The Design Toolkit: Top 5 Tools for Designing Your Own Merchandise
Whether you’re trying to kick your business’ branding up a notch, or just want to try your hand at designing your own custom items, taking your first step into merch design for the first time can be intimidating if you don’t know where to start. From creating mockups to drafting your own designs, there is quite a lot to take into consideration.
However, many tools that can make things much simpler are readily available online. In this blog, we will introduce some of the resources and programmes that you can turn to for graphic design help and easy mockups.
You may have already heard of this particular website due to its reputation as one of the best tools to use for any sort of graphic design. Boasting a wealth of graphics, templates and fonts to browse through, Canva provides everything you need to create your own dazzling merch designs. Beginner-friendly and full of free resources, Canva is the go-to option for many designers who have just begun their journey.
Other than being an effective tool for creating designs, Canva also provides mockup templates for various merch types in both static and video form, allowing you to visualise how your designs would look in the wild. Especially if you’re just starting out with merch designing, Canva is definitely a great avenue to start with.
Best for: Casual and beginner designers
Cost: Free to use; optional tiered subscriptions to access more resources
- Canva Pro — $18/month
- Canva Business — $25/month
Made for creating high-end merch designs, Kittl contains an arsenal of resources that are meant to provide print-ready graphics. Unlike Canva, which is more versatile, Kittl focuses on tools for creating graphic-intensive designs for merchandise and apparel, such as vector manipulation and a wider range of text effects. This makes it easier to create impactful designs and edit them onto various merch items to create realistic mockups.
Easy and free to use, Kittl is a promising platform for aspiring merch designers who want to give their items that extra “oomph”
Best for: Both beginner and professional designers
Cost: Free to use; optional tiered subscriptions to access more resources and commercial rights
- Pro — $12/month
- Expert — $26/month
- Max — $48/month
If you have experience in design and want to try something that feels more professional, Inkscape is the one for you. Optimal for creating T-shirt designs in particular, Inkscape offers a variety of tools such as vector editing and drawing- and text-related resources to produce the perfect mockups. Additionally, Inkscape offers digitisation services for embroidery designs, allowing you to load your custom designs into an embroidery machine.
With a large range of free-source materials at your disposal and the freedom to go wild with your creative vision, Inkscape is a tool that is sure to satisfy any budding merch designer.
Best for: Professional and intermediate designers
Cost: Free to use
Link: Software can be downloaded via https://inkscape.org
Adobe Illustrator provides an industry-standard experience and interface for any serious merch designer. Much like Inkscape, Adobe Illustrator has a variety of professional tools that will benefit any designer, such as vector manipulation and high-precision tools that ensure optimal design quality. It supports various file formats and allows for illustration, logo creation and graphic design, all compressed into the same software.
If you’re in need of a professional design software, giving Adobe Illustrator a try is a must.
Best for: Professional designers
Cost: Paid subscription required
- Individual — $30.81/month
- Teams — $49.98/month
Pacdora is a free online tool that specialises in generating 3D mockups for a wide variety of merch items. Offering up to 2000+ different models to try your design out on, this site is sure to help you visualise which types and colours of merchandise would complement your design best. For any graphic designer who wants to play around with their printing options, Pacdora is the perfect fit.
Best for: Both beginner and professional designers
Cost: Free to use; optional tiered subscriptions to access more resources and commercial rights
- Lite — $14/month
- Pro — $29/month
- Business — $99/month
Summary
| Easy to use? | Range of resources? | Paid? | Suitable for: | |
| Canva | Beginner-friendly | Large variety of graphic resources for all kinds of graphic design, mockups available | Free to use, optional paid subscription to unlock more resources | Casual/ Beginner designers |
| Kittl | Beginner-friendly | Large variety of resources for merch-related designs (like logos), professional tools available | Free to use, paid subscription required for more resources and commercial rights | Beginner and professional designers |
| Inkscape | Intermediate | Professional tools for editing graphics and vectors available | Completely free to use | Professional designers, budding designers who want to try out professional tools |
| Adobe Illustrator | Intermediate | Professional tools for editing graphics and vectors available | Paid subscription (with a 7-day free trial) | Serious/ Professional designers |
| Pacdora | Beginner-friendly | 3D mockups only | Free to use, optional paid subscription to unlock more resources and commercial rights | Beginner and professional designers |