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Both cover design & graphics and thumbnails & cover art. Here is what separates them on price, billing, what you can take with you, and coverage.
| 99designs | Desygner | |
|---|---|---|
| Starting price | From $249 | From $12.50 |
| Pricing model | One-time purchase | Free plan, paid tiers |
| Free tier | No | Yes |
| Billing | One-time purchase | Monthly or annual |
| Free trial | Not stated | None |
| API | Not stated | Yes |
| Data export | Not stated | Not stated |
| Their cut | Not stated | Not stated |
| Runs on | Web | Web, iOS, Android |
| Covers | Hiring & Freelancers, Design & Graphics, Thumbnails & Cover Art | Design & Graphics, Social Media Management, Thumbnails & Cover Art |
| Works with | Nothing in particular | Nothing in particular |
| Founded | Not listed | Not listed |
| Reader rating | No reviews yet | No reviews yet |
| Live deals | None right now | None right now |
Run a design contest, pick the entry you like
99designs, now owned by Vista, runs the contest model: post a brief and a prize, get dozens of submissions from designers around the world, pay only the one you choose. For a logo or a channel identity that is a lot of directions to look at for a fixed price. The people who dislike it dislike it on principle, because everybody who does not win works for nothing.
Our note
The objection to the contest model is real and worth stating: everybody who does not win works unpaid. If that sits badly, Dribbble and Contra both put you in touch with a designer who is paid for the work they do.
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A design suite that stays free for three seats
Desygner does templates, a background remover, auto-resizing and a social scheduler, and gives all of it away on a plan that covers three people in a workspace. The whole pricing page is written as an argument against paying Canva, which tells you who it is chasing and also that the free tier is the product rather than a lure. Paid plans exist for larger teams and are sold per user by the year.
Our note
The free tier is the product here, and it is a genuinely unusual one: three seats with the background remover and the scheduler included. The rest of the pricing page is an argument against paying Canva, which is worth reading with that in mind rather than as a comparison somebody neutral wrote.
Ratings are the average of reviews readers left. The facts are stated by each tool’s own listing and are not verified by CloutStack. How we make money.
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