5 Dynamic Gradient Tools for Graphic Designers

Creating gradients as a designer is frustrating. So much goes into color pairings, linear vs. radial, and how to correctly apply them in your designs.

Although I use them quite often, I think most gradients are badly applied and there’s little good usage of them on the web. Their popularity is reflected in the number of resources that have sprung up online for creating them.

The tools I listed below cover a variety of purposes and can help you create fantastic gradients whether your final project is built from Photoshop or a web page background.

‍

#1 Mesh Gradient by Burak Aslan

Created by product developer Burak Aslan, Mesh is an easy way to create manipulatable gradient surfaces on the web. Click anywhere to add up to 11 points and drag to warp the effects of the gradient. Create a one-of-a-kind gradient effect by simply rearranging each point.

The product is currently under beta testing and featured on Product Hunt so make sure to give the project an upvote if you find it useful.

‍

#2 Grabient by Unfold

I love simply designed products that display their features on the homepage. Grabient is a gradient color customizer with the ability to implement the colors in your Sketch projects and copy the CSS code. You can also alter the angle of the gradient to your liking and add up to five different colors.

Developed in partnership by full-stack JavaScript developer John Korzhuk and Unfold founder, Eddie Lobanovskiy.

‍

#3 Gradient Hunt by Franco Maldonado

Bringing high-quality gradients to the internet without restrictions, Gradient Hunt was made with designers and artists in mind. The collection serves thousands of different hand-picked color gradients and is growing every day.

Each gradient is created by Gradient Hunt’s users themselves and the best of these get to be shown on Gradient Hunt’s homepage. All gradients are free to use. By providing a rich collection, Gradient Hunt aims to be the ultimate resource for color gradients.

This collection of beautiful gradients was founded in June 2018 by Html Colors founder Franco Maldonado.

‍

#4 CoolHue by Webkul.Design

CoolHue is a code-based gradient application that provides you with 60 color combinations to play with. Instead of downloading your gradients in a JPEG image file, CoolHue allows users to render and embed their palettes in JSON.

Now you can directly access these gradient color palettes from right inside your favorite prototyping tools like Sketch App and Figma by downloading the CoolHue plugin for free.

‍

#5 Grainients by We Are Heroes

Do you know the worst thing about most gradients? They have no texture. Often reminiscent of a skyline, clouds, or sunset, they show little depth. Grainients offers a huge collection of over 2000 grainy gradients. Adding a bit of noise to the designs gives each style a bit of character.

This 7GB file download is well worth the digital space. You have a selection of either 2 or 3 color granients. Each folder houses 45 more folders with 54 grainient designs in each.

‍

Although I could list a whole lot of generators out there, at the end of the day it is only you who can make the right decisions in your designs. Not all gradients will fit your needs and that’s completely fine. The most important thing is for you to learn how to use gradients, how to use them correctly, and how to make them work in your projects. Hopefully by using some of these tools you’ve been able to take a step forward in your creative process.