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16 Great Graphic Design Blogs and Sites

May 18th in Inspiration, Web Roundups by Danny Outlaw

What are your favorite design blogs and sites? There are so many design blogs now, that your top list is sure to be a bit different. Here we've collected 16 great design sites that consistently bring high-quality material to their audience. They are filled with great resources, original material, thought provoking articles, or well constructed design tutorials that keep you growing as a designer. Add these sites to your feed reader, if they aren't already in there!

PG

Author: Danny Outlaw

Danny Outlaw is best known for his work at Outlaw Design Blog. Aside from blogging, he also works full time as a Wordpress designer. Danny has freelanced from all over the world and is working on a book and website in which he will share his experience about Freelancing Abroad. Danny also has an unhealthy obsession with toys, LOST, and Sharpie markers.

1. The Dieline

I'm not sure how many people know about this blog, but I just recently found it and liked what I saw. If you are looking for good packaging design inspiration, this is the place to find it. Here you can see outstanding packaging, labels, and other printed products. You can even vote on designs you like to share your opinion on the design. The posts include large and crisp images of the products. More complex packages might also include a variety of shots.

2. Outlaw Design Blog

OK, maybe this is a little shameless self promotion, but at least Outlaw Design Blog has a lot to offer in the way of graphic design. Aside from the freelance resources for graphic designers, you can also find a growing collection of Photoshop tutorials. There are also a number of print design tutorials that are currently in the works and should be surfacing soon.

3. Designer Daily

This is another up and coming graphic design blog that is worth keeping an eye on. Its really just another design blog that showcase both web design as well as graphic design and some other design related news. That said, the selection of materials that is on the site at the time of this writing seem to be really useful. A nice amount of up to date roundups of things like icon sets, poster design, etc.

4. We Made This

This is another personal blog from a smaller design firm. The nice thing about this graphic design blog is that you won't find the same old stuff here. Nope. No web roundups and major list of awesome icon sets. This blog is more devoted to the authors outlook on graphic design in day to day life.

What is nice here is that the author usually highlights some form of graphic design in a post and then shares some of his thoughts on it. It is a nice read if you are tired of the same old design blog.

5. Ad Goodness

I don't know what sort of graphic designer doesn't enjoy looking at creative advertisements. Its kind of like porn for designs in my opinion. Personally, I am addicted to the stuff. The Ad Goodness blog showcases some of the most creative ads to be conceptualized.

One nice feature of the blog is that they try to credit as many people as possible for the work involved. From the photographer to the creative director, they credit as many people as they can. Another great feature is that you get nice big images to look at rather than smaller ones typically found on blogs.

6. Authentic Boredom

I'm not really sure how you would describe Cameron Moll's blog, but its one that has to make this list. I have been reading this blog for a while now and recently started following him on Twitter. Cameron's blog is the blog for his portfolio/business site. But that's not to say it is filled with self promotion and personal rants, although there is some of that too.

On this blog you can find a wide variety of topics and articles about graphic design, history, theories, and more. I would compare this blog to something like a more personal version of The New Yorker magazine. There are lots of articles where he offers his professional opinion about both web and graphic design.

7. Smashing Magazine

I think you would be hard pressed to find a graphic designer that doesn't know about Smashing Magazine, but this list wouldn't be complete without it. Plus, everyone has to discover Smashing Magazine at some point right? This site may very well have set the standard for the web roundup style post on all things web design and graphic design related. No matter what you are looking for as far as graphic design goes, you'll likely find it covered in some fashion on Smashing Magazine.

8. Im Just Creative Blog

If you are a logo designer on the hunt for a good logo design blog, you have probably realized there is a very limited selection on the topic. One of the lesser known logo design blogs I follow belongs to a serious name in the Twitter community, I'm Just Creative.

The blog is his personal blog for his logo design business. It includes everything from inspiration posts, showcase of his own work, and logo and typography articles. If you are big into typography and appreciate an organic approach to logo design, then this is your guy.

9. David Airey Blog

In complete contrast with the above recommendation would be logo designer David Airey's blog. I say complete contrast only due to the fact that just about every one in the logo community knows who he is. I'm not sure how many people know of Im Just Creative.

Popularity aside, David's blog is full of useful and interesting posts for logo designers and graphic designers. He has a lot of personal articles about typography, branding, logo design, and business.

10. Go Media Blog

I'm sure everyone out there knows about Go Media and their awesome vector packs, but have you ever taken the time to visit their website? If so, you have probably stumbled across their company blog. If not, you are in for a surprise.

This isn't your usual design firm blog. No, this blog is almost another division of the company altogether. This blog sports a ton of real great info for all kinds of graphic designers. From comic book artist to t-shirt designers, there is some sort of article or tutorial on this site that will help you increase your skills and teach all sorts advanced techniques not found elsewhere.

11. Core 77 Blog

It surprises me that you don't hear more about a number of the articles that come from Core 77. there are a lot of long and comprehensive graphic design articles to found here. Equally surprising is the lack of reader interaction on some of their posts.

Make no mistake though, the Core 77 blog is filled with tons of great posts that cover a variety of topics that graphic designers will appreciate. They cover a variety of topics from interviews with top designers to showcases of outstanding design, packaging, and much more.

12. Blog Spoon Graphics

There is certainly a shortage of graphic design blogs out there that really showcase Illustrator in all its glory. Lucky for us, Blog Spoon Graphics exists. In my opinion, this blog is one of the best blogs to find Illustrator related tutorials (aside from our very own Vectortuts+ site of course).

While there are a ton of great vector related tutorials on this blog, the articles I find the most interesting are the ones where blog owner, Chris, shares his design practices. There are a number of tutorials where he shares his design process from concept to completion on a number of his personal and paid projects.

13. Design is Kinky

The Design is Kinky blog is a nice place to find a wide variety of graphic design news, inspiration, and links all in one place. This graphic design blog streams a lot of more trendy related design materials.

The author definitely has a style of design that he likes and shares all the cool things he finds and comes across on the web. I'm sure his style is very much in line with a variety of you out there. Lots of designer toys, skulls, bright colors, and well...kinky design stuff. A nice blog to discover new graphic design related stuff.

14. Veer - The Skinny

If you are one of those designers who refuses to buy a font or pay top dollar for a stock photograph, then you probably have never truly explored the Veer website. Veer sells high quality fonts and stock resources, but also has a world of other resources as well. One of these resources being its sites main blog.

The blog covers a wide variety of graphic design related topics. Some of my favorite post they do are the ones that showcase creative posters and ad campaigns. What I like about these aside from outstanding images is that they often tell the back story behind the design which always makes for an interesting read.

15. Anamorphosis

It seems that a number of popular graphic design blogs cover a spectrum of topics. The design blog Anamorphosis is no exception. While the blog design itself is simple, the content that graces its posts is great.

What really gets me interested in this blog is that they actually write articles about events, things they find inspiring, etc. Whereas other graphic design blogs simply share a picture they like or give you links to other sites. This site reads sort of like a newspaper. It is simple and to the point, but still engaging and informative.

16. Creative Curio

This blog would be a lot cooler if it got updated more, as the content on it is really quite educational. There are a lot of original and creative print design type tutorials there. These aren't your basic create a flyer type tutorials, but more experimental and educational tutorials to help make you a better designer by showing you how to think outside the box. There are lots of design theory type articles here that are written in a more creative manner and not like boring text book material.

Graphic Design Week

To celebrate the launch of GraphicRiver's new Print Design Templates category we're putting on a whole week of graphic design tutorials on both Psdtuts+ and Vectortuts+. The new category means you can now sell your design work to make extra cash On the flip side if you're coming up short on inspiration, you can get a kickstart by grabbing a Photoshop, Illustrator or InDesign template via GraphicRiver. So to give the new category the launch it deserves, all this week we'll be bringing you articles and tutorials just like this one, on graphic design as part of our Tuts+ Graphic Design Week.

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User Comments

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  1. PG

    Mark May 18th

    cool stuff

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      Frog May 21st

      Not wrong Mark!

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    lawrence77 May 18th

    danny you put your blog also :lol:

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      chilakilez May 25th

      I have in my bookmarks 165 blogs for graphic design, and somehow, someone listing “16 Great Graphic Design Blogs and Sites” and listing their own blog in there just doesnt do it for me… I have 149 reasons to say this list left me with a bad taste in my mouth…

      ( Reply )
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    Nick May 18th

    Nice ones…haven’t seen half of these.

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    Benjamin Reid May 18th

    It’s good to see ‘Blog Spoon Graphics’ in there!

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    massafakka May 18th

    nice v nice. im looking forward the great stuff to come…
    wow what a week ;) this is really one of the best sites in internet…
    thx so much….

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    Victoria Web May 18th

    Some really good examples of blog sites, with great style and imagery like “we made this” simple but effective design.

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    Danh ba web 2.0 May 18th

    I voted Outlaw Design Blog, Smashing Magazine and Blog Spoon Graphics. Thanks for nice list

    You can see my blog: http://tr.im/lDmi

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    wpheroes May 18th

    Nice list!

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    stuartflatt May 18th

    Some uncommon ones there, others to think of;
    freelance folder
    web designer wall
    just creative design

    ( Reply )
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    Pradeep CD May 18th

    Great list… i did not know some of them…thanks

    ( Reply )
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    Fabio Sasso May 18th

    Great list, what about abduzeedo.com?

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      lawrence77 May 18th

      Thats my question too??? :(

      ( Reply )
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      Claudia May 20th

      yeah i was gonna say u missed abduzeedo!

      ( Reply )
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      Frog May 21st

      abduzeedo! should of been top of the list

      ( Reply )
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    olybop May 18th

    nice selection ! Thx !

    ( Reply )
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    cecilie enoksen May 18th

    thank you 4 this post !!! amazing blogs

    ( Reply )
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    bekaix May 18th

    great list, but abduzeedo? personally is the best site for a graphic designer

    ( Reply )
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    Grafpedia May 18th

    Great list. Thanks

    ( Reply )
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    shawn May 18th

    Don’t forget http://www.behance.net. that is a great resource for inspiration. But this is my daily goto site.

    ( Reply )
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    Freddy Samuel May 18th

    thanks for adding adgoodness :)

    ( Reply )
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    Bobby May 18th

    This is a good list, but what about Veerle Pieter’s blog???

    http://veerle.duoh.com/

    She has tons of exceptional graphic design related articles and tutorials. Especially on Illustrator and Photoshop. :)

    ( Reply )
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    AREA 1 May 18th

    Great job with this list ;)

    ( Reply )
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    thomas May 18th

    you missed http://sharebrain.info :)

    thx for the list !
    greetings,
    thomas

    ( Reply )
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    Ted May 18th

    Some of this site is… meh

    ( Reply )
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    Dario Gutierrez May 18th

    Interesting list Danny.

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    Holly May 18th

    Thanks for the list!

    ( Reply )
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    Zik May 18th

    Very good list ! Thanks for sharing

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    chris May 18th

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    Sergio Ordóñez May 18th

    If you dont want to loose your credibility you never should add your own site on a “X great sites…” list, it makes us think you are listing the sites to promote yourself and your buddies… shameless self promotion, as you admit.

    I would do my list and I would add a link inviting the PSDTuts users to visit my blog at the end of the post.

    ( Reply )
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    John May 18th

  28. A great reference to a lot of blogs on the scene, now I just need to find the time to read them all without missing any deadlines :-0

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    Pam May 18th

    Hi Danny,
    Thanks for the work on the list…and mostly for mixing it up a little. I have seen most of these even the newer ones but it’s nice to finally see them recognized on a list.

    There are so many great designers and their blogs that it is simply impossible to represent them all in one post…so good job.

    Thanks,
    Pam

    ( Reply )
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    bob May 18th

    dont forget abduzeedo.com either…

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    Renzo May 18th

    man, nice list you have here, I personally love GoMedia site.

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    Susan B May 18th

    this is a good site for the business side of graphic design http://www.forgraphicdesignersonly.com/ Has podcasts and lots of useful tools too.

    ( Reply )
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    Carla May 18th

    You forgot Abduzeedo.com =)

    ( Reply )
  34. Whoa, Danny, I’m floored! Thank you for mentioning Creative Curio!!! So I guess I need to start updating more, huh? :) It is in the works! I’m coming back! Thanks for the motivation!

    Oh, and I agree with Susan B, For Graphic Designers Only is an awesome blog on the business side of design. Michael Huggins is on Twitter, too, and he sometimes Tweets articles you can’t find just by going to the site.

    ( Reply )
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    Lionel May 19th

    très belle liste. Merci beaucoups

    ( Reply )
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    Jamie Allsop May 19th

    These are some really great examples of sites that are well designed and have had some though go into them, I especially like the We Made This blog. Now I just need to find the time to read these blogs, thanks for sharing this great list.

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    Tomas Matejka May 19th

    Great one

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    Agustin May 19th

    thanks

    ( Reply )
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    EMware May 19th

    Nice collection … thx !

    ( Reply )
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    hybridanime49 May 19th

    Awesome sites! great way to learn about design!

    ( Reply )
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    chetan May 20th

    i would like to suggest couple of sites in that….

    http://wb4d.com
    http://hiddenpixels.com

    ( Reply )
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    praeter design May 20th

    My two cents Adobe’s Kuler http://kuler.adobe.com

    Great for a quick color set grab

    ( Reply )
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    Wooden Toys May 20th

    Very good list !

    ( Reply )
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    Jarod Taylor May 21st

    I subscribe to most of these already, but there are certainly a couple more out there that should’ve made the list.

    While it’s not updated necessarily daily, Nick La’s Web Designer Wall is a great read. So is Jay Hilgert’sBittbox.

    Good list!

    ( Reply )
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    Mikah Sargent May 21st

    I visited all of these sites, and subscribed to RSS wherever possible! Thanks for the list.

    ( Reply )
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    ideamashups.com May 21st

    Great list! Thanks!

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    aidil May 21st

    good list (some are classics e.g. designiskinky),

    and here are my personal favs, which are http://www.k10k.net and http://www.thefwa.com

    :)

    ( Reply )
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    underdog May 22nd

    the most blog .i was visited.

    ( Reply )
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    Osvaldo Uribe May 22nd

    You need to know http://alucinogena.com

    is the best blog ever… they have a lot of content and link…

    is on spanish, but is cool also!

    ( Reply )
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    Radu Chelariu May 25th

    Awesome, albeit short, list. Some of these are on my “first things in the morning” list. If the first thing you do before brushing your teeth is check design blogs….you might be a design junkie :P

    Boy, I almost feel ashamed to push my blog in here. But hey, what’s shame going to get a blogger starting out? http:/sickdesigner.com/ is my design blog.

    ( Reply )
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    Sneh | LBOI Blog May 25th

    Some of these are new to me! Thanks for the list :-)

    ( Reply )
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      SEO Rab October 5th

      and me too, thanks for the review

      ( Reply )
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    Yampper May 25th

    Very good list ! Thanks

    ( Reply )
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    Paul Saunders May 26th

    ummm more RSS feeds thanx!!

    ( Reply )
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    rory May 27th

    Well there goes my morning…

    Nice collection of blogs, some of these Ive never heard of so I’ll be checking them out, hopefully they’ll give me some inspiration for my web design.

    …ssh dont tell the boss!

    ( Reply )
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    Graphic Designer May 28th

    If somebody says cool stuff or nice list again, am gonna kick there butt!
    Surely you can contribute more than that peeps?

    ( Reply )
  56. PG

    graphic design June 9th

  57. PG

    Best flash sites June 15th

    It would be kinda of interactive media,where anybody can post the dreams they had during their sleep… With so many people now interested in dream interpretation,

    ( Reply )
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    John June 27th

    Thanks for these and also for the links in peoples replies to this too, some great resources out there.

    ( Reply )
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    Victoria Web July 22nd

    The dieline website is my favourite, i really like the open design and simple icons. Its a very clean looking website, without looking empty a perfect space to showcase products.

    ( Reply )
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    Sam July 28th

    Thanks for sharing these fantastic blogs, I will check out the one I didn’t already know about now.

    ( Reply )
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    Matt - New-Logo.co.uk August 22nd

    This is a great list. I had not seen imjustcreative.com so am pleased to see this being as I am a logo designer. Thank you for sharing.

    ( Reply )
  62. Nice design blogs and sites. My vote goes out to Outlaw Design Blog, Smashing Magazine, and Go Media Blog. But the list is incomplete without abduzeedo. Anyways, I do understand that it is almost impossible to mention all in a single post as there are too many great design sites out there.

    ( Reply )
  63. Hello
    Great post

    ( Reply )
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    clippingimages October 7th

    Nice collection. Well defined. Thanks for sharing this great post.

    ( Reply )
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    Web Design Manchester November 9th

    Some great examples of well-made design. Thanks for posting

    ( Reply )
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    Kimmy November 16th

    Thanks for sharing this list! You should check out the guys at http://www.madmediamonkey.com They offer some of the best resources and hv grown. Have a gd day everyone =D

    ( Reply )
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