today and take the first step toward mastering the art and science of design.
Methodology: How We Determine Course Relevance
At ClassRanker, we aim to help users find the most relevant and high-quality courses quickly. To achieve this, we use a relevance-based ranking system inspired by the Bayesian Average method, which takes into account both course ratings and the number of reviews. This ensures that courses with a good mix of high ratings and solid review counts are ranked higher, while newer courses or those with fewer reviews are still given a fair chance.
Relevance-Based Sorting
Courses on ClassRanker are by default sorted by relevance, which takes into account:
- Course Rating: The average rating of each course (on a scale of 1 to 5).
- Review Count: The number of reviews the course has received.
We calculate the relevance of each course by balancing its rating with the number of reviews it has. Courses with higher ratings and more reviews naturally rank higher. However, we also ensure that courses with fewer reviews are not unfairly ranked just because of their high score.
Dynamic Baseline Values
The ranking system is driven by dynamic values that are recalculated regularly:
- Baseline Rating: The average rating of all courses in the database. This helps normalize the rankings.
- Baseline Review Count: The average number of reviews across all courses, which helps balance the weight between courses with many reviews and those with fewer reviews.
This approach ensures that as the database grows, the rankings remain fair and reflect the overall course quality and popularity.
Why This Matters
By sorting courses based on relevance, we ensure that the most useful, well-reviewed courses are prioritized, making it easier for you to discover the best content available. Our system is transparent and adapts over time, so new courses and ratings are always taken into account.
This methodology helps ClassRanker deliver relevant, high-quality course recommendations to meet your learning needs.
Course ratings and rankings are updated daily based on real student reviews and completion rates. The information shown here was last updated on February 16, 2025.