--- title: "Adobe InDesign Reviews, Pros and Cons - 2026 Software Advice" description: "Reviews of Adobe InDesign. Learn how real users rate this software's ease-of-use, functionality, overall quality and customer support. Talk to our advisors to see if Adobe InDesign is a good fit for you!" source_url: "https://www.softwareadvice.com/graphic-design/adobe-indesign-profile/reviews/" page_type: "reviews" language: "en" --- [Home](https://www.softwareadvice.com/) / [Graphic Design Software](https://www.softwareadvice.com/graphic-design/) / [Adobe InDesign](https://www.softwareadvice.com/graphic-design/adobe-indesign-profile/) / Adobe InDesign Reviews Software Advice offers objective insights based on verified user reviews and independent product and market research. When our advisors match you to a software provider, we may earn a referral fee. [Overview](https://www.softwareadvice.com/graphic-design/adobe-indesign-profile/) Reviews [Alternatives](https://www.softwareadvice.com/graphic-design/adobe-indesign-profile/alternatives/) # Adobe InDesign User Reviews ## Reviews summary - Overall rating: 4.8/5 - Total reviews: 344 ### Secondary ratings - Ease of use: 4.1/5 - Customer support: 4.2/5 - Value for money: 4.2/5 - Functionality: 4.7/5 ### Rating distribution - 5 stars: 274 reviews (80%) - 4 stars: 66 reviews (19%) - 3 stars: 2 reviews (1%) - 2 stars: 0 reviews (0%) - 1 star: 2 reviews (1%) ### Most mentioned pros - Adobe is moving into a subscription-based model to boost profits while cutting corners (a recent forced "upgrade" removed access the entire Pantone library of colors). If you're looking to get started in layout, use a web-based option, or consider QuarkXpress or Corel Draw. - Adobe InDesign is a demanding tool but essential as soon as you want to offer professional quality printed products to your photo clients. - Being able to create literature and presentation for any client with any brand and having full flexibility over design and layout ### Most mentioned cons - It's inability to work effectively from files saved on network drives means i have to copy files to a local drive before working on them. - What I least liked about Adobe InDesign is that the software can be very slow, and sometimes it gets stuck and shuts down. - The user interface can feel a little clunky at times on smaller screens or on a laptop screen. ## Adobe InDesign customer reviews Showing reviews 1-25 of 344 (page 1). ### An Underrated Software That's the Real Money Maker - Overall rating: 5/5 - Reviewer: Joshua W. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Printing - Company size: Self-Employed - Product usage: Used daily for more than 2 years - Reviewed: April 2022 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. For me, Indesign is a life-changing software that has enabled me to reach not only my goals but my dreams of publishing a full-blown magazine. I have sent over 2 million files to print, every one of them created in Indesign. It's my bread and butter. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 5/5 - Value for money: 5/5 - Customer support: 5/5 - Functionality: 5/5 #### Pros Photoshop gets all the attention but Indesign is the unsung hero of the print design world. It doesn't get the viral tutorials or talked about much but it's the real money maker in my opinion. I have mastered this software and with every job I get, it becomes the backbone. Assembling complex PDFs for online distribution or creating magazines or even large format print documents. I simply love Indesign. The recent round of updates is amazing and really improves the overall experience. I have always loved how it perfectly balances complexity and simplicity. It's my babe. All the other designers come to me for Indesign needs because they skipped over it. A shame, but I don't mind as it keeps the money coming in. #### Cons I can't find a complaint. The only issue was how small the interface was, has now been corrected in this last update. #### Reasons for switching to Adobe InDesign Corel constantly crashed and froze up. It's limited and archaic. I used to think Indesign was some distant elite program. But once I made the switch, it took about an hour and I never looked back. Sorry, Corel... Thanks for some good (and very frustrating) years. But Indesign is the real deal. --- ### The most versatile and the most feature rich DTP application - but do you really need all that - Overall rating: 5/5 - Reviewer: Aleksandar D. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Media Production - Company size: 2-10 employees - Product usage: Used daily for more than 2 years - Reviewed: March 2022 - Review source details: This review was submitted organically. No incentive was offered Never, never had any problem or issue. All job done with the perfect precision. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 4/5 - Value for money: 3/5 - Customer support: 5/5 - Functionality: 5/5 #### Pros Adobe inDesign is professional standard - must have application if you work in DTP industry. Even you dont make final prepress in inDesign, you have to have one working place with inDesign, because most of clients will send their creations in inDesign .indd format. And, there are no job or task you cannot complete with inDesign. #### Cons inDesign as solo application is not solution for business. You need additional photo and vector drawing tools, and then we come to Adobe Suite... and we then come to subscription ... and prices ... and ... there are no cheap way to runaway from Adobe ecosystem anytime in future. #### Reasons for choosing Adobe InDesign In one job position in our publishing office, we have to have one inDesign license because our clients. --- ### The standard for layout designing and publishing - Overall rating: 3/5 - Reviewer: Emilio M. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Defense & Space - Company size: 10000+ employees - Product usage: Used monthly for more than 2 years - Reviewed: May 2023 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. I love InDesign, I've been using it almost all my life. But it as time goes by it is becoming more and more outdated. Although there are new softwares more capable in many areas I'm not switching because InDesign it's the standard #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 3/5 - Value for money: 2/5 - Customer support: 5/5 - Functionality: 3/5 #### Pros It is the most complete software for publishing and layout designing. Once you are used to it, it is capable almost of everything. There are many feature to automate repetitive task which are super convenient. #### Cons It is becoming outdated. I find annoying the fact that you cannot open a document generated with a newer version of InDesign. Launching it is super slow even though it is not a demanding resources program. There are not many tools for digital publish layouts, and the ones that it has are outdated. #### Reasons for choosing Adobe InDesign Because it is still the standard for publishing. --- ### InDesign is worth it - Overall rating: 5/5 - Reviewer: Raegan P. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Education Management - Company size: 51-200 employees - Product usage: Used daily for more than 2 years - Reviewed: May 2026 - Review source details: This review was submitted organically. No incentive was offered Overall I am a huge fan of Adobe InDesign. I use it all the time in my job. It is a valuable asset to me. It helps me do my job well. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 5/5 - Value for money: 5/5 - Customer support: 5/5 - Functionality: 5/5 #### Pros I love Adobe InDesign! I use it for print designs for books, newsletters, cards and so much more. It is one of my everyday essentials. The program is easy to use and is worth every penny. I am such a fan of Adobe Indesign. I could not do my job without it. #### Cons I wish that Adobe Indesign had an automatic save feature. It would be helpful to not have to think about saving the program but rather let it be an automatic feature. --- ### The industry standard - Overall rating: 5/5 - Reviewer: Oliver R. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Design - Company size: 2-10 employees - Product usage: Used daily for more than 2 years - Reviewed: January 2026 - Review source details: This review was submitted organically. No incentive was offered Great, I use this software daily and it is the industry standard for graphic design. There isn’t another product that comes close when it comes to designing presentations and literature #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 5/5 - Value for money: 4/5 - Customer support: 3/5 - Functionality: 5/5 #### Pros Being able to create literature and presentation for any client with any brand and having full flexibility over design and layout #### Cons Some glitches within the software making previews glitch and needing to be up to date to with software versions for some files. --- ### Essential item in any designer's toolkit - Overall rating: 5/5 - Reviewer: Bevan W. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Construction - Company size: 2-10 employees - Product usage: Used daily for more than 2 years - Reviewed: May 2025 - Review source details: This review was submitted organically. No incentive was offered InDesign is my trusty workhorse in the design space - particularly for print design it is essential. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 3/5 - Value for money: 2/5 - Customer support: 2/5 - Functionality: 5/5 #### Pros Indesign is a bit of a 'jack-of-all-trades'. You can create anything from print to digital and social. There are so many features to use, and more are always being added. It is an essential item in any designer's toolkit. #### Cons InDesign does require training to use - study a lot of videos online, or better yet, if you know someone who uses it, get them to give you a run-through. Also, without the right settings for your use case, you will not produce things to the best quality for your project. --- ### a key tool for layout-heavy projects like brochures - Overall rating: 5/5 - Reviewer: Rafia R. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Information Technology and Services - Company size: 2-10 employees - Product usage: Used weekly for less than 2 years - Reviewed: January 2026 - Review source details: This review was submitted organically. No incentive was offered InDesign is a key tool for layout-heavy projects like brochures, reports, and brand guidelines. It helps keep complex documents clean and consistent. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 5/5 - Value for money: 4/5 - Customer support: 5/5 - Functionality: 5/5 #### Pros The layout control is excellent, especially for multi-page documents. Styles, grids, and typography tools make it easy to maintain brand consistency across large projects. It’s also well integrated with other Adobe tools. #### Cons There’s a learning curve, particularly for designers coming from purely visual tools. Like other Adobe products, the subscription cost may be high for very small teams. --- ### Adobe Indesign is professionnels - Overall rating: 4/5 - Reviewer: Charles-Stephen L. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Media Production - Company size: 2-10 employees - Product usage: Used weekly for less than 2 years - Reviewed: May 2026 - Review source details: This review was submitted organically. No incentive was offered #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 4/5 - Value for money: 5/5 - Customer support: 4/5 - Functionality: 5/5 #### Pros The layout of professional documents such as brochures, presentations or printed media are my cause of the use of this tool. It is very useful for obtaining a clean and structured rendering. #### Cons No negative point according to my use for the moment he answers Very well my needs Exactly how I want it, every day --- ### Robust tool that streamlines content creation and design. - Overall rating: 5/5 - Reviewer: Joshua O. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Facilities Services - Company size: 1001-5000 employees - Product usage: Used monthly for more than 2 years - Reviewed: December 2025 - Review source details: This review was submitted organically. No incentive was offered Great tool for designing templates and doing some basic image editing. It is flexible, versatile and very comprehensive in how much customization it allows. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 5/5 - Value for money: 5/5 - Customer support: 5/5 - Functionality: 5/5 #### Pros InDesign is incredible tool for designing templates and documents that allows for great flexibility and customization. Objects and designs are created are versatile and increase high resolution which allows for high quality print designs. The user interface has a learning curve but once learned, it is very comprehensive. #### Cons The user interface can feel a little clunky at times on smaller screens or on a laptop screen. I understand that this is due to how comprehensive the tools, but it can make it difficult to see everything on one screen at once. --- ### InDesign Creative - Overall rating: 4/5 - Reviewer: Seharshah S. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Computer Software - Company size: 501-1000 employees - Product usage: Used weekly for less than 12 months - Reviewed: December 2025 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 5/5 - Value for money: 4/5 - Customer support: 5/5 - Functionality: 4/5 #### Pros Adobe InDesign is excellent for creating professional layouts like brochures, presentations, and print-ready documents. The tools are powerful, and once you get used to it, designing complex layouts becomes very smooth. #### Cons It takes time to learn, especially for beginners. The subscription cost can also feel high if you don’t use it frequently for large projects. --- ### The only choice for print design! - Overall rating: 5/5 - Reviewer: Ryan M. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Design - Company size: Self-Employed - Product usage: Used daily for less than 2 years - Reviewed: February 2025 - Review source details: This review was submitted organically. No incentive was offered Indesign is so easy to use but like other Adobe apps, it's really powerful. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 5/5 - Value for money: 5/5 - Customer support: 5/5 - Functionality: 5/5 #### Pros Started using Indesign from the first version, I never really got on with Quark and pushed my agency to Adopt it. #### Cons I think it's pretty great to be honest, I'm using a slightly older version due to my older setup. #### Reasons for switching to Adobe InDesign Indesign was much better and aligned to the other apps I was already using. --- ### Short Learning curve - A must have for text-based content creation. - Overall rating: 5/5 - Reviewer: Sean P. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Oil & Energy - Company size: 11-50 employees - Product usage: Used daily for more than 2 years - Reviewed: November 2023 - Review source details: This review was submitted organically. No incentive was offered Coming from using photoshop for creating designs for flyers and brochures - company profiles ect... and this has been an absolute eye-opener. Now I feel like i know what the pros do. I can edit elaborate,(and readable, text-heavy + image-rich content with huge page-counts without creating monstrously big file-size. - nothing can convert into pdf as efficiently as Adobe InDesign. I have found myself almost fully ditching Photoshop, Microsoft Word and others for weeks at a time because editing here feels effortless for me (someone that loves beautifully designed and thought out documents) . The only big gripe for me is that InDesign isn't very well adopted by my collogues... so when they need to edit a file that i made - they cant easily open it like they would an MS Word document. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 5/5 - Value for money: 5/5 - Functionality: 4/5 #### Pros IT just works! - it looks like a photoshop-ey interface, but the user experience is more fitting to Designers/Nothing else seems to convert my elaborate book designs filled with HD images into PDFs with the level of optimization like InDesign does.It feels like a proper design tool but with a built-in word processor. A perfect middleground between Design and Word functionality.Its an Adobe product so it gets updated often! and now with those nifty Ai tools that automagically makes your work alot easier! #### Cons Its an Adobe product so its probably on the expensive end for a non-pro user.Coming from Photoshop - I had to rethink the way i designed and that was a small but noticeable learning curve.Lacks some of the granular functionality of Microsoft Word to be considered a possible competitor for word processing. #### Reasons for choosing Adobe InDesign Made for documents and long format text files, books and magazines. Just what i needed #### Reasons for switching to Adobe InDesign Needed more efficient way to make small file size PDFs with very high quality. --- ### Solid Design Software - Overall rating: 5/5 - Reviewer: Kari L. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Real Estate - Company size: 201-500 employees - Product usage: Used weekly for more than 2 years - Reviewed: April 2025 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. I've been using it for 2 decades and it's the most reliable software for designing print pieces like brochures, proposals and booklets. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 5/5 - Functionality: 5/5 #### Pros It offers a wide range of design abilities and tools to meet all my design needs for business and personal use. #### Cons There isn't much I can say don't like about InDesign, but I can't always keep up with the new tools and technologies. --- ### Very good but ongoing payments - Overall rating: 5/5 - Reviewer: Margaret W. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Animation - Company size: Self-Employed - Product usage: Used daily for less than 2 years - Reviewed: March 2025 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. Very good experience until I canceled monthly subscription to Adobe Creative Suite. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 5/5 - Value for money: 3/5 - Customer support: 5/5 - Functionality: 5/5 #### Pros It has a very pretty layout and easy to design #### Cons Requires ongoing Adobe subscription to use --- ### A powerful tool for print and digital publishing - Overall rating: 5/5 - Reviewer: David B. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Machinery - Company size: 11-50 employees - Product usage: Used weekly for more than 2 years - Reviewed: March 2025 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. InDesign is a top-tier tool for publishing and layout design. Once you get used to its workflow, it becomes an invaluable resource for creating magazines, books, and marketing materials. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 5/5 - Value for money: 5/5 - Customer support: 5/5 - Functionality: 4/5 #### Pros Adobe InDesign is perfect for creating professional layouts for print and digital media. It offers precise control over typography, page design, and multi-page documents. #### Cons It can be complex for new users, especially those unfamiliar with layout design software. The subscription model may also be costly for occasional users. --- ### Create Design Layouts Exactly as You Envision - Overall rating: 5/5 - Reviewer: Bethany R. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Hospital & Health Care - Company size: 501-1000 employees - Product usage: Used daily for more than 2 years - Reviewed: December 2024 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. Adobe InDesign is a versatile tool for graphic design layouts. It has more features available than other software, which allows for designers to quickly achieve exactly what they want. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 5/5 - Value for money: 4/5 - Customer support: 5/5 - Functionality: 5/5 #### Pros Adobe InDesign is the most versatile program for graphic design layout projects. It is my go-to software for layout of magazines, catalogs, brochures, etc. It easily integrates with other Adobe software (such as Illustrator and Photoshop), as it is simple to place graphics created in other programs into the layout in InDesign. InDesign is very intuitive when it comes to formatting text. It allows for flexibility to manipulate the layout to exactly what you envision. #### Cons It is a bit on the expensive side, and only available as a subscription. --- ### Excellent user friendly design software - Overall rating: 5/5 - Reviewer: Kelly B. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Arts and Crafts - Company size: 2-10 employees - Product usage: Used weekly for less than 2 years - Reviewed: February 2025 - Review source details: This review was submitted organically. No incentive was offered I use the Adobe software together and InDesign is the perfect software to begin designing my projects. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 5/5 - Value for money: 5/5 - Customer support: 5/5 - Functionality: 5/5 #### Pros I really enjoy all the products by Adobe for graphic arts and design. InDesign is the beginning software when I am creating flyers, pamphlets for companies. User friendly and allows you to create the design you imagine. #### Cons Honestly, I haven't found anything that stands out in this software. --- ### Designed to Perfection - Overall rating: 5/5 - Reviewer: Verified Reviewer - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Wholesale - Company size: 1001-5000 employees - Product usage: Used weekly for more than 2 years - Reviewed: January 2025 - Review source details: This review was submitted organically. No incentive was offered InDesign is a key part of my workflow. It is easy for newcomers to pick up and learn and helps our team create polished and professional designs fast. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 5/5 - Value for money: 5/5 - Customer support: 5/5 - Functionality: 5/5 #### Pros InDesign is probably the best document layout software on the market. It has tools to make grid-based or freeform layouts for everything from fliers to booklets. It is easy to drag and drop elements to build new and exciting designs. #### Cons I have very few complaints about InDesign. The process of adding, sizing, and displaying images is a bit antiquated, but otherwise the product is very polished. --- ### Perfect software to create print material - Overall rating: 5/5 - Reviewer: Verified Reviewer - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Non-Profit Organization Management - Company size: 2-10 employees - Product usage: Used weekly for more than 2 years - Reviewed: January 2025 - Review source details: This review was submitted organically. No incentive was offered #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 5/5 - Value for money: 5/5 - Customer support: 5/5 - Functionality: 5/5 #### Pros Allows me to quickly create print material and easily exports to pdfs that are easy for my printer to work with. #### Cons Template master pages can be difficult to navigate and create. --- ### Great for Printing but not for design. - Overall rating: 4/5 - Reviewer: Melanie L. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Publishing - Company size: 2-10 employees - Product usage: Used weekly for less than 2 years - Reviewed: January 2025 - Review source details: This review was submitted organically. No incentive was offered It's pricey but works pretty well once you figure it out. It takes a while to figure it out though. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 3/5 - Value for money: 3/5 - Customer support: 3/5 - Functionality: 4/5 #### Pros It's great for creating publications that need to be printed. #### Cons The learning curve is rouge and it's not very user-friendly. --- ### My everyday tool - Overall rating: 5/5 - Reviewer: Ntuthuko N. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Design - Company size: Self-Employed - Product usage: Used daily for more than 2 years - Reviewed: October 2023 - Review source details: This review was submitted organically. No incentive was offered As a daily user of InDesign, I'm a very and can recommend it anyone, as a Designer it makes my life very easy #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 5/5 - Value for money: 5/5 - Customer support: 5/5 - Functionality: 5/5 #### Pros it's very user centered and easy to use. #### Cons It has less options to manipulate images --- ### As a graphic design student... - Overall rating: 5/5 - Reviewer: Melanie S. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Graphic Design - Company size: Self-Employed - Product usage: Used daily for more than 2 years - Reviewed: October 2023 - Review source details: This review was submitted organically. No incentive was offered I am very happy, I hope that every year they get better and better, and that this program reaches its full potential. Thank you Adobe. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 5/5 - Value for money: 5/5 - Customer support: 5/5 - Functionality: 5/5 #### Pros I'll just be honest, I'm in love with Indesign, thanks to this program I found my passion for editorial design. I don't understand how many people don't like to use it, or simply aesthetically speaking, it doesn't appeal to them. For me it is the opposite, I am very happy with the way it is organized, visually it has a clean and spacious look that does not interrupt you with what you are designing, I like the default work tables, the tools you have to streamline the work of the layout designer, etc. 10/10 #### Cons I don't like that automatically the quality of the images is lower than the original, because it is difficult to know if the image is like that because of performance or because the image is really in very low quality, but I understand that it is a way to speed up the performance of the file. --- ### Best Layout and Publishing software for proffesionals - Overall rating: 5/5 - Reviewer: Marija Š. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Design - Company size: 2-10 employees - Product usage: Used daily for more than 2 years - Reviewed: May 2022 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. Adobe InDesign is easy to work with once you get a hang of it. I also have Adobe CC so it is my go to for 99% of all of the publishing and printing projects. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 4/5 - Value for money: 4/5 - Customer support: 3/5 - Functionality: 4/5 #### Pros Adobe InDesign is NOT an easy drag and drop software, and as such it takes some time to master it, but if you do you will get all encompassing tool for printing and publishing. It offers all the functions to make your designs work in almost any scenarios. Master pages are amazing time savers so you don't need to copy and paste repeating elements on each and every page of your book, magazine or brochure. You can also setup automatic page numbering, chapter naming or Table of contents, which are all huge time savers. It is the best software for text editing especially for the large text blocks like books or magazines. #### Cons Adobe InDesign's biggest strength is also it's biggest weakness, it should be used as a part of Adobe Creative Cloud collaborative tools, which means if you need Photo Editing or Vector Editing and design you will need to that in Photoshop because these tools are non existent in InDesign. So if you are looking to by cheap software you need to look somewhere else, this is not for you. In order to unlock all of the powerful tools you need to have all of Adobe's Creative Cloud suite of applications. --- ### Let's Indesign - Overall rating: 5/5 - Reviewer: neji A. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Newspapers - Company size: 51-200 employees - Product usage: Used daily for more than 2 years - Reviewed: November 2022 - Review source details: This review was submitted organically. No incentive was offered Well, during several years we had been using Indesign and it had been successes whth. We used to use Quarkspress but we changed mind and had no reason to regret. In paper projects which are our main activities; nothing stopped us to got ahead whith Indesign and Adobe in sum. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 5/5 - Value for money: 4/5 - Customer support: 4/5 - Functionality: 4/5 #### Pros As I said before, you can't not adopt Indesign as partner when you decide to do some publishing works, for paper or online forms. I can pretend that it is a publishing portal as long as it collaborate whthdifferent Adobe tools. It can even be enough to you if all elements are ready to insert. #### Cons I had some problem with switching between Machintosh and Microsoft Indesign. Sometimes you have to do this, but the rivality between the Apple and Microsoft make the shipping hard and may break some links inside the product not yet finished. --- ### Adobe Indesign Software Review - Overall rating: 4/5 - Reviewer: Arumuga P. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Animation - Company size: Self-Employed - Product usage: Used weekly for less than 6 months - Reviewed: September 2022 - Review source details: This review was submitted organically. No incentive was offered #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 4/5 - Value for money: 5/5 - Customer support: 3/5 - Functionality: 5/5 #### Pros The first stage of your website design is to set up a simple skeleton – something that is ‘structurally sound’ and doesn’t require too much work. You should then test this with colleagues and customers before the final design is completed. So how can you design a website that is going to be a success, that will get people to engage with it and, at the same time, keep you in business? This article contains some tips that can help you get the best out of your time in designing a website. It’s all in the software .The main difference between web design software and graphic design software is that the web design software has content-management tools and content-creation tools, such as photo editing software. Graphic design software, such as Photoshop, offers similar content creation tools but does not include any content-management tools. To work the best, most designers prefer to create websites in a tool where the elements (pictures, text and so on) can be put together in the order you want them to be seen on screen. Adobe InDesign, in particular, is well suited to this because it contains a range of built-in tools for laying out the different pages of the website (although web pages, in themselves, are really just files on the internet), including drag-and-drop, which is one of the most common methods of working. However, there are many other programs that offer similar functionality and it can often be a case of using the ‘right’ program for your work. #### Cons In Photoshop, you start with a blank canvas and create all the elements in the order you want them to appear. For a web design, Photoshop works best if you start with a template that already contains all the elements. There are also other programs that work in a similar way. Once you’ve got your website in the right shape (which can take a while) it’s time to add the final finishing touches. Web pages are often created with Flash (using programs like Flash Catalyst), but HTML (using InDesign) and XHTML (using an editor like Notepad) are the most common forms of web page creation. Flash is more commonly used to animate elements on websites, for example, when you have a picture of a car, which moves down a ramp as part of a scrolling screen. You can animate a lot of elements (such as moving text) using CSS, but if you have more than a few items to animate it is easier to create them using Flash or some other multimedia programme. If you’re working on a website that has complex formatting, such as ‘page-breaks’ or ‘margins’, then it’s best to work on this before adding the page layout so that you can avoid having to go back and make these changes if your design changes (and, let’s face it, sometimes designs do change). You can add these formatting tags using a program such as Dreamweaver, but it’s more efficient to add them after the page layout is complete. ## More reviews [Next reviews](https://www.softwareadvice.com/graphic-design/adobe-indesign-profile/reviews/?page=2) --- Adobe InDesign Reviews, Pros and Cons - 2026 Software Advice