Visual Design: The Ultimate Guide
How This Course Will Transform Your Career
In This Course, You'll
Get excited when you use visual design principles to create impressive visuals people love! Great visual design makes the message clear, memorable, and persuasive—whether it's an app, a logo, or a presentation slide. You'll learn what makes a design excellent and how science and culture influence what works and what doesn't. You'll create designs that truly connect with people. Visual design isn't just about beauty—it's about shaping ideas that inspire action, build trust, and give meaning to your work. If you want to stand out with timeless, human-centered skills, this course is for you.
Make yourself invaluable with practical design skills that amplify your impact in any industry! Did you know that you only have 50 milliseconds to make a good first impression? Great visual design ensures you pass the test every time. You'll learn to use visual elements to guide emotions, influence purchasing decisions, and optimize User Experience (UX) and User Interface (UI) design. You'll master color theory, typography, and grid systems to improve usability, build credibility, and create designs that stop the scroll.
Gain confidence and credibility as you fast-track results with step-by-step exercises and downloadable templates! Complete optional tasks to walk away with portfolio-ready case studies that will help you land your dream job and advance your career. You'll get hands-on and design a low-fidelity wireframe, apply a monochromatic, complementary, or triadic color scheme, choose typefaces, and select a grid system. It's easier than you think! No matter your background, you can master Visual Design. With clear guidance and real-world examples, you'll apply your skills right away. This course will give you the visual design skills you need to solve design challenges, collaborate smarter, and make it easy for decision-makers to say yes to your vision.
It's Easy to Fast-Track Your Career with the World's Best Experts
Master complex skills effortlessly with proven best practices and toolkits directly from the world's top design experts. Meet your experts for this course:
Mia Cinelli: Associate Professor of Art Studio and Digital Design at the University of Kentucky.
Joann Eckstut: Color Consultant, Founder of The Roomworks, and one of the 12 designers chosen by the Color Association of the USA to create the yearly forecast used by industries to keep up with color trends.
Arielle Eckstut: Author, Agent-at-large at the Levine Greenberg Rostan Literary Agency, and Co-Founder of The Book Doctors and LittleMissMatched.
Gain an Industry-Recognized UX Course Certificate
Use your industry-recognized Course Certificate on your resume, CV, LinkedIn profile or your website.

Our courses and Course Certificates are trusted by these industry leaders:
Why Learn Visual Design?
Visual Design falls under the umbrella term of User Experience (UX) design. UX design is your fast-track to a meaningful, secure, and rewarding career.
Worried You'll Lose Your Job to AI? UX Design Skills Make You AI-Proof
UX design builds on your core human strengths such as emotional intelligence, deep human understanding, critical thinking, intuition, and imagination.
AI can't replicate your uniquely human ability to design for real emotions and needs such as joy, comfort, curiosity, safety, and a sense of belonging. These deeply human insights are your superpowers. With UX design skills, you'll turn them into products and experiences people truly love. You become irreplaceable, confident and in demand.
And yes, we'll also show you how to use AI to accelerate your results.
Feeling Stuck in the 9–5? Design Your Freedom
Tired of feeling undervalued, anxious, or trapped in your career? UX design skills open doors to freedom, flexibility, remote work, and a career you're excited about—without starting from scratch.
Stop wondering if you could be more. Start realizing your full potential today.
UX Design is Booming: Accelerate Your Career to Higher Salaries and Impact Across All Jobs and Industries
Salaries for people with design skills are soaring, often surpassing $200K in cities like San Francisco, and job growth is strong (13% globally). Why? Because companies thrive when their users are happy. Companies that invest in great design outperform the S&P 500 Index by a whopping 228%.
Design a Life You Love
Great design is all about helping people meet their needs and achieve their goals through intuitive, meaningful, and delightful experiences. Skills in design will empower you to create experiences and products that make people's lives easier and more fulfilling. And when people love what you create, your business thrives, and your salary potential grows. You get the ultimate double win:
You'll feel deeply fulfilled by designing experiences and products people love.
You'll be financially rewarded for your real-world impact.
Course Overview: What You'll Master
- Each week, one lesson becomes available.
- There's no time limit to finish a course. Lessons have no deadlines.
- Estimated learning time: 17 hours 42 mins spread over 5 weeks.
Lesson 0: Welcome and Introduction
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0.1: Get Help, Career Advice, and Job Opportunities (2 mins)
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0.2: How to Get Your Course Certificate (16 mins)
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0.3: Grow Your Global Network and Build Your Brand (12 mins)
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0.4: Global Skills, Local Jobs: Build Your Network in Your Area (2 mins)
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0.5: Gain Timeless Skills Through Courses from IxDF (21 mins)
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0.6: Mandatory vs Optional Lesson Items (7 mins)
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0.7: Learn Smarter: The Perfect Mix of Video and Text (6 mins)
Lesson 1: Visual Principles
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1.1: Welcome to Visual Design: The Ultimate Guide (13 mins)
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1.2: What is Good Design? (22 mins)
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1.3: Conversations (6 mins)
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1.4: What are Visual Design Elements? (39 mins)
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1.5: What are Visual Design Principles? (48 mins)
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1.6: Conversations (6 mins)
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1.7: The Work of Artist Paul Klee (39 mins)
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1.8: Build Your Portfolio: Album Cover (8 mins)
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1.9: Congratulations and Recap (6 mins)
Lesson 2: Color Theory
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2.1: Welcome and Introduction (7 mins)
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2.2: What is Color? (22 mins)
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2.3: Why Do We See Color? (56 mins)
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2.4: Understand Color Theory (46 mins)
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2.5: What are Color Modes? (25 mins)
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2.6: What are Color Systems? (25 mins)
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2.7: Why Do Colors Change? (25 mins)
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2.8: How To Confidently Use Color (35 mins)
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2.9: Understand Color Symbolism (37 mins)
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2.10: Conversations (6 mins)
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2.11: What Color is the Dress? (10 mins)
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2.12: Build Your Portfolio: Album Cover (9 mins)
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2.13: Congratulations & Recap (6 mins)
Lesson 3: Typography
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3.1: Welcome and Introduction (7 mins)
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3.2: What is Type? (30 mins)
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3.3: Why Does Type Matter? (18 mins)
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3.4: Conversations (6 mins)
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3.5: What Is Type Anatomy? (20 mins)
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3.6: Carved in Stone (20 mins)
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3.7: How to Talk Type (40 mins)
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3.8: What Are Type Grids? (56 mins)
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3.9: How to Design with Type (47 mins)
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3.10: Build Your Portfolio: Album Cover (9 mins)
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3.11: Congratulations & Recap (6 mins)
Lesson 4: Grid Systems
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4.1: Welcome and Introduction (7 mins)
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4.2: What Are Grid Systems? (26 mins)
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4.3: Types of Grid Systems (48 mins)
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4.4: Conversations (6 mins)
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4.5: How To Use Grid Systems (37 mins)
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4.6: What Are Typographic Systems? (39 mins)
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4.7: The Work of Designer Massimo Vignelli (31 mins)
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4.8: Conversations (6 mins)
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4.9: The Map (42 mins)
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4.10: Build Your Portfolio: Album Cover (8 mins)
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4.11: Build Your Portfolio: Redesign—Bad Design, Begone! (9 mins)
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4.12: Congratulations & Recap (6 mins)
Lesson 5: Course Certificate, Final Networking, and Course Wrap-up
How Others Have Benefited

Denice Zhu, United States
“The course was helpful in setting a foundation and providing opportunities for hands-on practice.”

Rakshith, India
“Easy to understand for a person who has zero knowledge about design.”

Vince Mendella, Canada
“The knowledge of the instructors and the content were superb. I learned a lot, and it built on what I learned over 30 years ago in design school.”
How It Works
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Take online courses by industry experts
Lessons are self-paced so you'll never be late for class or miss a deadline.
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Get a Course Certificate
Your answers are graded by experts, not machines. Get an industry-recognized Course Certificate to prove your skills.
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Advance your career
Use your new skills in your existing job or to get a new job in UX design. Get help from our community.
Start Advancing Your Career Now
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