99 Sites ALL Designers Must Know About
Written by Jacob Cass on Monday, February 25, 2008 – 3:59 pm
Below is a list of 99+ graphic design resources, in English and (and a few other languages), that all designers must know about.
It is sorted by category (click to go to category):
- General Design
- Web Design
- Resources
- Show Cases
- Development
- Flash and Flex
- Typography
- Video and Motion
- Personal Design Blogs
- Web 2.0
- Relaxation
- Various
For more resources you can check out the 101 Places To Get Design Inspiration. Also don’t forget to subscribe for more graphic design resources.
General Design
1 Spunk United
An excellent magazine with a selection of the worlds best artists providing inspiration, interviews, articles and more.
2 FreeLance Switch
The community site of reference for all freelances. You must know this one!
3 Computer Arts
The site of the excellent international magazine Computer Arts. I have subscribed to this mag and love it!
4 David Airey
A graphic and logo designer who shares his knowledge on these areas.
5 Behance
A site gathering the portfolios of the artists of the whole world, a true inspiration.
6 Pdf Mags
References all the PDF mags out there! A great resource.
7 Graphic Design Forum
The most active of the graphic design forums out there. A bit more focused for the beginner designer.
8 Design Is Kinky
An Australia site focused purely on design news and design in general. Stay up to date!
9 Freelance Folder
A community blog which posts regular articles on freelancing. Very diverse.
10 Bittbox
Provides regular resources for design… tutorials, brushes, vectors and more!
11 Vandelay Webdesign
Provides very social media friendly articles, large resource lists and tips for web designers.
12 You The Designer
Very complete and diverse range of articles on graphic design.
13 Design You Trust
A daily design magazine, blog and small community, full of new design trends, news and events, great design portfolios and hand-picked design stuff from all over the globe.

Web Design:
14 Noupe
An excellent site on Web design & the development of the web (CSS & Ajax).
15 Smashing Magazine
Information for all. So broad that if you are a designer and you don’t know this site, we all have pity for you.
16 Think Vitamin
Vitamin is a resource for web designers, developers and entrepreneurs. 50,000 subscirbers can’t be wrong.
17 24 Ways
Web design and development, quality articles are always here.
18 A List Apart
Another pillar of the Web Design blog world, very good articles with diversified contributors.
19 Site Point
Very diversified site, graphics, css, ajax… Also editor of many Web Design books.
20 The Rissington Podcast
Excellent podcasts full with humour of excellent the Web Designer John Oxton and Jon Hicks.
21 Web Appers
Blog of Open Resources for Web Developers. .
22 Happy Cog
They publish their best ideas and speak out to the world on web design.
23- Web Designer Wall
A must have for all web designers and designers out there!

Resources:
24 Design Float
A digg like site for design related subjects. Must know!
25- Psd Tuts
The best tutorials on the web. Mmmmm.
26- Blue Vertigo
The MUST HAVE bookmark of all stock resourceson the net.
27- SXC.hu
My favourite stock site, you may notice I use this site for most of my images on this site.
28- Icon Finder
Self explanitory.
29- Da Font
Free fonts. Mmmm.
30 Maniackers Design Make
A lot of inspiration can be found here along with a lot of free resources. Bit hard to navigate though.
31- Colour Lovers
Find, create and exchange your pallets of favourite colors.

Show Cases:
32- Command Shift 3
Have you heard of hot or not? This is like that but for web designs, you choose the best website of 2. Great for inspiration.
33- Showcase Point
Showcases Flash & CSS sites with several options of sorting.
34- Zeniltuo
Large database of all the inspiration sites out there.
35- The FWA
Mainly shows off flash websites but is always of high quality. Great inspiration here.
36- CSS Mania
Another showcase site.
37- CSS Remix
A very good gallery of CSS websites.
38- Best Web Gallery
A very good selection of designs.
39- ScreenFluent
A very good selection of Web designs.
40 W3C Sites
Excellent selection of valid W3C sites.
41- CSS Beauty
A good gallery and it also has very interesting articles on the development of websites with news.
42- Edu Style
The schools and universities have also right to a gallery css, this one is particularly remarkable.

Development:
43 - Problogger
Tips on blogging in general. Must have for any blogger.
45- Pro Blog Design
Tips on improving your blogs design. Only quality articles here.
46- WP designer
The blog of reference for all the WordPress developers.
47- Ajax Rain
One of largest Ajax bookshops on the Web.
48- CSS3.info
The site of future standards - CSS3.
49- CSS Earth
Site referring the best articles on the development of CSS on the Web.

Flash & Flex:
51- Labs Adobe
New technologies and development from Adobe.
52- Christophe Coenraets
Blog of a Flex developer.
54- Adobe AIR Tutorials
The site of for tutorials on AIR.
55- Mike Chambers
The blog of Mike Chambers based on programming and technology.
56- The Blog Flash
Blog for Action Script 3 and Flex.
57- Jean Phi Blog
One of the largest French flashers. Has some great work, but the French part may be a problem for some.

Typography:
60 Swiss Legacy
A blog focused on typography, swiss design and the grid.
61- I Love Typography
Speaks for itself. A must know.
62- Design & Typo
The blog of the famous Peter Gabor, posts cool inspiration pieces (in English too).
63- The Typographer
The site on typography for the French.
64- Slanted
Large German site on typography.

Video & Motion:
65- Stage6
YouTube of animation (2d and 3d). Great quality.
66- Fubiz
A great blog which posts creative daily inspirational pieces of design. Bookmark this one for sure.
67- Motiono Grapher
International reference for all who are in the motion business.
68- Video Copilot
Tutorials of creating special video effects.
69- Graphics/ Motion
Italian Blog of Motion, the articles are of great quality and are updated very regularly.
70 FX Guide
Great Community site of Video and Motion, do not miss this one!
71- Works Motion
The site of John Dickinson, great inspiration here.

Personal Design Blogs:
72- Elliot Jay Stocks
Just check it out. His name pops up everywhere!
73- Veerle Blog
One of most beautiful blosg on the Web, very complete articles and tutorials, in short a must.
75- Jina Bolton
Design of Jina Bolton (aka Sushi Monster), author of the book “Art & Science of CSS” and of the excellent conference “Create Sexy StyleSheet.” A very envious portfolio.
76- Snook
Blog of the graphic designer, developer, writer and lecturer of Jonathan Snook - very complete tips and tricks for all Web Designers.
76- Stuff And Nonsense
Super and super blog of Markley, one of best WebDesigners in the world.
77- Lysergid
Blog of the excellent French Art Director Loïc SATTLER. Great articles, fresh design.
78- Iso 50
Blog of the excellent graphic designer Scott Hansen.
79- John Nack Blog
Blog of John Nack, composed of very complete article on graphics and Adobe.

Web2.0:
80 NetVibes
The web comes to you. News aggregator plus!
81- Del.Ico.Us
A tool for bookmaking and social media attention, must have!
82- Twitter
Get updates on what your friends, co workers, etc are doing.
83- FaceBook
A website where you can pass your life.
84- Flickr
The social site of photography - a great number of people are present there with new photographs to discover each day.

Relaxation:
Places for just browsing - Areas that most designers are interested in. (ie. Fashion, Music, Design)
85- Vinyl misuses
A magazine about toys.. Must check this site out, some really cool designs.
86- Discobelle
Excellent site of music, showcases music videos, parties, etc.
87- Hype Beast
Magazine for fashion design and culture.
88- Lense
A French reference for all those who wish to know some more about photography.
90 PopRave Blog
Underground culture of the clothes industry.
Various:
91- All Graphic Design
A site for everything graphic design related.
92- North X East
Articles for bloggers.
93- Ads Of The World
Web site which publishes all of the worlds ads. Great inspiration here.
94- LogoPond
Logo Design Inspiration
95- Logo Design Love
A blog focused totally on Logo Design. Regular articles and resources.
96- Split Da Diz
I have translated his page from French into English as he was the original poster of this article however I changed the French sites he recommended into English ones, fixed the old links he had posted and changed the order of some items… Visit his site!
97- Boing Boing
A genearl directory of wonderful things.
98- Business of Design Online
Pretty much anything to help a design business grow online.
99- Just Creative Design
Who else would have brought you this massive English list of 99+ graphic design resources? We provide graphic design tips, resources and articles for all.
More Sites You Should Know About
- DesignFlavr -The masters of Design and Illustration.
- Inspiredology - The social media master of design. Inspiration at its best.
- DesignMeltDown - Categorises websites into categories for inspiration.
- Creative Briefing - A web workers blog.
- ImageAfter - A great stock site.
- IgniteMotion - Free motion backgrounds.
- CSS Artillery - A showcase of web standards across the globe.
- CreativeBits - A mac orientated website around design.
- Communication Arts - The essential creative resource.
- Designers Who Blog - A blog dedicated to designers who blog among other things.
- NO-SPEC - Educate the public and designers about speculative, or ’spec’ work. Must read.
- Creative Latitude - A worldwide community that unites various creative disciplines for collective promotion, education and ethical business practice.
What other sites should be added? What are your favourites?
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By speckyboy (1 comments) on Feb 25, 2008 | Reply
Excellent resource list. I have dugg it. Keep it up.
speckyboy’s last blog post..53 Steps to follow if you want to become Freelance Web Designer/Developer (60+ Resources)
By Mark Bloomfield (1 comments) on Feb 25, 2008 | Reply
Awesome post! Well researched…
My addition:
Wikkid Apps is a great showcase of awesome web applications for a wide variety of applications.
Mark Bloomfield’s last blog post..Pulse
By Dexter | Techathand.net (8 comments) on Feb 25, 2008 | Reply
A very good resource… I like it ( Stumble )
Dexter | Techathand.net’s last blog post..WordPress Tips : Is it good to Use Excerpt
By kroma (1 comments) on Feb 25, 2008 | Reply
Great Collection
By Dmitry (1 comments) on Feb 25, 2008 | Reply
Jacob, great job!
By Tjobbe (1 comments) on Feb 25, 2008 | Reply
Great set of links there, but a lot of your title tags on the links are completely muddled up.. Tjobbe’s last blog post..Facebook fading away?
By Jacob Cass (634 comments) on Feb 25, 2008 | Reply
Thanks everyone for the comments.
Thanks Tjobbe. I have no idea how all the title tags just swapped everywhere, never seen it happen before?
By thomas (1 comments) on Feb 25, 2008 | Reply
you forget http://sharebrain.info
thomas’s last blog post..CSS Addict - Blog
By john (18 comments) on Feb 25, 2008 | Reply
Absolutely great list!
I’m bookmarking it!
john’s last blog post..Coolest Ads Ever
By Ray (3 comments) on Feb 26, 2008 | Reply
A friend of mine told me about this website: http://www.designmeltdown.com. It tags websites by different design elements and gives descriptions of each of the elements - pretty useful IMHO.
By Chad Mueller (2 comments) on Feb 26, 2008 | Reply
A great blog that offers inspirational designs, showcasing posts full of brilliant images, logos, websites and more.
Chad Mueller’s last blog post..120 Brilliant Logos
By Brian Yerkes (47 comments) on Feb 26, 2008 | Reply
Hi Jacob,
Great extensive list. You’ve got “Web Designer Wall” listed as “Web Wall Designer” in number 23 and 74 though…
thanks for the list, great work
Brian Yerkes’s last blog post..Logo Design Contests - Good or Bad
By Tristan Bethe (1 comments) on Feb 26, 2008 | Reply
As alternative image resource why not give http://www.imageafter.com a try?
Or find lot of other free image resources on the forum:
http://www.imageafter.com/foru.....ead_id=250
By Jessica Sprague (1 comments) on Feb 26, 2008 | Reply
This is awesome! Thank you for putting this list together!
Jessica Sprague’s last blog post..And the winners are….
By David Airey (52 comments) on Feb 26, 2008 | Reply
Thanks for the mentions, Jacob. I’m pleased with how you’ve signposted both my blogs, and how they stand out quite nicely. Blues and reds are always effective at attracting attention. Just ask a news reader.
David Airey’s last blog post..70 of the best logo design resources
By Tyler (2 comments) on Feb 26, 2008 | Reply
Great post!
Add Ignitemotion.com to the sites for free video content.
keep it coming!
By jesusOmar (6 comments) on Feb 26, 2008 | Reply
Great, I didn’t know about half of this sites. Thanks
jesusOmar’s last blog post..January 2008 Desktop
By anglictina (1 comments) on Feb 26, 2008 | Reply
WOw, really great list
By johno (2 comments) on Feb 26, 2008 | Reply
A very good list, and quite a number I’ve never herd of. This should keep me busy for the next few days. Didn’t I see you on Lauren’s blog the other day?
johno’s last blog post..Sunday Type: fruity type
By Jenny (10 comments) on Feb 26, 2008 | Reply
Oh wow. I haven’t heard of some of these. I’m just starting my business so checking these out would prolly be a good idea huh?
Jenny’s last blog post..Share The Food You Love
By CSSArtillery (1 comments) on Feb 26, 2008 | Reply
You forgot http://www.cssartillery.com
CSSArtillery’s last blog post..Peminoz.com
By peter gabor (1 comments) on Feb 26, 2008 | Reply
thank’s Jacob for this magnificent promotion. it’s a honnour for me to be among so prestigious links.
the bests | peter
peter gabor’s last blog post..“Pauv’con” | LaCie | Spams et calculs arithmétiques
By DM (2 comments) on Feb 26, 2008 | Reply
Great list, a few I’d not seen before, thank you!
Quick note of a typo:
76- Stuff And Nonsense
Super and super blog of Markley, one of best WebDesigners in the world.
“Markley” should be “Malarkey” (roughly translated as balivernes).
By inspirationbit (47 comments) on Feb 26, 2008 | Reply
excellent post, I’m sure Digg users will digg it
I was wondering why this list was familiar to me - now that you mention that French site, everything makes sense. Still you’ve put lots of work into this - well done.
inspirationbit’s last blog post..A Bit Of Literature - Mr. Know-All
By DM (2 comments) on Feb 26, 2008 | Reply
Er… I don’t know why I add the French in there, for some reason I assumed you were French mother tongue. Have now read your About page and realised that *ahem* you’re not. Sorry!
By kristarella (61 comments) on Feb 26, 2008 | Reply
Wow, great round-up!
I’ll bookmark it
BTW the two titles called “[something] Point” are showing up as “[Something] Not”. Very odd
By Jacob Cass (634 comments) on Feb 26, 2008 | Reply
Thomas, thanks for the site add.
I will add your site too.
Jesus, Your welcome.
And yes I am a regular over on Creative Curio.
John, Thanks for bookmarking, along with the other 700.
Ray, Thanks for that add, I think designmeltdown deserves to be added as well
Chad, Thanks for the comment chad, you social media posting king
Tristan, Thanks for the link to Image After, I use that site too! I will add it.
Jessica, Your welcome.
David, Your welcome too. Yes they do stand out don’t they!
Tyler, I have added IgniteMotion too
Anglictina, Your welcome.Johno, It will keep you busy for many many days
Jenny, What type of business are you starting?
CSSArtillery, I have added your site. Thanks.
Peter. Your welcome, your site deserves it
DM, Thanks for the point out.
Vivien, Unfortunately Digg users did not digg it as much as StumbleUpon and Del.icio.us
Kristarella, Thanks for the point out.
Thanks to all visitors too!
By David Airey (52 comments) on Feb 26, 2008 | Reply
Thought you’d like to know, the link from Logo Design Love goes to Ads of the World.
Where the images eating too much bandwidth?
David Airey’s last blog post..70 of the best logo design resources
By Jacob Cass (634 comments) on Feb 26, 2008 | Reply
Sorry David you are correct. Something went strangely wrong when I copied this post from Dreamweaver, you will notice all of the title texts are completely muddled up.
Some links also went weird, and words went back to front… ie. Web Designer Wall went to Web Wall Designer. And ‘Showcase Point’ went to ‘Showcase Not’ - No idea what happened, there has never been a problem before. I have fixed it up now.
Yes the images were chewing right into the bandwidth. 3.5mb per visit.
By David Airey (52 comments) on Feb 26, 2008 | Reply
No worries at all. Interesting that you draft your posts in Dreamweaver.
David Airey’s last blog post..70 of the best logo design resources
By Jacob Cass (634 comments) on Feb 26, 2008 | Reply
I find it a lot quicker, especially for adding pictures and you have more control over the layout and more functions as well. For smaller posts I use the Wordpress built in one.
By Jim (3 comments) on Feb 26, 2008 | Reply
I’m truly hurt. You didn’t mention my site (thegraphicmac.com)
And how about CreativeBits.org and Adsoftheworld.com - both excellent resources as well.
By Jacob Cass (634 comments) on Feb 27, 2008 | Reply
Your site seems to be down Jim. Ads of the world was mentioned. I will add CreativeBits.Org - Thanks!
By Brian Yerkes (47 comments) on Feb 27, 2008 | Reply
Jacob / David,
I use Dreamweaver also for most of my posts, if they include several images, special formatting etc. It is much easier and you can also have more control over uploading images and graphics…gives you complete freedom to put images in different directories etc…
I actually use Dreamweaver when editing my entire blog…the style sheets etc. I also find this to be much more efficient.
Brian Yerkes’s last blog post..Logo Design Contests - Good or Bad
By Fubiz (7 comments) on Feb 27, 2008 | Reply
Thanks for the focus!
By Steven Snell (11 comments) on Feb 27, 2008 | Reply
Thanks for mentioning Vandelay Design.
Steven Snell’s last blog post..25 Beautifully Dark Website Designs
By Jacob Cass (634 comments) on Feb 27, 2008 | Reply
I agree with you Brian as well.
Your welcome Steve and Fubiz.
By Cássio Lacerda (1 comments) on Feb 27, 2008 | Reply
More than good for it all!
Thanks.
By Pneumatiky (1 comments) on Feb 29, 2008 | Reply
Nice, very useful
By Robot Cartoons (1 comments) on Mar 6, 2008 | Reply
Sweet! Thanks for the links, I bookmarked this page so hard.
Robot Cartoons’s last blog post..Death and Supreme Knowledge
By Mohammad Amin (1 comments) on Mar 9, 2008 | Reply
great …
thanks
By Ryan (10 comments) on Mar 12, 2008 | Reply
Thanks for the list. thumbs up:)
By Dom (1 comments) on Mar 12, 2008 | Reply
Stumbled, thumbed, used, thanks! http://www.thevirusmustbestopped.com/
By Jacob Cass (634 comments) on Mar 12, 2008 | Reply
You’re all welcome
By Zoznam Horoskopy (1 comments) on Mar 14, 2008 | Reply
Useful list, thankx, by the way good design of your website, your work?
By Jacob Cass (634 comments) on Mar 20, 2008 | Reply
It is a heavily modified theme
By free icons (1 comments) on Mar 26, 2008 | Reply
Very Nices Work,
Can you add my free icons site to your list
http://www.freeiconsdownload.com
Free Icon Download Offers Over 230 High Quality Royalty Free icons Set, Everything is free there and they are all useful.
Thanks
By ali Sabet (1 comments) on Mar 27, 2008 | Reply
hey you forgot http://www.sabet.tv and http://www.mojizu.com
my 2 design networks!! Awesome article.
By Jacob Cass (634 comments) on Mar 27, 2008 | Reply
Thanks Ali Sabet!
By Webdesigner (1 comments) on Mar 30, 2008 | Reply
Thanks a lot! This list is awesome. I found a lot of excellent sites for design inspiration. I became your RSS subscriber.