Did you know that around 65% of people are visual learners? Most of us love images, which is why they can be among the most effective media one can use to convey messages.
Naturally, that means design is one of the most important parts of good marketing. Smart design enhances the way you and your brand grab attention as well as communicate ideas to your audience.
That’s one of the reasons we did a list of the top graphic design trends before. But things move fast in the marketing realm – today, there’s a whole new list of emerging trends to look at!
So, let’s go over the new graphic design trends in 2024. This should give you and your creative team some ideas for your next ad and marketing materials.
The “human touch” or hand-drawn look
As more and more AI art comes out, we’re seeing a reaction to it in this trend. Essentially, artists are showing off art with more “imperfections” – draft marks, broken or uneven lines, unedited colours, and more.
The idea is to be unapologetic about a bit of messiness and embrace it as part of the work. And a lot of people are appreciating it, not least because it hints at the human talent and uniqueness it takes to produce such a design.
We recommend this if you want to humanise your brand and give it a clearly personal character. It’s a fantastic way to emphasise that with you, customers will be dealing with a company that’s not just about mechanical, mass-produced products and services.
Retro pixels with modern design
Some readers will still remember pixel-style interfaces on devices. Think of old games too where your character’s face was barely more than a single square. That’s the retro, 8-bit pixel style we’re talking about!
It may seem old-fashioned, but it still inspires quite a bit of fond nostalgia (which may be good for some brands). Just think of some things associated with it to realise why – they include gems like Super Mario Brothers 3 and the earliest Final Fantasy games.
There’s also a charm to retro design that many people respond to. Today, we’re seeing it paired with interestingly modern elements. You’ll get pixel-type text surrounded by high-resolution 3D designs now, for instance, and the contrast makes it look even better.
Brutalist anti-design
Ah, brutalism. It’s aggressive, it’s in your face, and it cares little about being pretty. Today’s trend inspired by it has fairly similar attitudes to decoration, although it’s most specifically about rebelling from the typical tenets of “good or attractive design”.
Designers using this style will set up elements in a layout with deliberate ignorance of balance, for example. They’re using strange composition that requires you to pause to comprehend what’s going on, or fonts that traditionally shouldn’t go together.
And when done well, it actually works! The idea is to grab attention immediately and hold you there – and this trend does it by breaking the expected rules, helping it stand out.
It can be a bit of a gamble, though, as it often relies on shocking or arresting the viewer with its bold surprises. Still, a good designer should be able to employ it properly. Just be aware that you’re trading a bit of comprehensibility for awe.
Eclectic typography
Typography is seeing even more experimentation in the graphic design trends of 2024, this time in an eclectic approach that has designers putting together different fonts. Think of serif fonts put together with sans-serif ones, or block letters suddenly flowing into cursives!
It can be highly unexpected, but that’s part of its virtue. It’s also a great option for those who want to put the words front and centre in their materials, so it’s probably among the best ad designs for those who want text-focused ads.
Surreal gradients
Gradients definitely aren’t new but this latest version of them is. It’s less about the softer gradients you expect than ones you don’t, like bright pink turning into sapphire blue or even citrus yellow!
The idea is to give traditionally soft gradients a boost in brightness with almost psychedelic hue pairings. It certainly imbues them with fresh energy and makes them impossible to ignore, in most cases.
We’d recommend using this graphic design trend to give your ads a boost in visibility as well as energy. It may also be ideal if you’re marketing to a younger generation.
The “natural” aesthetic
This probably ties into the heightened interest in sustainability and eco-friendliness among consumers. The idea here is to employ points of design that invoke those ideas – think of earthy colours, a lot of green, references to plants and the environment, and so on.
We see a lot of incorporation of “natural” textures in this trend. Think of designs where items you find in nature are featured prominently: rocks, soil, leaves, petals, and even feathers. Textures associated with organic products are common too, like woven grass or paper twine.
Hopping onto this design trend may be a good idea if your brand wants to emphasise its own natural, sustainable, or organic virtues. It’s a great way to reinforce those messages to your audience.
AI-assisted graphics
We can’t really talk about graphic trends this year without pointing out that AI-assisted design is among the most popular options now. For a simple reason, of course: it makes relatively polished-looking graphics accessible to more people, even those on a budget.
In our opinion, it’s best used by someone who has the art of prompting down. With a good prompt, AI like Midjourney and Chat GPT can produce fairly good designs. Given its nature, it’s also probably best used with conceptual ideas.
Use these graphic design trends to make marketing and ad materials now
Did these new graphic design trends for 2024 give you ideas for the best ad designs? We certainly hope so – but remember, you don’t have to work it all out alone if you’re still unsure.
Our creative team has put together countless high-performing ads and marketing materials for our clients, from visual to text content, and we can do the same for you. Simply reach out to us today and we can figure out what would work best for you in terms of design.
Contact us for a chat for your digital marketing needs – we’ll be glad to talk any time!
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