DesignCrowd

I was trying to access the platform as a designer. Despite meeting the minimum requirement of three designs accepted by the curation team, I had to generate many more before being considered. After a brief conversation with the support team, they explained that the acceptance process depends entirely on the curation team, and they couldn't do anything to expedite it.

This resulted in me spending almost two weeks creating high-quality designs consistently. Despite receiving positive feedback from clients, the platform didn't recognize my efforts or give me credit for them. Moreover, some of my original and well-crafted designs were rejected without any explanation, leaving me unclear about what needed improvement.

The platform's Rules & Regulations felt unnecessarily clumsy and unfriendly toward newcomer designers. They seemed to place little value on the hard work behind the designs. If a design was disqualified, there was no consideration of the effort invested. Overall, working here felt like a waste of time due to the lack of support, transparency, and recognition.
My last logo, which was rejected by the platform without explanation, is now uploaded here for reference.
This is unacceptable and truly a waste of time and effort due to their disregard and lack of consideration.

Too much clumsy by their Rules & Regulations, not friendly for newcomer designers, they don't value the designs, if it disqualifies any, how hard efforts one could make to done it, Working here is a Waste of Times.

I paid for the package to receive designs from 3 different designers. The designs were pitiful and poorly done. It was truly a joke what was provided. I attempted to provide feedback and have the design altered, but it was pointless as there was so little to start with. I asked for my money back, thinking it was a money back guarantee. Turns out it is NOT a money back guarantee. They are only refunding $159 and withholding $80 for fees that they claim are not refundable. BEWARE! Do not use Design Crowd.

After a few revisions and even switching designers I was still not happy with the quality of work. I was looking for a professional A board for my company and sent examples of what I want. After growing impatient with the designs I asked for a refund, but they said they could do a partial refund. I am very disappointed with this company. Frankly I only lost time and money.

Want to spend hours designing a logo and have it denied by the design crowd team and ban your account for 6 months? Then this is the site for you! Not only do they deny your design before the client can review it, they leave no feedback at all! If they don't think your design is up to that individual reviewing its standard, they close your account for 6 months. I would highly recommend this site to anyone who wants their time wasted and would like a big slap in the face.

Save your money, time, and frustration.
This company is very frustrating. They do not offer customer service by phone, UNLESS YOU PAY EXTRA. They don't offer you privacy on your job, UNLESS YOU PAY EXTRA. When you get inferior work/designs they don't refund much of what you paid.

MY PHONE STARTED RINGING IN THE MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT. Calls from designers around the world who saw my contest online. What company does this? Shouldn't my information be private? Shouldn't only their registered designers have access?

I will stick with 99Designs.

This is very funny as I am a part of multiple designer networks where admissions to some took months of interviews, have my business and worked 5 years in the industry and my account was not verified due to "low quality of designs". And I just wanted to design on the side not for money but for fun and needed additional briefs haha. Well, I know design is subjective, but their website looks like it was designed in 2005 and most of the designs accepted would not be accepted by any serious design studio, so I just find it funny that they seem to value lack of quality on their selection team.

I had a terrible experience here, a single bad review on a project prevented me submitting new work for a fixed time on any open jobs giving an advantage to my competitors, as the rating system is only from 1 to 5 you are given a quality rating far below what would be fair (as support explained people use the rating system to sort what they like not necessarily as a review of quality but organising the submitted designs). As a designer you're not allowed to ask the client what they dislike or to adjust/revise to their tastes, but you are given penalties if one client marks down your work even if just to organise their received submissions which directly affects your ability to apply in a timely manner to other jobs on the whole site, which results in more lower ratings. It's a hot mess.

They paid the wrong designer & said we'd have to pay more $ to use one we wanted. AND overcharged us

Don't work with this company. I have one designer pose as an employee and con me into spending more money on a design. Of three projects I signed up for 2 of them contain copyrighten images. I am sure the 3rd does too I've just not found out about it yet. Overall a horrible experience. Don't use them.

As many designers before me have already told, designcrowd is a scam. They close my account and did not authorized it even though my designs were in great quality.

I commissioned DesignCrowd to design me a very simple logo for a 42mm round sticker according to my brief. After reading their marketing material on the website, I paid $229 upfront with a high expectation of simple yet professional output.
The designs that I received were basically auto generated generic images and font that you do yourself on an any logo generator website for a fraction of the cost or even for free.
I objected strongly in their limp auto generated " Customer Survey" and was contacted shortly thereafter by one of their customer service reps.
Because I had opted for their higher level professional service in "attracting the Best Designers " through choosing the non refundable option, I was not due a refund.
I strongly objected again, repeating the fact that their design work was not of a professional standard. I demanded my $229 back and The rep disappeared. So I forwarded my email to the CEO. He's on YouTube proselyting about what a smart savvy guy he is. It turns out, his email is non contactable and their phone number is not answered.
Anyway, the rep was replaced by a snappy middle manager who said they would make an "exception" for me and give me a refund. Minus $95 for their outsourcing of the work. I can only presume that their cheap robot programs work for money.
Next time I'm in Sydney I'll be paying these clowns a visit.

These guys are total rip-off artists. Don't waste a penny with them.

I just started a new company and needed new and fresh designs for my logo regarding my business cards, email signature block, and stationary. I also needed a new look for the new book cover. DESIGN CROWD came through in GREAT fashion. In fact, there were so many good designs that it was a painful task to finally make a decision. I also highly recommend that you pay for the VIP personal (only $29.00) customer assistance because it is more than worth it. The customer service was totally unbelievable GREAT and therefore suggest that Design Crowd make Hopner L. Vice President of the company. She was GREAT!

I'm an experienced designer and I've been ban after submitting 3 designs. I've got an email saying that my work didn't meet the quality requirements. I made sure that my logo meets all requirements given by the contest holder and still got banned. I can't even log in to my account and delete my personal infos which is totally unethical and that's probably why they exist to "steal personal informations". I'm quite sure they post fake projects brief. I will post my design for you to tell me if the quality is that poor and please consider that i had to respect the brief and use their colors "a minimal logo for a social media app".Run away from designcrowd as fast as you can.

I've been trying to reply to the briefs for over a month. Every time I try to land on any URL within the site, I'm given a 403 error. I've tried this with and without a VPN.

EDIT 05/04/2023: Since my last review, their support has been in contact with me. My rotating VPN wasn't supported by the site, and they recommended that I not use it. A few weeks later, however, I see that it now works just fine, telling me they've since fixed the problem site-wide. That's more to say for a lot of other businesses imo.

If I had to give any other critique of the actual service, I'd say there's a missed opportunity by not sorting the information in a more calculated way. There are likely designers of every kind of background being solicited on there, yet the customer isn't really clear on which one in particular. They actually need. There doesn't seem to be a good way for designers to filter, and I imagine that's similar on the client's side.

• Designs received within minutes of listing going live (zero consideration given).
• 90% of designs were stock images from Pond5, Shutterstock, Adobe Stock etc.
• 90% of designer included elements which I had specifically stated I did NOT want.
• Remaining 10% lacked any creativity and looked very dated.
• Not sure anyone read the detailed brief I provided.
• Money back guarantee is a total con. You get a portion back and it takes 10 days.
• Avoid at all costs.

They don't deserve 1 star... I've been a professional designer for over 15 years. My account was created for something fun for me to do on the side. I was flagged and banned for creating high end illustrated work from scratch (followed all guidelines). It felt that I was banned because the quality I submitted was too good for them to offer to the client. They stated this was because I used stock images which just isn't true as all my work was illustrated and I can prove it. After reading reviews, it seems that they ban great designers and have their team members have priority over these contests. I have no idea what they're doing with my work that I submitted either.

I regret to find this service. The process to get started is simple. I received a single "design" which is worse than free clipart. I complained and requested a refund instead they extended the deadline and invited more "designers". (they refused to make a refund because I "guaranteed" my project and designers already "invested" their time. I don't know what time was invested to this single poor design, probably couple minutes and I suppose to pay 170euro for this truly disgrace)
So I didn't receive any even lowest appropriate design nor my money back