Canva is one of the most popular free online graphic design software apps. You can use Canva to design anything from social media graphics to print invitations. You can start from scratch or use one of the thousands of templates. Canva has a free forever plan as well as their Canva for Work monthly plan, for team projects and more features.

Canva was started in 2012 by Melanie Perkins, Cliff Obrecht and Cam Adams. The Canva free account includes two folders and 1gb of storage. You have your choice of over 8,000 templates and access to millions of free and fee based photos. You can also upload your own images.

Canva has a Photo Editor (see screenshot), Font Editor (see screenshot) and Color Palette Editor (see screenshot). One feature that I really like is the online design tutorials. Some of these are interactive step-by-step tutorials that walk you through the design process, within the Canva workspace. You will probably want to check out the Canva Design Courses or Workshops.

But the best way to discover Canva is to go to your account workspace and start building a design. Start with one of the many templates (see screenshot) from an email header to a book cover.

Social Media Posts - In the Social Media section, you have templates for the most popular social sites including, Twitter, Pinterest, Facebook and Instagram. Each template is already sized to the correct dimensions.

Documents - In the Documents section, you have templates for a letterhead, magazine cover, resume, yearbook and more.

Blogging and eBooks - This section has templates for book covers, desktop wallpaper, web banner, photo collage, infographic and more.

Marketing Materials - This section has templates for a menu, brochure, label, logo and more.

Social Media and Email Headers - Here you have templates for many types of headers for Facebook, YouTube, Twitter and more. Do you have an Etsy shop? There are templates for the Etsy shop cover and shop icon.

Events - Do you need to announce an event. There are templates from postcards to programs and invitations.

Ads - These include templates for a Facebook ad and more.

All of these templates have the most popular dimensions such as the 1080 x 1080 pixels Instragram post. But, if you want to use your own dimensions, just click the Use Custom Dimensions button at the top of the window.

Finally, don't forget to check out the Canva YouTube channel. There you will find many playlists from Getting Started to Branding with Canva.

*Screenshots used by permission of Canva.