Canva design review – using Canva for business
When it comes to how to create your own graphics, there’s only a few graphic tools I’d consider using and Canva is definitely one of them. I wanted to do a Canva design review so that you could see how easy it can be using Canva for business.
What is Canva?
A free graphic design tool that allows you to easily create;
- Visual social media graphics (posts, covers, ads, banners, icons etc)
- Pinterest and infographics
- Printables, flyers, posters
- Logo and business cards
- Presentations
What features do you get? (Both free and Canva premium)
- Simple to use drag and drop editing tool that allows you to use text, stock photos and art elements.
- Huge library of design templates; 250,000+ free templates
- Thousands of stock photos are great (millions for pro)
- Printing Service
- Font pairing
- Background removal (pro)
- Schedule social media posts (pro)
- Optimisation on export (PNG transparent backgrounds for pro)
- Colour combination chart
- Design school – colour theory in practice
- One click resizing tool (pro)
Canva design review for those using Canva for business graphics
Wait don’t stress out just yet!
What’s great about Canva?
As a source of inspiration, templates and a library of stock photos. Canva is great. Not only is it my main tool for social media, I also use it to create activities and printables for my son.
Canva Pro is all you need to create social media graphics, printables, and advertising to promote your products, services and blog.
What’s annoying about Canva?
As a photographer I can’t go any further without mentioning just how bad the image editor is. This is not a photo editor, despite the ability to actually perform photo edits. The tool is crude and destroys lovely photos. Please do not edit photos in Canva.
It’s completely web based. No internet means no tool. So if you’re on the go, this would be a major drawback compared to other apps.
Some templates are over used, and are extremely identifiable. If you scroll through instagram or Pinterest you’ll see plenty of Canva templates being use straight from the box. Make sure you put your own twist on the templates, in order to keep them unique.
No source file you can edit after the fact. At the current time you can only export images as jpg, png and pdf really, which means you need to complete it in Canva. You won’t be switching tools like you can in Adobe.
How much does Canva cost?
Let’s talk money, is Canva free to use? Yes, but for a full break of how much is Canva check out the table below. When it comes to Canva pro vs free and the good old question of is it worth it? I’d always recommend a Canva pro free trial, so that you can get a feel for it.
I personally, use Canva Pro because of its wealth of stock photos and templates. I’ve found that it’s all I need.
| Free – Best for occasional use | Pro – Best for using Canva for business | Enterprise – best for social media managers |
|---|---|---|
| £0.00 | £99.99 yearly £10.99 monthly | £24/ per person |
| 250,000+ free templates 100+ design types (social media posts, presentations, letters, and more) Hundreds of thousands of free photos and graphics Invite members to your team Collaborate and comment in real-time 5GB of cloud storage | Everything Free has, plus: Create 1 Brand Kit and upload your own fonts and logos One-click design Magic Resize 420,000+ free templates with new designs daily 75+ million premium stock photos, videos, audio and graphics free-to-use Save designs as templates for your team to use 100GB of cloud storage Schedule social media content to 7 platforms | Everything Pro has, plus: Establish your brand’s visual identity with logos, colors and fonts across multiple Brand Kits Control your team’s access to apps, graphics, colors, logos and fonts with brand controls Control team uploads into Canva Built-in workflows to get approval on your designs Set which elements your team can edit, and stay on-brand with template locking Unlimited storage Single-sign on (SSO) 24/7 Enterprise-level support |
Canva pro free for educators
It’s worth a note that educators and non-profit charity organisations can get Canva pro for free, apply here.
Who’s Canva for and who it’s not for?
Canva is a great graphic design tool for those who want to create easily, without the learning curve of alternatives like Adobe Photoshop and
Tools similar to Canva
Picmonkey is the most similar Canva alternative.
Piktochart is great for long form infographics.
Crello is a smaller version of Canva. Has similar designs, but no where near the range.
If the lack of power in the image editor fills you with dread. Then I recommend Adobe’s Creative Cloud where you can play and switch between highly powerful tools specific to your need; from photo editing in Lightroom to creating social graphics in Indesign. But it can be overwhelming.
If you want something simplify photo editing then Luminar AI is your friend.
How to use Canva?
How to use Canva app
Canva tips I wished I’d know when I started out
Canva Tutorials
Canva Tutorials
The simple questions we've all asked about Canva finally answered in one simple place. Don't forget to save this for later.
How to Create a Brand Kit in Canva
Save time with all your branding saved in one place. No more having to remember hex codes and fonts.
How to Curve Text in Canva
Everyone loves a curve, and finally Canva has joined the rest with Curved text.
Canva Must know shortcuts
- Add a line: L
- Add a rectangle: R
- Add a circle: C
- Add a text box: T
- Bold text: Command-B
- Italicise text: Command-I
- Underline text: Command-U
- Use uppercase letters: Command-Shift-K
- Left align text: Shift-Command-L
- Center align text: Shift-Command-C
- Anchor text to the top of text box: Shift-Command-H
- Anchor text to the middle of text box: Shift-Command-M
- Anchor text to the bottom of text box: Shift-Command-B
- Decrease font size by one point: Shift-Command-,
- Increase font size by one point: Shift-Command-.
- Decrease line spacing: Option-Command-Down
- Increase line spacing: Option-Command-Up
- Decrease letter spacing: Option-Command-,
- Increase letter spacing: Option-Command-.
- Tidy up: Alt-Shift-T
- Copy style: Command-Option-C
- Paste style: Command-Option-V
- Deselect an element: Esc
- Select all elements: Command-A
- Save: Command + S
- Delete Selection Content: Backspace or Delete
- Duplicate an element (option 1): select the element and click Command-D
- Duplicate an element (option 2): select the element, click Command-C to copy, and Command-V to paste
- Move an element in increments: select the element and click the arrows
- Move an element in larger increments: select the element, hold Shift, and click the arrows
- Bring element forward: select the element and click Command + ]
- Send element backward: select the element and click Command + [
- Send element to the very back: select element and click Option-Command-[
- Bring element to the very front: select element and click Option-Command-]
- Select an element behind an element: select the front element, hold Command, and keep clicking until you reach the element at the back
- Group elements: select the elements and click Command-G
- Ungroup elements: Shift-Command-G
- Move multiple elements (not grouped): select an element, hold Shift, select the other elements, and drag them
- Constrain proportions while resizing: select the element/s, hold Shift, and drag corners to resize
- View an element’s distance from other elements and from the edges: select an element, hold Option, and move your cursor
- Zoom in: Command (+)
- Zoom out: Command (-)
- Zoom to actual size: Command-0
- Zoom to fit: Alt-Command-0
- Zoom to fill: Shift-Command-0
- Undo an Action: Command-Z
- Redo an Action: Command-Shift-Z
- Add a comment: Option-Command-M
- Next comment: N
- Previous comment: Shift-N
- Present in full screen mode: Option-Command-P
- Exit from full screen mode: Esc
- Mute or unmute video: M
- Loop video: Alt-Shift-L
- Play or pause video: Spacebar
- Presentations: Q to shush crowd
- Presentations: D for drumroll
- Presentations: C for confetti
- Presentations: O for bubbles
- Presentations: B to blur presentation
- Collapse sidebar: Command + /
- Enter scrolling view: Option-Command-1
- Enter thumbnail view: Option-Command-2
- Enter grid view: Option-Command-3
- Toggle assistant: ?
- Navigate to the toolbar: Command-F1
- Lock / unlock: Alt-Shift-L
- Show guides: Command-;
- Show Rulers: Shift-R
- Add an empty page: Command-Enter
- Delete empty page: Command-Backspace
