- What do graphic designers do?
- Graphic designer career path
- Graphic designer salaries
- Qualifications and training
- Graphic designer skills
- Pros and cons of being a graphic designer
- Graphic designer work-life balance
- Graphic designer employers
- Related jobs
Do you have a passion for art? Can you imagine nothing better than turning your design hobby into a career? If you’re looking for a job that combines your love of art with business, a career in graphic design could be for you.
Are you interested in beginning your career in graphic design? Explore current graduate marketing and PR opportunities available now.
What does a graphic designer do?
Graphic designers create graphics and illustrations for a client or company. You may design logos, make graphs and charts for the client to use in presentations or advertising or help design sections of a website. Here are the daily tasks that you can expect to undertake as a graphic designer:
- Have meetings with clients or teams in the organisation to understand the designs that you should create
- Discuss your ideas for designs with your team
- Research a company and a target demographic so you can design something that represents the brand well and appeals to the consumer
- Make drafts for designs
- Present your drafts to your supervisor, team or client
- Edit your designs based on feedback and present a final product
Graphic designer career path
Your career could give you many different opportunities for the type of work you can do as a graphic designer. Some graphic designers move into user interface design, game design, illustration and many more career paths in art. Here is the conventional career path for graphic designers:
Entry-level
Your job in graphic design begins as a junior or entry-level graphic designer. In these roles, you learn the basics of graphic design. Your supervisor gives you introductory work which may challenge your skills but doesn’t require a higher level than you have. You discuss your ideas with the team and complete your work by your deadlines.
Career progression
The next step up for you is a mid-level graphic designer. With the promotion comes an increase in responsibility. You may chat with clients and bring in more of your own ideas and concepts into your work.
A senior graphic designer is the next career level. In this role, you are responsible for your own work and the work of your team. You mentor less senior colleagues, giving them advice for improving their designs and tips for editing their current work. Your designs are higher profile than your less senior colleagues’ and you may have more complex work.
Future career
If you’re interested in working upwards in a company, you could become a creative director. In this role, you have control over the future marketing campaigns, presentation templates and other creative aspects of the company. This is a senior role and comes with a senior paycheck, but reaching this level requires a lot of experience in graphic design and marketing.
If you’re successful as a graphic designer, you could start your own business. You find your own clients, having established a great portfolio of your own work, and maybe even employ other graphic designers and employees in business-related roles to help you run your company.
Graphic designer salaries
As a graphic designer, you have three main options for the type of work you can get. Firstly, you could work for one company or organisation designing all the content that they need for their website, presentations and advertising. Secondly, you could work for an agency that connects you with clients who need some form of graphic design. The final option is working on a freelance basis, finding your own clients and choosing your own work.
These salary options are most applicable for permanent positions for one company or working for an agency because they have more standard progression and salaries.
- As a junior or entry-level graphic designer, you could earn between £19,000 and £25,000 per year
- Mid-level graphic designers earn an average of £28,000 per year
- Senior graphic designers earn an average of £38,000 per year
- Creative directors earn an average of £74,000 per year
Qualifications and training
If working as a graphic designer has piqued your interest, then learning about the necessary steps to entering this career path will help your applications. Here’s what you need to do to start your working life as a graphic designer:
Education
Graphic designers typically have an undergraduate degree in an art or design subject. Having a master’s degree isn’t usually necessary but it might help you learn more advanced skills. If you’re not interested in getting a degree, you can complete a college diploma in graphic design. Either option demonstrates your skills at design well and whilst a degree might be considered more highly, a diploma gives you more relevant experience for the job you’re going into.
Work experience
Having work experience ideally positions you for work as a graphic designer. The aim of work experience is to teach you how to work well on the job and to help you build up your portfolio. Your portfolio is a collection of samples of your work that you can show to a hiring manager to demonstrate your experience and skill.
Ways to build up your portfolio include making your own designs at home. You could redesign the logo or branding of a company that you like. You could volunteer to make the designs for a local business or university society. You could even design the branding for fictional companies. Having high-quality designs that demonstrate the breadth of your ability helps a hiring manager recognise your potential
Graphic designer skills
If you’re considering a career in graphic design, there are many skills that improve your work. Here are the skills that you need to work as a graphic designer:
Hard skills
- Digital design. Working in graphic design means working with computer systems to complete your work. You typically use drawing tablets and graphic pads to draw on your computer.
- Creative software. You should have a good understanding of how to use different types of creative software, for example, programmes within the Adobe Creative Suite. Understanding how to use the functions in these programmes helps you adapt to a workplace.
Soft skills
- Creativity. Being creative means you can make your designs eye-catching and original, ideal for giving the company the best exposure you can.
- Art skills. Having a good understanding of art and the techniques behind it helps your work as a graphic designer. This includes understanding colour palettes and combining colours to make your designs aesthetically pleasing.
- Critical thinking. You receive a brief from your supervisor or a client. From this, you create designs for them. Being able to critically think about what they want and analyse their words helps you make the perfect design and reduce the number of edits you need to do.
- Research. You should research the client or company you’re working for to understand the tone and how they want to be portrayed through their designs. You should also research the target demographic that the client or company wants to attract so you can understand the type of design which appeals most to them.
Pros and cons of being a graphic designer
Working as a graphic designer could be your ideal job allowing you to turn your hobby into a career. Here are some positive and negative aspects of working in graphic design that you should consider before committing to the career path:
Pros
- Your job lets you use your creative and artistic skills every day
- If you’re working for an agency or freelance, then you get a wide range of work that is varied and interesting
- If you’re working for a single company, then you have steady employment
Cons
- It can be difficult to frequently create new designs and come up with new ideas. This may lead to burnout
- If you’re working for an agency or freelance, your work might be unpredictable which can be stressful
- If you’re working for one organisation, you might get work that you don’t always find interesting
- Unless you reach a director or management position or are successful in freelance work, your salary typically won’t increase beyond £40,000 per year
- If your interests are in art rather than design, other jobs like illustrator or animator might be more suitable for you
Work-life balance
As a graphic designer, you work standard office hours or 9am to 5pm, Monday to Friday. You may work additional hours around large deadlines. In a permanent position at a company, you typically work in the company’s office. In agency work, you’re more likely to work from home but you may have the opportunity to work in your client’s office.
Graphic designer employers
You could begin your career as a graphic designer by working for top companies. Since graphic design is relevant to most organisations, there are many companies, including top companies, that need graphic designers. Here are some of the biggest companies that you could work for in graphic design as a graduate: