Best web design course – Top 8 Courses + Essential tools and skills you need

What are the Qualifications to be a Web Designer?

Web design is a different industry than other industries.

It is a constantly changing industry, so having a 10-year-old degree does not mean you are a great web designer.

Web designers are often judged on the quality of their portfolio sites, which showcases recent work.

Your portfolio is not the only thing that will highlight your talents. With the site, you can show potential clients that you are skilled in design and development.

 

 

The Essential Tools and Soft Skills to Success

Also, you may need to be proficient in various tools and soft skills that will help you get into a web designer position.

Let’s begin by looking at some tools that you might use.

• Basic illustration and photo-editing tools: Photoshop, Sketch, and GIMP.
• Interaction design tools Adobe XD and Invision Studio
• Local development environment (if you are developing prototypes or working with a CMS) DesktopServer, XAMPP, and others. Learn how to install WordPress locally so you can test new designs.

You can also use a variety of popular frameworks to help you stand out.

• Animation Kits: Animate.css and Bounce.js.
• jQuery plugins and libraries: Lazy loading, parallax scrolling, and many more.
• It is important to be familiar with Bootstrap, React, and other popular frontend frameworks.
• Potential clients can benefit from knowing WordPress and how to create templates.

If you want to be successful, you will also need soft skills.

• Understanding consumer psychology and human behavior on websites. The basic concepts of decision paralysis, social proof’s value, and color psychology are all important.
• Freelancers need to be able to estimate projects and negotiate.
• Moreover, knowing how to write proposals and land clients is essential. This skill is valuable in any company or agency setting.

 

Best online web design courses

You can learn flexible skills by taking a few online courses in web design. Below is a list of top websites that teach UI/UX, product design, and web design.

 

Dribbble’s 16-Week Certified Product Design Course

Dribbble’s 16-Week Product Design course is designed to get you from zero to career ready through on-demand, flexible video learning, and weekly mentorship sessions. You will graduate with new skills, a portfolio that is ready for interviews, and the confidence and ability to create beautiful and functional digital experiences.

 

This career-focused course will teach you.

• Design Thinking: Discover the different ways to think about design and how you can use them in your job.
• UX/UI research: Analyze UX and UI data to help you make design decisions.
• Learn how to create wireframes, flow charts, and prototypes that bring your product designs to life.
• Designing in Figma: Learn how Master Figma uses libraries, systems, tools, and techniques.
• Career preparation: Get expert guidance regarding your resume, portfolio, interviews, and how to land your first job as a product designer.

Students are matched with a mentor from Dribbble as part of the course. Mentors are carefully selected and have at minimum four years of experience in product design at reputable, forward-thinking companies. You will learn from the top industry professionals, collaborate with them and get weekly live feedback on your web design and mobile app projects.

 

WebFlow University – Ultimate Web Design Course

WebFlow University offers the Ultimate Web Design Course for a fee. This course is hosted by WebFlow university and designed by WebFlow’s CMS.

This video course contains over five hours of lessons and is an excellent introduction to web design.

Topics:

• HTML & CSS basics
• Web structure
• Buttons
• Typography
• Media elements
• Components
• Basics of styling
• Layout basics
• Advanced layouts
• Responsive design
• CMS and dynamic content
• SEO

Length5 hours (of video)

Certificate: Not available

Pros:

• Web design is at the forefront of technology.
• Simple-to-follow instructions
• More than 5 hours of video content. If you follow along, it will be much more actual learning.

Cons:

• Although it is a great crash course, it does not give you a solid foundational understanding of all concepts.

 

 

Udemy Ultimate Web Designer & Web Developer Course

The Udemy Ultimate Website Designer & Developer Course, taught by Brad Hussey, is designed to give students the skills to create more than 20 custom-designed and developed projects.

The course covers nearly 34 hours and provides an overview of essential web design and development topics. It includes Figma design, Photoshop design, coding HTML and CSS, and managing SQL databases. Udemy’s Ultimate Web Designer and Web Developer course is for those with minimal to no experience in web development.

 

FreeCodeCamp: Introduction To Responsive Web Design – HTML & CSS Tutorial

FreeCodeCamp released a 4-hour introduction to responsive design on YouTube in 2019.

This course will show you how to create a responsive website with just three pages. It also covers the basics of responsive design, CSS, and HTML5.

Topics:

• Responsive design basics
• Mobile-first design
• CSS units
• Em vs. px
• Flexbox
• CSS styles
• Responsive containers
• Media queries
• Responsive navigation
• Page structure
• Widgets

Duration: 4 hours video

Certificate: Not available

Pros:

• Learn how to make a responsive design using HTML and CSS in 2023.
• Learn about important CSS units and advanced HTML tags.
• YouTube offers over 4 hours of well-divided video for no cost (no signup required)

Cons:

• Responsive design is a limited foundational knowledge (good if you already have basic HTML and CSS).

 

Coursera’s UI/UX Design Programs

Coursera is a great website for learning UI/UX design. It offers courses and specializations offered by some of the most prestigious universities and tech companies around the globe. Google offers a UX design specialization through Coursera. This certificate program prepares students for UX design careers even if they have yet to gain experience. This specialization will require you to take seven courses.

• Foundations of User Experience Design (UX)
• Begin the UX Design Process: Empathize. Define. And Ideate.
• Make Wireframes and Low Fidelity Prototypes
• Do UX Research and Test Early Concepts
• Figma allows you to create high-fidelity prototypes and designs.
• Responsive Web Design in Adobe XD
• Create a user experience for social good & prepare for jobs

You will receive more than 200 hours’ worth of instruction and assignments. This will give you the confidence and skills to apply for UX design jobs once you are done.

 

TreeHouse – Web Design Track

TreeHouse, an online subscription-based learning platform for programmers and designers, is available as a subscription. The web design track includes 43 hours of video and interactive lessons about HTML, CSS, layouts, and other basics.

This course also covers basic skills, such as an SVG tutorial for budding graphic designers.

Topics:

• HTML & CSS basics
• Web design process
• Advanced HTML forms
• Tables
• Typography
• CSS layouts
• Responsive design
• Flexbox
• Bootstrap 4
• Wireframing
• Animations in CSS
• The layout of CSS grid

Video length: 43 hours

Prices: Courses start at $25/month, and courses that are more than this cost $49/month.

Certificate not available for tracks (only for $199/month Techdegree programs).

Pros:

• This book is an excellent introduction to web design and includes over 40 hours of interactive learning.
• A community you can learn from and interact with.
• With over 15 hours of HTML and CSS basics learning, you can build a strong foundation.

Cons:

• TreeHouse can become costly if you have a full-time job that leaves you with little time to study.

 

DeVry University Online Undergraduate Certificate In Web Design

DeVry University’s certificate in web design prepares students for Adobe Certified Associate exams in many areas, including graphic design, illustration, visual communications, and web authoring. The certificate program includes instruction on basic technical skills, but more emphasis is placed on design than the Cornell program. This makes it an ideal choice if you want help learning and applying design principles to real-world projects.

Enrol in this program to learn the following:

• Software and programming: Instruction in HTML, CSS, and Adobe Creative Cloud is included in the program.
• Multimedia integration: Learn how to use multimedia authoring tools to add animations, audio, and video to a website to make it interactive.
• Communication and media: Learn to use visual media for entertainment and information.
• Web design: This certificate program includes scripting languages, authoring languages, digital media, and web management tools.

 

W3C HTML5 & CSS Fundamentals

W3C’s HTML5 & CSS Fundamentals course is delivered via EdX and teaches students how to create web pages that conform to the most popular standards. Basic enrollment is free, although you can upgrade to premium. You should spend between four and six hours reviewing the course materials and applying the knowledge each week. However, because this course is self-paced, you can go faster or slower depending on your needs.