Adobe describes InDesign as "industry-leading layout and page design software" for both print and digital.

But while it's aimed at graphic design professionals, it's not too difficult to learn---especially if you have the right training.

Fortunately, there are tons of InDesign tutorials on the web. And best of all, many of them are free. We'll look at the best ones in this article.

What Is Adobe InDesign?

Adobe InDesign is a tool that enables graphic designers to create single- or multi-page documents. So things like brochures, magazines, books, and flyers. It's particularly good for print documents, but can also be used to create layouts for digital media.

With InDesign, you can easily arrange images using frames and manage text using the Story Editor and other features. You can also import images from other Adobe software, like Illustrator and Photoshop, and they'll synchronize automatically.

Can You Really Teach Yourself InDesign for Free?

It's easier to learn something when you have a real teacher who can answer questions and guide you. With a teacher, they will also be able to add their own personal insights and examples based on experiences they've had.

But if you're dedicated and practice what you learn, you don't necessarily need a teacher. Instead, you can become a capable designer using the following free resources.

Adobe Tutorials

What better place to look for help learning InDesign than its creator's website? Adobe offers a small collection of InDesign training videos, ranging from a couple of minutes to several hours in length.

Adobe indesign tutorials

Adobe’s InDesign training covers all the basics you’ll need to get started. It doesn't have a huge amount of tutorials, but there is enough content to learn the fundamentals of the InDesign software.

A good place to start is with the Get Started with InDesign tutorial. It goes over the basics, like creating a new file and zooming in and out. Once you understand the basics, you can move onto other courses.

The Official User Guide

Another great resource Adobe offers is the InDesign online user guide. This covers far more of what InDesign can do, and how you should use it.

Adobe indesign user guide

The guide is not structured like a course, though, so it's not something you'd want to just dive into.

But if you've completed the InDesign tutorials for beginners, it will be a useful resource to dip into as you begin working with the software.

When you're working on something and a question comes up, you can head to the user guide to get the answer.

Yes, I'm a Designer

Set up by Adobe Certified instructor Martin Perhiniak, the Yes, I'm a Designer YouTube channel offers a decent selection of tutorials for all of Adobe's most popular graphic design tools. For InDesign, there are videos that cover everything from typography to layout principles.

Yes i'm a designer youtube

If you want a complete and structured course, you need to visit the Yes, I'm a Designer website and sign up for a paid subscription. Nonetheless, these free tutorials are worth a look if you want some pointers.

Bring Your Own Laptop

Another YouTube channel set up by an Adobe Certified instructor, Bring Your Own Laptop is the brainchild of designer Daniel Walter Scott. On the official website, you can sign up for courses for all the major Adobe Creative Cloud tools. Annual or monthly memberships are available.

But the YouTube channel has plenty of usual tutorial videos for beginners and more advanced users. Among them is a Free Adobe InDesign Course for Beginners, which is almost two hours long and made using extracts from Scott's full course.

Envanto Tuts+

Envato is a marketplace for creative assets, like graphic design templates, 3D models, and audio samples, which comes with a monthly subscription. But Envato Tuts+ is its training site, and many of the tutorials it offers are available for free.

In addition to how-to guides and courses, this site offers eBooks and guides.

Envato tuts website

There are a few good courses if you're new to InDesign. You should check out The Basics of Print Design if you're not familiar with the craft.

But if you just want to get on with using InDesign, take a look at Adobe InDesign for Beginners. This is an eight-part course presented by none other than Daniel Walter Scott of Bring Your Own Laptop.

Terry White

Although this isn’t a structured course, Terry White’s videos on InDesign have helped over 400,000 beginners start making the most of InDesign.

Terry white youtube channel

His lessons include "How to Get Started With InDesign CC," "Publishing from InDesign to iPad," and "How To Create a Fixed Layout eBook"---along with around 50 other lessons.

Terry also provides tutorials for other Adobe Creative Cloud software. If you want to improve your photography, you'll also find related courses.

CreativePro

CreativePro is a website that offers articles, tutorials, and more for graphic design professionals. Recently, it merged its InDesignSecrets website and InDesign Magazine titles into its main CreativePro.com.

CreativePro website

This means CreativePro is now home to a comprehensive online resource for all things InDesign. Once you’ve got the basics nailed, this site is an excellent place to go next.

Related: The 7 Best Free InDesign Templates Sites for Books, Flyers, Magazines, and More

You’ll find thousands of articles, InDesign templates, podcasts, and videocasts, plus an active forum.

MakeUseOf

The very website you're reading now has some useful InDesign tutorials for beginners. For example, in the past, we've looked at how to use InDesign paragraph character styles and how to package InDesign documents.

MUO InDesign article screengrab

We also regularly cover other Adobe software like Photoshop and Illustrator, which integrate with InDesign. And we write about hardware-related issues that are important for design work too.

So while you're here, why not check out some of our other InDesign articles?

Are Free InDesign Tutorials as Good as Paid Ones?

There are some fantastic free InDesign tutorials available online. But if you want a full, structured course, you're often better off paying for this. Indeed, many of the best free tutorials are created by professional Adobe instructors to advertise their full, premium services.

But if you can't afford to pay for training, with a little patience you can get by with free resources instead. The key thing is that, whatever you choose, you stick with it and are always eager to learn more.

In the long term, your enthusiasm may be what counts more than the courses themselves.