Contrary to popular belief, you don’t need a big hulking desktop whirring away in order to be a designer. The beauty of being a designer today is the versatility and ease of devices like the iPad, which offers a lot of benefits to graphic and product designers. In fact, I’ve designed some of my best digital planners on my iPad pro. 

As a designer, my iPad is an essential part of my daily work routine. I no longer need a digital drawing board, I can draw, create and design everything I need right on my iPad. One of the most convenient things of using an iPad to design is that I can open two apps side by side and use them simultaneously. For example, I can add stickers that I saved from Dropbox to my planner in Goodnotes. Another truly wonderful feature that has nothing to do with specs and the new mouse and tracking pad feature is that using an iPad helps me to declutter. I used to have tons of papers with sketches and notes and design books filling my bookshelves and desk. Now I have everything in one place, no more paper, no more clutter. 

The iPad really does give you all you need in one super convenient, portable device. You can work at home or on the go on your iPad without needing any extra accessories. Not only can you create quality products, like digital planners on your iPad Pro, but you can also download any number of designer’s apps that are optimized for the iPad. From awesome illustration apps to planning apps to video editing apps, your iPad can take you from brainstorming to finished product with lightweight apps that pack a heavy punch.  

Here’s a select list of my absolute favorite design apps to use on my iPad:

App#1 Procreate 

Procreate lets you sketch, paint and create through their award-winning app. The most popular app for painting, drawing, and illustration on the iPad. You get access to hundreds of brushes and stamps that makes learning how to draw easy and fun!

I like to use Procreate to create gorgeous creatives like: 

• Illustrations

• Digital planner stickers

• Planner and notebook covers

• Patterns

Price: One-time fee of $9.99.

App#2 Goodnotes

Goodnotes recaptures the joy of hand-written note-taking, allowing you to write out your thoughts digitally. Their note-taking and PDF markup app lets you create digital notebooks and type text on your iPad (if hand-writing isn’t your thing) with an Apple Pencil using Sidecar. Import docs and write on, sketch on or add images to them, giving new life to document editing and sharing. You can conveniently create, organize and sync your documents across devices. It lets you start working on a document on your desktop and then seamlessly continue working on your iPad so you can keep working when you’re away from your home or office.  

My favorite uses for Goodnotes are:

• Daily planning and organization

• Brain dumping ideas

• Making sketches

• Testing my planners

• Packaging my stickers

• Testing my digital planner

Price: One-time fee of $7.99

App#3 Affinity Designer

Affinity Designer is the hands-down winner among professional graphic design apps. There’s virtually nothing you can’t do with this app from creating vector curves to combining them with raster graphics to working with unlimited layers and 100% color fidelity not to mention a place to organize your artboards. Their simple drag and drop system allows you to export images directly from your iPad. No wonder it’s won so many awards. 

Affinity Designer is my go-to app for creating vector-based designs. It’s also the fastest app available for sticker cropping. Saves me tons of time and produces beautiful results. 

Price: One-time fee of $19.99.

App#4 LumaFusion

LumaFusion is a fantastic video editing app that works perfectly on your iPad. You can edit videos and create effects right on your iPad, no heavy video editing software required. Premium video, audio and effects editing capabilities including fast and slow motion and time lapse. They have dozens of royalty-free music, loops and backgrounds or choose from thousands of options by subscribing to Storyblocks for LumaFusion. It also has great project management features, allowing you to multi-task and edit across split screens. When you’re finished with your masterpiece, proudly share your work across a multitude of platforms including YouTube and Vimeo.  

LumaFusion is my choice of app for tasks such as:

• Creating and editing videos for my online courses

• Creating plan-with-me videos for Instagram

• Adding time-lapse to my videos

• Creating walk-through videos 

Price: One-time fee of $29.99

App#5 Momento

Momento is a GIF and stop-motion app that allows you to create cool and dynamic GIFs. With Momento, you can add stickers, text, music, filters and you can apply zoom, effects and filters to get exactly the branded designer look you want. They’re super easy to share on a variety of platforms like Instagram, Snapchat, iMessage, TikTok and more. 

I use Momento to create GIFs for my Instagram stories and posts. I especially like that it allows me to export them in different quality and file types. 

Prices: $2.99/week, $39.99/year

App#6 Concepts

Concepts is an advanced sketching app that helps you bring your designs to life. Its hybrid vector-raster Fluid Engine gives 64-bit precision while its super responsive high performance 120Hz displays work perfectly with an Apple Pencil on an iPad. The high accuracy you get on the iPad makes it super appealing to designers who praise it for its user friendliness and technical perfection. Infinite canvas, amazing brushes and five fantastic layers help bring your ideas to reality. 

Whenever I’ve got a new planner idea, I open Concepts on my iPad and get to sketching. Their unlimited canvas gives me the freedom to brain dump, wireframe, sketch and outline. It’s the perfect app for creative work. 

Price: 

Free basic services

Customizable packages and subscriptions

Final thoughts!

How about you? What app gets the most use on your iPad? What are your favorite uses for this app?

With all these fantastic apps available, it’s easier than ever to start an online business and start earning money from apps on your iPad! Get started with my Design your own digital stickers course.