Your content, social media, and digital marketing campaigns are all highly dependent on visual content. The good news is, you don’t have to be a master of graphic design to create captivating visuals. While you should certainly outsource the serious graphic design jobs to the pros, there is a lot that you can accomplish with tools like Canva.

Canva is a great tool that makes the challenging task of generating graphics super easy. They offer gorgeous and flexible templates, stock imagery, elements, and a drag and drop interface. You may already know this, but did you know that there are some tweaks and shortcuts to make your Canva experience even better… and we know what they are. Here are we go!

The Top 16 Canva Hacks You Need to Know

Try Before You Buy! 

Yes, it’s worth getting a Canva Pro account, but you should also know that there are a lot of beautiful elements you can use… for FREE. If you want to try out the app before you subscribe to the paid version, you’ll have the option to buy only the elements you want to add to your design. This is a great way to test the waters.

Adding Text Quickly

Second, on our list of cool Canva hacks that you should know is a neat trick for adding text quickly.

Adding text in Canva is a simple step that only requires choosing a text style and then clicking on it with your mouse. However, there’s sometimes instances where you may need to add a bunch of different text boxes to your Canva layout. This is a simple task that can get a little bit tedious.

But fear not! There’s a little trick that can help you complete this process much faster. As a nice perk, this hack won’t even require you to use your mouse to click on the text menu- you don’t even have to search for the text style! This a simple keyboard shortcut already for you. All you do is type the “t” on your keyboard to get a text box on your design.

Yes, it’s that easy. Once that’s done, you can type the text that you want on it. We know… it’s ridiculously simple.

Undo and Redo… and Redo Again

As the saying goes, nobody’s perfect- even us! We almost made a mistake one time. Jokes aside, it’s very often that you’ll make an “ooops’  in your Canva design journey. You may even want to try your design a different way and choose other styles. Let’s say you drag the image to the bottom part, move the text somewhere on the side, change the background colors… and it’s only to find out later on that the previous design was better. Ugh, annoying, right?

There are even incidences where you may accidentally change something that distorts the look of the graphic. Well, here’s a little something to ease your mind.

CTRL + Z, CTRL + SHIFT + Z

You’ve probably heard of this keyboard hack before. If you haven’t, you’ve been missing you!

It’s worth noting, if you want to undo the previous action, you only need to hold your CTRL key and then hit Z. If you did many things (on your design) that you want to well… undo, you could hit CTRL + Z a few times until your graphic is back to where you want it.

And if you want to redo the action you’ve undone, no problem! Hold your CTRL key, then your ‘SHIFT’ key, and hit Z. Like with the previous keyboard shortcut, you can do this a couple or more times until your design’s back to how you like it. This Canva hack is so simple and fast, and one that you’ll definitely use all of the time!

Get The Whole Picture 

Sometimes you just need to take a closer look at your Canva design to ensure that the work you’re doing is all all good. Oftentimes clicking the zoom percentage button at the bottom part of your Canva workspace will pull you away from the work – it can be a real hassle. Once again, then these keyboard shortcuts can help.

CTRL + (+), CTRL + (-)

If you want to zoom in, then simply hold your CTRL key and then press the + button on your keyboard. Once you’re done checking (or editing) and want to see the full image, you can easily zoom out by holding the CTRL key and then just pressing the – button.

It may not sound like a big deal, but hacks like this can truly save precious seconds off your graphic design work.

Moving Elements Around 

When you want to move elements around your page, there are instances when they get quite stubborn and don’t go where you want them to. The good news is that Canva has a feature where it automatically snaps the elements to the invisible gridlines to help you align them faster. While it can be handy at times, there are moments when you want to get rid of it. This little hack can be used during those moments.

SHIFT

To freely move elements on your Canva page, all you need to do is hold down the SHIFT key and drag the design element around with your cursor. This prevents Canva from automatically aligning your image, and makes moving objects in tiny increments easy.

Change the Pre-Set Templates

As you likey know, Canva has plenty of gorgeous and professionally-made templates- and this list continues to grow. One of the best things about every template – aside from them being made for you already – is that you can tweak them to better suit your theme. This way you’re not starting from scratch, and your graphics will still look professional and unique.

Be Inspired By Completed Designs

So, you need to start from scratch but you’re feeling stuck. Easy solution. You can get inspiration from Canva’s completed designs. You can go to Canva’s Design Inspiration and find examples to help you get over any of your creative blocks. Alternatively, you can head over to Google and search for samples to guide you through your layout.

Pair Complementary Fonts for a Balanced Design

Have you ever heard that opposites attract? Well, the same can be said for graphic design- especially with fonts. For instance, if you’re using display fonts, it’s best to pair them with something a bit more neutral to balance it out. Another example is using something like a Serif font with a Sans-Serif font. Get where we’re going with this?

Matching Colors With Your Background Image

If you’re not a graphic designer by trade, it’s not always easy to choose the right font color for the text on your design. Don’t worry – there’s a good hack for you. Match colors within your image.

Allow us to explain. If your background has a lot of color blue, then it might be safe to use the same color for your text. All you have to do is use a color picker tool to get the color’s HEX code and then paste it on Canva’s color picker tool.

Now if the text is difficult to read because of the colors, you can add a shape element behind the text and reduce its transparency to make it opaque and make it stand out.

Use Those Grids! 

So, you want to add a bunch of images to your graphics? Alright, let’s do this!

You can use your grids to arrange them beautifully. Canva’s design tool has many grid designs that you can utilize to suit the type of graphics you want.All you have to do is go to Elements, choose among the different grids available, and then drag it to your Canva page. You can simply add multiple grids and resize them if needed!

Have Fun with Shapes! 

Sometimes, the only thing you need to make your graphics have that extra character is to add shape! Canva has a ton of free shapes you can use for this very purpose.

Use Frames or Borders

If you’re finding that your background overwhelms the message you want your audience to see, you can use frames or borders to add a solid line on your text to draw attention. This will help to provide a simple yet elegant look to your design.

Add Lines to Emphasize Words

Hey! Do you want to emphasize a word on your graphics to get your message across? Here’s a secret – you can use lines to do this. For instance, you can add a solid line underneath the word you want to really stress.

Shapes Help Highlight

The other thing that you can do is add shapes for highlighting words or images. For example, you can put a shape behind your text to draw attention you want to it. You can even change the shape’s transparency if you don’t want to completely cover your background.

Adjust the Colors of Your Photos 

Okay, so maybe the photography of what you’re working on wasn’t the best. There will be times when the colors of your photos just don’t make the cut. This is due to poor lighting, oftentimes. Regardless of the cause, you don’t need to have poor graphics because of this.

Canva has an excellent photo adjustment feature that enables you to tweak your photo’s colors to suit your design. You can also adjust the contrast, tint saturation, and other aspects to make sure that you precisely get the graphics you want. If you prefer, you can also make use of Canva’s automatic filters to quickly adjust the colors.

Be Consistent

Finally, when you’re creating graphics for your business and brand, it’s important to keep your elements consistent! It’s good to choose the same brand colors, filters, fonts, and overall color palette when making your designs for easy recognition.

In summary, Canva is an easy-to-use graphic design tool that allows beginners, non-designers, designers, and beyond to create designs quickly and efficiently, with the help of ready-made, “drag and drop” templates, icons, shapes, photos, fonts, color palettes, and more! We highly recommend using Canva, and using the hacks that we listed.

As always for all of your design needs (big or small), please contact us at www.dalexdesigngroup.com