So you’ve decided to create an app for your business… great choice! You’ll soon be reaching out to a whole new audience as you put your business at the cutting edge of technology, but first, you need to develop it.
You’ll undoubtedly want your app to look great and portray your company in the right way, so for that, you’ll need a variety of fantastic graphics.
From icons to headers, splash screens, custom buttons and much more, it can be difficult to know where to start when it comes to their design, but fortunately, there is a range of great, free design tools out there that can help you along the way.
Whether you’re experienced in design or a beginner, the following design tools will allow you to create fantastic graphics just as well as a professional saas design agency like Fivecube, regardless of your experience level.
Image: Campaign Creators/Unsplash.
Our Top 10 Design Tools
1. Canva – The All-in-One Design Platform
Best for: social posts, marketing materials, app store images, and quick brand assets.
Canva remains the go-to design tool for non-designers. Its drag-and-drop interface makes it easy to produce professional visuals with no prior experience. The free plan includes thousands of templates covering every format imaginable: logos, presentations, infographics, and more.
In 2025, Canva’s AI suite – Magic Studio – can automatically resize designs for multiple platforms, generate headlines or captions, and remove image backgrounds instantly. The new Brand Hub helps you save your colour palettes, logos, and fonts to ensure visual consistency across all assets.
We’ve seen hundreds of AppInstitute users build entire app store listings – icons, screenshots, banners – inside Canva. Its one-click export settings for PNG, JPG, and SVG keep everything perfectly sized for Android and iOS upload.
“Canva now serves over 170 million monthly users across 190 countries.” — TechCrunch, 2025
2. Figma & FigJam – Design Collaboration Done Right
Best for: UI/UX design, app prototypes, and team collaboration.
Figma has become the gold standard for interface design. The free plan now offers AI-powered component tagging, instant layout alignment, and version control – features that used to require expensive licences. FigJam, its whiteboarding partner, lets teams map out flows, brainstorm features, and comment in real time.
Even solo creators benefit from Figma’s smart suggestions. As you design screens, its AI recommends standard UI patterns to speed up layout creation.
At AppInstitute, we often encourage founders to sketch their first app screens in Figma before moving into the no-code builder. It saves hours later when aligning navigation, branding, and feature placement.
“Figma remains the top collaborative design tool, used by over 80% of UI/UX teams globally.” — UX Tools Survey, 2025
3. Krita – Powerful Free Illustration Software
Best for: digital painting, custom icons, hand-drawn assets.
Krita is open-source and remarkably feature-rich. Its brush engine rivals Photoshop’s, supporting pressure sensitivity, texture layering, and advanced blending modes. Artists use it for concept art, storyboards, and app mascots.
For small brands, Krita’s biggest advantage is true ownership — you can export in any format without watermarks or licensing limits.
We’ve seen AppInstitute users design distinctive restaurant logos and illustrated loyalty stamps in Krita, giving their apps a unique, handcrafted style that stands out against template-based designs.
4. Photopea – Photoshop in Your Browser
Best for: quick photo edits, PSD manipulation, and layered compositions.
Photopea is a hidden gem — it runs entirely in your browser, opening native Photoshop (PSD) and Illustrator (AI) files for free. You can retouch photos, adjust colour balance, and work with masks and smart objects, all without downloading a thing.
Its interface mirrors Adobe Photoshop closely, making it an easy transition for those who can’t justify a Creative Cloud subscription.
We’ve used Photopea internally to resize app icons and marketing banners for multiple screen resolutions — it’s lightweight, fast, and doesn’t require log-ins.
“Photopea processes over 30 million files per month, proving browser-based design is here to stay.” — VentureBeat, 2025
5. Runway ML – The Future of AI Video and Image Creation
Best for: short promotional videos, product demos, and social ad clips.
Runway ML sits at the cutting edge of AI media. Its free tier includes text-to-video, object removal, and AI background replacement. You can upload a few product shots and have Runway generate a cinematic video in minutes.
For app marketing, it’s ideal for creating teaser reels or short clips that explain features visually.
“AI-assisted video editors now reduce production time by 45% on average.” — HubSpot AI Trends Report, 2025
We’ve seen AppInstitute clients use Runway to produce launch videos showing off their app interfaces, complete with music and captions — no film crew required.
6. Coolors & Khroma – Smart Colour Palette Generators
Best for: branding, UI design, and accessible colour schemes.
Both tools specialise in effortless colour palette creation. Coolors lets you lock in favourite tones and generate complementary hues with the spacebar. Khroma learns your taste through AI — after rating a few colours, it generates palettes in your preferred style.
Strong colour harmony improves user trust and brand recall. We often advise AppInstitute builders to finalise their app colour scheme using these tools before they start designing.
“Brands with consistent colour usage see up to 80% higher recognition rates.” — LucidPress Brand Consistency Study, 2025
7. Remove.bg – Instant Background Removal
Best for: product photography, profile shots, and logo overlays.
Upload an image, and within seconds Remove.bg isolates your subject perfectly. It’s particularly helpful for transparent icons or menu images in restaurant apps. The free version includes high-quality downloads, and the AI handles complex edges like hair or fabric better than most paid alternatives.
We’ve seen small cafés use Remove.bg to clean up menu photos before uploading to their ordering apps — a tiny tweak that instantly improves perceived quality.
8. Google Fonts & Fontshare – Free Typography Libraries
Best for: brand identity and readable in-app text.
Typography defines tone. Google Fonts remains the go-to library for open-source, web-safe fonts, while Fontshare curates modern display and editorial typefaces ideal for branding. Both libraries are free for commercial use.
Pro tip: pair a simple sans-serif (for UI) with a distinctive display font (for headlines). Stick to two typefaces max for consistency across your app and website.
“Readable typography increases app dwell time by up to 20%.” — Nielsen Norman Group, 2025
9. Pixabay & Pexels – Royalty-Free Image and Video Libraries
Best for: hero images, lifestyle photography, and video B-roll.
Both platforms continue to dominate the free-asset space. Their AI search now suggests visuals based on mood, composition, or brand colours. All assets are royalty-free and cleared for commercial use.
We’ve seen many AppInstitute users rely on these libraries for app onboarding screens, social backgrounds, and marketing banners. They’re a lifesaver when you need professional visuals fast.
“The top 5% of restaurants using strong imagery in their listings see twice the conversion rate on delivery apps.” — QSR Digital Insights, 2025
10. AppInstitute’s Built-In Design Tools – For Fast, On-Brand Apps
Best for: app icons, splash screens, and consistent colour themes.
Inside the AppInstitute builder, you’ll find built-in design options tailored for small businesses:
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Customisable colour palettes to match your logo
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Automatic image resizing for iOS, Android, and PWAs
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Real-time previews across devices
You can import your Canva or Photopea designs directly, then fine-tune inside the builder.
We’ve seen business owners with zero design experience create polished, branded apps in a single afternoon using these tools.
Pro Tips for Using Free Tools Effectively
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Create a mini brand guide – lock in colours, fonts, and tone before you design.
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Work mobile-first – most customers experience your designs on their phone.
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Compress images – large files slow down apps and sites.
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Blend AI with personal touches – use automation for speed, but add human edits for authenticity.
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Save everything in vector or high-resolution formats – you’ll thank yourself later when scaling designs.
Other Design Tools
Klex
If you want to create great-looking graphics at speed, Klex is the platform to do it on. This design tool hasn’t been designed with professional designers in mind, therefore for all you design novices out there, this is a great place to start.
You can choose from a wide variety of existing templates as well as a plethora of design tools, effects and fillers. There’s then a choice of fonts if you want to add text to your designs alongside some fab customisation options too.
To dip your toe into the design world, Klex is a great tool to mess around with and we can guarantee that you’ll surprise yourself with the quality of the results you produce.
Figma for Collaborative Design
Figma stands out as an excellent tool for teams who need to collaborate on design projects in real-time. Known for its robust vector capabilities, Figma allows multiple users to work simultaneously on the same design project. This makes it ideal for UI/UX design and prototyping where team input is invaluable.
Its intuitive interface means you can create or modify designs, and feedback is instant, which streamlines the design process. Users have access to an extensive library of components and templates, saving time on repetitive design tasks. Figma’s browser-based system also means there’s no need for software installations, making access convenient from anywhere.
HubSpot’s 15 Free Infographic Templates
HubSpot offers users free, easy-to-use infographic templates for PowerPoint and Illustrator.
The 15 customizable infographic templates can provide you with some much-needed inspiration to design your own infographics in PowerPoint or Illustrator.
Better yet, HubSpot’s customizable infographic templates show you how you can work with a theme, design icons and shapes, create a colour scheme and use fonts for design.
Easelly
Easelly is another online infographic design tool. Users have access to thousands of images and infographic templates and can also have one of Easelly’s designers create a design for them.
There are even articles and webinars created to inspire users to make beautiful designs. Easelly is perfect for teachers, students and business owners who need to take complex information and turn it into an easy-to-follow format.
Easelly also has various premium plans for students, individuals and businesses.
Pablo
If you’re looking to create engaging social media posts for your app or business, Pablo by Buffer is the tool for you.
Users can search through over 600,000 free images to create social media graphics and posts that are guaranteed to catch the attention of their followers.
Snappa
As the name suggests, Snappa allows users to easily create online graphics for social media, blogs and ads in no time at all.
Snappa also allows users to choose from thousands of pre-made templates, fonts, vectors and stock photos. This online design tool also allows users to resize photos for various social media platforms.
Additionally, Snappa allows users to upgrade to a premium version of the program and has different prices for individuals and teams.
Free Font Design Tools
Pro tip: don’t forget about your font designs!
When creating an app or online content, don’t forget that fonts play a major role in user experience.
Many of the free design tools we have mentioned in this article come with thousands of built-in fonts for you to choose from.
In addition to the tools mentioned, Google Fonts offers a vast collection of open-source fonts that can elevate your app design’s typography. With more than 1,000 font families, it’s ideal for creating a cohesive visual style. Ease of integration and adaptive design capabilities make Google Fonts a favourite among developers and designers for web and app projects alike. This resource ensures you maintain a consistent and accessible user interface across different platforms.
Remember to look carefully at the free font design tools and keep the end-user in mind to create an easy-to-read and attractive app interface.
Free Photo Editing Platforms
Adobe Photoshop Express
Can’t afford Adobe Photoshop? No problem. Adobe Photoshop Express is a free photo editing and collage-making application.
It is available on iOs, Android and all Windows devices with Windows 8 and above. Adobe Photoshop Express is a nifty program with a drag and drop feature to quickly edit and transform photos.
Although users have many of the same features that are available on Photoshop, there is also the option to upgrade to premium features to make more advanced edits.
Pixlr
If you’re looking to use photos within your new app, Pixlr enables you to edit and play around with its various effects, overlays and borders. It is an app available on both iOS and Android, so you can upload any photos directly from your phone.
This photo editing tool has over 600 effects to choose from to add to your photos, as well as being able to do everything else you’d expect from a photo editor such as cropping, resizing, whitening and removing the increasingly common red eye.
If you’ve used Photoshop to work on photos in the past, you’ll soon get to grips with Pixlr as its interface is very similar and arguably more straightforward to use.
Fotor
Fotor is an online photo editing platform that is available on any mobile device or desktop software.
Users can also enjoy thousands of stock photos, design templates, tutorials and guides to get the best out of their images.
BeFunky
BeFunky is a great online design tool if you are looking for a photo editing platform with a range of graphics, frames, effects and textures.
If you’re looking for a platform that can easily edit photos, create engaging graphic designs and photo collages, then BeFunky has all of the tools you need.
BeFunky also has a variety of tutorials and inspiration for users to learn design tips and make the most out of the platform.
There is also an option for users to have access to BeFunky Plus, which starts at $4.99.
GIMP
GIMP (GNU Image Manipulation Program) is open-source graphic design software that an increasing number of people are migrating over to from Photoshop.
The interface is different in many ways, however, there is a version that replicates Photoshop’s look and feel, making it easier to move from the old to the new.
You then have access to a full suite of tools to help you make incredible looking graphics, including the trusted favourites like painting tools, cloning, colour correction and enhancement.
What’s also great is that the development team have created a product that offers compatibility with all of the popular file formats, therefore making it easy to upload any existing graphics that you want to make amendments to.
Free Vector Design Software
Gravit Designer
A great choice for designing splash screens and vector graphics for your new app, Gravit Designer is clean and easy to use, with an interface that will adjust to exactly how you need to use it.
There is a great choice of tools for you to take advantage of, including a knife tool, blending modes and much more that will go a long way in helping you to create stunning vector graphics that will perfectly complement your new app.
This free graphic design tool is well worth playing around with as you get to grips with the many different elements to it, however, with a little investment in time you can make the most of all that the software has to offer.
Affinity Designer for Vector Graphics
Affinity Designer is a popular choice for those looking to create high-quality vector graphics without breaking the bank. Offering features comparable to Adobe Illustrator, it excels in precision and flexibility. Affinity Designer supports both vector and raster workflows, allowing you to switch between the two easily depending on the project requirements.
Its clean interface and powerful performance enable you to craft designs swiftly. With tools like anchor point precision and stroke stabilisation, creating detailed graphics becomes straightforward. Affinity Designer also features a thriving community that continuously shares tutorials and resources to enhance user expertise.
Inkscape
Inkscape is a free online vector graphics editor used to create vector images in Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) format.
Moreover, Inkscape offers several features for illustrations, logos, cartoons and typography which makes it perfect for app developers, too.
The best part is, Inkscape is absolutely free.
Vectr
Vectr is another free graphics software that allows users to easily create high-quality vector graphics.
Additionally, Vectr’s design tools allow users to create blur-free logos, website mockups and presentations.
Another great feature of Vectr is that it allows for team collaborations so that designers can work on designs and projects together.
Free Colour Tools
When designing your app, elements of your website or social media graphics, you need to keep your colour palette and branding consistent. Luckily, there are free design tools that can help with this.
Colourmind
Colourmind is a colour scheme design tool that uses deep learning. This free online software can learn colour styles from photographs, movies and even popular art.
Better yet, Colourmind is updated each day with new datasets and has a variety of templates for users to choose from.
Simplifying Color Palettes with Adobe Color
Adobe Color is an invaluable tool for any designer looking to develop harmonious colour schemes. With its intuitive colour wheel, you can experiment with various colour combinations and download palettes that suit your design aesthetic. Extract themes directly from images to create palettes that reflect the mood of your app.
Adobe Color also allows users to explore trending colour themes, providing inspiration and direction for your colour choices. Perfect for ensuring your app or website maintains a professional look, Adobe Color integrates seamlessly with Adobe Creative Cloud, supporting a streamlined design workflow.
Coolars
Coolars is another design tool that allows users to create their own perfect colour palette or be inspired by thousands of other colour schemes.
If you have no idea what your colour scheme should be, Coolars will give you recommendations and access to their HEX codes.
This colour scheme design tool is also used by well-known companies like Walt Disney, Netflix, Dropbox and Apple, to name but a few.
ColorZilla
If you are a web developer or graphic designer, ColorZilla was designed for you. This free design tool is a Google Chrome and Mozilla extension to help with colour-related tasks.
ColorZilla includes an eyedropper tool, a gradient generator and a colour picker. This design tool allows you to get a colour reading from any point in your browser, adjust it and add it to another program.
Free Stock Photo Platforms
The next design tools your app or web content needs are free stock photos. Here is a list of websites where you can get high-quality stock photos for free:
Freepik Stock Photos
Freepik hosts one of the most expansive collections of stock photos and other visual assets like vectors, icons, videos, illustrations, and more. They add new content daily, so you’ll never run out of inspiration for your creative projects.
It covers many themes, from nature and travel to business and technology. Best of all, Freepik stock photos can be used for personal and professional projects.
Freepik goes beyond mere downloads it also offers a combination of AI tools including an AI Image Generator, Pikaso AI Art Generator, and many more. This website offers you the possibility of editing, customizing, and transforming your visuals effortlessly, all within the convenience of your browser.
Freepik offers various licensing options that are essential for using its resources legally. Most files can be used for personal and commercial projects, provided you credit the original author. It’s crucial to review each asset’s specific licensing conditions to ensure they meet your project’s needs. Freepik also offers a premium subscription, granting access to exclusive content and eliminating the requirement for attribution.
Unsplash
Unsplash is a website that is dedicated to sharing free stock photos under the Unsplash licence.
Users looking for high-quality stock photos can go onto the Unsplash website and search through and download images by over 207,000 contributing photographers.
On the Unsplash website, you can also find professional photographers in your area that are available for hire.
Burst
Burst is another website where you can download free, high-resolution images and is powered by Shopify.
Not only are Burst’s photos perfect for blogs and websites, but they are also great for commercial use.
Burst’s website also allows users to scroll through collections of images if they are unsure of what they are looking for.
Vecteezy
Vecteezy is an online platform that allows users to download free vector art, stock photos and videos.
Furthermore, Vecteezy’s network of contributors continuously add free content to the website so you have tonnes of content to choose from.
Users can also join the pro version of Vecteezy to unlock a range of features, from unlimited downloads and priority support to access to the entire library of images.
Free Design Tools to Show Off Your Work
Behance
Whilst not necessarily design software as such, Behance is a great place to look for inspiration and see what your peers are creating.
Behance gets millions of views each month, so if you have a design that you’re particularly proud of, you can add it to Behance for all to see too.
You can then browse through thousands of designs by searching across a range of categories for further inspiration on what might look great within your new app.
Creating graphics for your app doesn’t have to be a scary process, so even if you’ve never designed anything before in your life, there are plenty of easy to use tools that enable you to produce designs that exceed your expectations and add a real touch of quality and uniqueness to your app design.
Dribbble
Dribbble is a social networking platform for digital designers and creatives.
Individuals in this field can use Dribbble as a design portfolio platform and recruiting website to find job opportunities.
There is also plenty of inspiration for those who need it and users can browse through upcoming live workshops.
FAQs on Free Design Tools
Are free design tools good enough for professional use?
Absolutely. Most now include AI-level features that rival paid software. The key is consistency and attention to detail.
Which tool is best for creating app icons and store graphics?
Canva or Photopea for design, Remove.bg for cleanup, and AppInstitute’s preview tool for correct sizing.
Do I own the rights to what I create?
Yes, in almost all cases. Check each tool’s licence, but most grant full commercial rights.
What’s the best AI tool for design in 2025?
Runway ML for video, Canva’s Magic Studio for general use, and Figma AI for UI design are the current standouts.
Can I really design everything I need for my app with free tools?
Yes — from branding to promotional assets, these tools cover every creative need for most small businesses.
Last Updated on November 6, 2025 by Becky Halls
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