Useful websites for designers

1. Sharing & Portfolio Platforms

Behance

Pros: The largest platform for the creative community, it’s great for showcasing portfolios, building mood boards, interacting with others, and finding jobs. Insights: Users highly praise its community-building features and job-finding capabilities, thanks to its wide reach and visual appeal. Experts also agree that Behance is very strong for personal promotion.

Dribbble

Pros: A specialized social network for designers, supporting the sharing of “Shots” (quick previews), recruitment, and personal branding. Insights: Used by major companies like Starbucks and Facebook to hire designers. Users report that its focus on design makes Dribbble an ideal place to be seen and to network.

2. Icon & Resource Libraries

The Noun Project

Pros: An enormous library of community-contributed icons that supports many languages and offers various licensing options. It’s useful for quick, intuitive design. Insights: The rich symbolic language helps designers easily find icons that fit their theme. Experts value the fact that the vector illustrations are stored in a format that’s easy to customize.

3. Inspiration and Trend-Tracking

Awwwards

Pros: This website specializes in curating and showcasing outstanding web designs from around the world, judging them on creativity, technical skill, and user experience. Insights: It’s a rich source of inspiration. Many design professionals follow it to stay updated on trends and to shape their creative thinking.

Designboom

Pros: A web-magazine covering industrial design, architecture, and art. It features interviews, international events, exhibitions, and design competitions. Insights: Industry experts highly regard the depth and quality of its content. Users appreciate how it reflects real-world design trends.

Dezeen

Pros: An internationally reputable online magazine for architecture and design that has received numerous journalism and media awards. Insights: It’s a key resource for keeping up with global design and architectural trends and is often cited by professionals for staying current with effective styles and content.

4. Modern Design & Collaboration Tools

Figma

Pros: A web-based UI/UX design platform that supports team-based work and streamlines the collaboration process. It recently launched AI features—Figma Sites, Make, Buzz, Draw—to help users create websites, interactive code, marketing content, and vector illustrations all in one place. Insights: Experts consider Figma a pioneering tool that turns design into “a part of the business.” It is especially powerful in the AI era due to its deep and continuous integration.

5. Website Builders

These platforms help designers build sites without needing to know how to code.

• Wix: Features a flexible drag-and-drop editor, over 900 templates, and AI support to suggest layouts and content.
• Squarespace: Has a beautifully designed interface, suitable for users who prioritize aesthetics, and includes powerful blogging and e-commerce tools.
• Hostinger: Inexpensive (starting from ~$3/month) and offers an AI Writer and Heatmap for site drafting, making it a great fit for users with a limited budget.
• Shopify & Webflow: Shopify is for professional e-commerce, while Webflow is for designers and developers who need precise design control without using code.

Quick Comparison Summary