AI in Graphic Design: How It Works & Expert Tips for 2026

Companies are adopting AI at a breakneck speed.

In a recent , 65% of participants noted their organizations regularly use generative AI—nearly double the percentage recorded 10 months before. The anticipated influence of generative AI also remains substantial, with 75% of participants forecasting it will bring about significant shifts in their industries.

The design sector will no doubt experience mammoth change, too. AI’s ability to analyze and interpret vast amounts of data, combined with a knack for learning and adapting at a swiftness humans can only dream of, is already fuelling the launch of .

Besides helping designers create their work faster than ever and freeing up time for other creative tasks, AI is making it easier to generate designs or convert an based on user preferences.

The result? Greater personalization, increased engagement and higher conversation rates for those who know how to wield its power.

If you’re hoping to build your brand in the AI era, it’s key to explore the impact, benefits and uses of artificial intelligence in design. Your competitors are likely already tapping into the latest AI design tools, using clever machines to rapidly produce their branding and marketing materials.

Don’t get left behind. Today, we are going to talk about different ways to use , with insights from , Gen AI Creative, and , Senior AI Creative & Art Director at Superside.

Machine intelligence is here to stay, with the global market value for generative AI expected to .

The technology’s rising popularity among designers is no surprise when you realize that AI helps them breeze through repetitive tasks, use data-driven insights to develop impactful results, and save time with more streamlined processes.

Innovations like make it even easier for creatives to crush the tasks on their to-do lists.

An increasing number of consumers now also expect personalization from brands. With 6 in 10 consumers adamant that brands should use their data to provide personalized experiences, many organizations (most notably ) are under pressure. AI can be a lifeline, helping brands generate designs that resonate with different target personas.

Some of the to generate ideas, images and designs are Midjourney, Dall-E, Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Firefly, Stable Diffusion and ChatGPT. But any designer with some AI experience will tell you that using these products doesn’t mean you can hit “auto-pilot” and walk away from your desk. While the software can make many aspects of the design process faster and easier, it cannot replicate the depth and .

AI’s design results are only as good as the human minds creating the prompts—one good reason to enlist the services of an excellent or tap into . The effort it takes to is another good reason to work with pros, as mentioned by Damien Correll to Superside Infinite Canvas summit attendees in a talk that debunked .

Using AI in graphic design has .

The three main benefits, according to Superside’s A-list designers, are the following:

1. Greater efficiency

AI now automizes time-consuming and repetitive tasks. This increased efficiency allows creative professionals to dedicate more time and energy to conceptual work.

Adobe Photoshop’s “Auto Selection” and “Content-Aware Fill” features are standout examples of AI tools that streamline workflows.

Auto Selection uses machine learning algorithms to intelligently select complex objects within imagery—a task that once required painstaking manual effort. Content-Aware Fill goes a step further by analyzing surrounding pixels to fill in removed or altered areas of an image.

With all the time designers and other creatives can save, it’s no wonder experts predict to the world’s economy.

2. Unlimited creativity

Sixty-nine percent of the world’s marketing and creative leaders believe . AI can generate numerous ideas and variations based on initial input, helping graphic designers break through creative blocks and explore directions they might not have considered otherwise.

Generative AI, in particular, has opened up new frontiers in . These systems can produce entirely novel imagery, patterns and designs based on learned parameters, offering designers a vast playground of possibilities.

3. Greater accessibility

AI is also lowering the barrier to entry for non-designers who need to produce visual content. User-friendly design assistants can guide novices through the creative process, offering suggestions and automating complex tasks. Graphic design tool Canva is the perfect use case: By 2024, this platform’s user base expanded to , with AI-driven tools like “Background Remover” driving usage among those who don’t have formal graphic design training.

The fact that the highest number of Canva users currently fit into (and not the creative sector) further underscores the user-friendly nature of this free online graphic design platform.

Moreover, AI can significantly boost graphic designers’ ability to perform , making their designs more inclusive and . AI can, for example, analyze font choices and sizes to ensure they meet minimum legibility standards across different devices and screen sizes.

AI-powered tools can augment creative process, streamline workflows and open up new design possibilities. Are you ready to have your mind blown? Let’s take a look at three tools that both Andrea and Helena like to call the “Holy Trinity of AI Design.”

1. Adobe Photoshop

Adobe Photoshop now offers several AI tools, including Generative Fill, Generative Expand, Face-Aware Liquify and the Curvature Pen tool.

allows you to generate lifelike people, increase image detail and sharpness, and even match the style of a reference image. It streamlines creating various high-quality concepts quickly.

Use this tool with to enlarge your photo’s background. For example, remove any distractions behind your main subject (e.g., a ginger cat), add objects (e.g., books in a bookcase) to create a realistic setting (e.g., a comfy lounge), and expand the image to fit the landscape format you require.

The Face-Aware Liquify feature uses facial recognition to identify key facial elements in a portrait photo, allowing you to easily modify and refine portrait images. For example, you can use the tool to elongate your subject’s nose, make the eyes appear bigger, and create fuller lips in just a few minutes.

2. Midjourney

This AI-powered text-to-image generation tool can magically create multiple image variations . Once you’ve generated your first images, you can refine your AI art by selecting options like “upscale” to increase resolution or “vary” to produce new variations based on a specific result. You can start with basic prompts or explore advanced techniques to achieve highly specific results.

as a single word or emoji (e.g., 🐈‍⬛). A slightly more advanced prompt would be “/imagine black cat,” asking the AI to use its imagination in creating the image. You can then fine-tune the image by adding various parameters. For example, if you’d like to adjust the level of stylization, you might use “--s” followed by a number, such as “/imagine playful black cat --s 1500.” This controls the balance between the accuracy of the prompt and Midjourney’s artistic interpretation.

Check out to create photorealistic images for SmartNews.

3. DALL-E

DALL-E, OpenAI’s model, is another fantastic tool for AI image generation. With the help of a state-of-the-art image captioner, DALL-E 3 (the latest version) can interpret and visually represent complex prompts with remarkable accuracy.

The tool’s uncanny understanding of context and nuance means it can accurately capture subtle details, render intricate elements like text and human features, and adapt to landscape and portrait orientations.

The trick with this tool is to have a clear vision of what you’d like to create it. For example, don’t simply prompt “cat on a couch.” Instead, be as descriptive as possible, using a prompt like “fat ginger cat sleeping soundly on a worn-out couch, painted in the style of Van Gogh” to get the result you’re after.

Today’s creative professionals use AI in five compelling ways:

1. Automate repetitive tasks

McKinsey & Company estimates that recent advancements in generative AI could currently occupying employees’ work hours. We experienced first-hand how AI can save designers hours of time by taking care of routine tasks such as removing image backgrounds, resizing images and applying consistent styles across design elements. Working hand in hand with AI allows the designers to focus on more complex or creative tasks.

Realizing the enormous power of generative AI soon after its release, Superside worked on ways to increase our ad design productivity by 70%. Our Craft & Productivity Team , identifying inefficiencies. They found that traditional tools like Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop were ill-suited for scaling ad production, leading to time-consuming manual processes, collaboration challenges, and a lack of holistic project views.

After careful consideration, they transitioned our designers to the cloud-based . This shift immediately allowed for seamless collaboration between team members, easier versioning and improved brand consistency through component libraries. Figma’s vector-based platform also helped our graphic designers create high-quality, responsive designs that are easily scaled and modified.

2. Generate creative content

With the help of generative AI, graphic designers can now create images, illustrations and completed designs based on simple text prompts. Artificial intelligence can help them brainstorm and explore new ideas quickly and experiment with different styles and concepts to create great results.

Once again, Superside provides a fabulous example of leveraging AI to generate creative content. Earlier this year, we achieved a significant milestone, . By integrating AI into our design processes, we reduced design costs for our customers by more than $1.4 million. Moreover, we streamlined project delivery, increasing efficiency by up to 60% in some instances.

Superside also successfully leveraged to meet the extensive image requirements of one of our customers, Goettl. The project, in which we produced , was particularly well-suited for AI as we were up against a tight deadline. Our creatives tapped into ChatGPT to generate creative prompts, Midjourney to create images, Photoshop to integrate product materials, and Magnific to perform post-production enhancements.

The result? We delivered a custom photo library with professional-grade assets at a fraction of what it would have cost if we used conventional methods, reducing our design hours by about 87% and getting the job done in record time.

3. Enhanced photo editing

AI can dramatically enhance photo editing by, for example, adjusting facial features, refining a photo’s color balance and adding filters. Tools such as Adobe Photoshop’s Content-Aware Fill simplify intricate edits, making the design workflow faster and more efficient.

This technological shift is already transforming the photography industry, with incorporating AI into their editing processes. With AI-powered retouching tools slashing photographers’ editing times by up to 70%, they can now focus more on capturing images and less on post-production. AI is also changing how photographers organize and present their work, with many using AI for image tagging and organization.

AI-enhanced design and photography tools are even more valuable when used in conjunction, but it’s critical to establish a strategic and aesthetic direction from the outset. Our work for of this approach.

After solidifying the visual and strategic direction, our designers used AI to increase their creative output. They delivered —triple the number they’d typically deliver within the allocated budget and time.

4. Creating custom graphics

AI provides a wonderful way to kickstart the design process and unlock creative potential. Within seconds, AI can generate custom graphics from scratch or modify existing ones, saving hours of work and creative energy. The latest tools can, for example, convert text descriptions into vector illustrations, produce tailored color schemes and propose design alternatives.

Superside’s creatives recently used AI-powered tools to stunning effect to showcase our exceptional talent at an event in New York. Our designers were asked featuring prospects and customers in five days.

The team used AI to generate custom graphics based on research gathered from LinkedIn and elsewhere about each individual’s appearance, location and interests. When the generated images fell short of accurately representing the prospects, they pivoted to using celebrity look-alikes as reference points to improve the accuracy of the AI-generated portraits.

With the help of Photoshop, the team then successfully created accurate, personalized posters. The use of AI for image generation, copy creation and efficient production of 3D avatars without traditional illustrators significantly reduced the project’s timeline.

5. Facilitate creative brainstorming

AI tools can enhance brainstorming by generating a string of new ideas and concepts based on a single prompt. This can help designers explore new directions, experiment with different styles, and overcome creative blocks.

But combining AI with human skill is the key to producing great designs. AI excels at data processing and generating variations, while humans provide emotional depth, empathy and cultural understanding.

While AI is truly remarkable, the technology also presents challenges that designers must navigate carefully.

1. Legal and ethical concerns

As AI systems churn out increasingly sophisticated designs, the line between human and machine authorship blurs, . There’s an ongoing debate about whether AI-generated works can be copyrighted and, if so, who owns the rights—the AI developer, the user or the AI system itself.

If you partner with Superside, we’ll answer all and allow you to stay 100% in control. You can always opt in or out of using AI in your project.

2. The importance of human creativity and oversight

We’re passionate about leaving humans in control of creative outputs, as can lead to inaccuracies and costly mistakes. Overusing AI also quickly results in generic outputs that lack creative spark, as AI draws from existing patterns and trends.

At Superside, we pair with AI to reduce project costs by up to 60%, expand capacity and get to market faster with high-quality assets for our customers. Importantly, however, and train our designers on the ethical, efficient use of AI.

Finally, we asked our expert AI designers for a piece of advice they could give to newcomers in this field, and this is what Andrea said:

Superside is spearheading the integration of AI technology in design. Our team of AI-savvy designers can also help you win customers with a truly spectacular array of concepts and creative formats.

If you’re ready to explore new possibilities and give your visual content wings, let’s chat.