How to work with text & fonts in Canva

Course contents
SECTION: 2
Project 1 - Social Post Design 3:51
SECTION: 11
Project 3 - Proposal Document 2:30

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Course info

85 lessons / 8 hours 23 quiz questions 20 projects Certificate of achievement

Overview


Welcome to the Canva Design Essentials course! Led by professional designer Dan Scott, this course is your gateway to mastering Canva and building a strong foundation in design principles. Whether you’re new to design or looking to sharpen your skills, you’ll learn how to create impactful, real-world designs with ease.

With 17 years of professional design experience and multiple teaching awards, Dan has taught over a million students worldwide. His hands-on approach and industry insights make learning engaging and accessible, empowering you to reach your creative potential.

You’ll learn:
  • - Design Fundamentals
- Social Media & Marketing Graphics
- Logo Design & Branding
- Create Professional Documents & Presentations
- Learn how to Edit Video
- Canva’s AI Features

This course is ideal for beginners in Canva and design, whether you’re a teacher, student, small business owner, or aspiring designer. With step-by-step instructions, you’ll gain confidence in creating visuals that communicate effectively and look professional.

Take the first step toward becoming a Canva Hero—sign up now to transform your design skills!

Requirements:
  • - All you need is a free Canva account. You can get a free trial from Canva here to get started.

Who this course is for:
  • - Absolutely no previous Canva experience is required.
  • - This course is designed for newcomers to Canva and design in general, so no prior design experience is necessary.
  • - This is a relaxed, well-paced introduction, perfect for producing a wide range of projects. Only basic computer skills are necessary - if you can send emails and surf the internet, you're more than capable of mastering this course.

What you'll learn:
  • - Creating Designs in Canva
    - Working with Free & Paid Images in Canva
    - How to Crop Photos in Canva
    - How to Crop with Frames in Canva
    - How to Name Your Canva Documents Right
    - Uploading Your Own Images into Canva
    - Where to Get Free Photos for Canva
    - Understanding Workspaces
    - Squares, Circles + Layers & Position
    - How to Export a JPG & PNG from Canva
    - Mixing Colors in Canva
    - Design Styles & Color Palettes in Canva
    - Working with Text & Fonts in Canva
    - Adding Drop Shadows to Text in Canva
    - Curving Text Around a Badge
    - Group, Lock & Aligning Elements in Canva
    - Creating Dotted & Arrowed Lines with Text
    - Modifying Shapes in Canva
    - Changing Color of Graphics & Collections
    - Editing the Background Remover Tool
    - AI Image Generator with Magic Media in Canva
    - Mockups in Canva
    - Testing & Posting on Your Phone for Instagram
    - Editing Canva Designs on Your Phone
    - Using Canva Template Logos
    - MoodBoard WhiteBoard Brainstorm
    - Using Markup Tools, Stickies, Comments & Sharing
    - Logo Competitor Analysis in Canva
    - Designing a Custom Logo in Canva
    - Picking Fonts for Your Logo
    - Choosing Logo Colors
    - Using Gradients in Canva
    - Understanding Brand Kits
    - Light, Dark & Stacked Versions of Your Logo
    - Working with a Word Style Doc in Canva
    - Font Combinations & Pairing in Canva
    - Changing Text Styles in Canva
    - Styling Tables in Canva
    - Designing Header Banners in Canva Docs
    - Using Highlight Blocks, Dividers & Quotes in Canva Docs
    - Presentation Templates & Styles in Canva
    - Using Layouts in Presentations in Canva
    - Page Transitions in Presentations
    - Animating Pages & Page Elements
    - Creating Charts in Canva
    - Adding QR Codes in Canva
    - Adjusting Images in Canva
    - Darkening Images for Text Overlays
    - Using Magic Eraser in Canva
    - Magic Edit in Canva
    - Magic Expand in Canva
    - Trimming Video in Canva
    - Applying Video Filters & Adjustments
    - Animating Text & Changing Timing in Canva
    - Changing Stickers & Adding Motion Effects
    - Animating Photos in Canva
    - Finding Free Videos for Canva
    - Exporting Video for Social Media in Canva

Daniel Scott

Daniel Scott

Founder of Bring Your Own Laptop & Chief Instructor

instructor

I discovered the world of design as an art student when I stumbled upon a lab full of green & blue iMac G3’s. My initial curiosity around using the computer to create ‘art’ developed into a full-blown passion, eventually leading me to become a digital designer and founder of Bring Your Own Laptop.

Sharing and teaching are a huge part of who I am. As a certified Adobe instructor, I've had the honor of winning multiple Adobe teaching awards at their annual MAX conference. I see Bring Your Own Laptop as the supportive community I wished for when I was first starting out and intimidated by design. Through teaching, I hope to bring others along for the ride and empower my students to bring their stories, labors of love, and art into the world.
True to my Kiwi roots, I've lived in many places, and currently, I reside in Ireland with my wife and kids.

Certificates

We’re awarding certificates for this course!

Check out the How to earn your certificate video for instructions on how to earn yours and click the available certificate levels below for more information.

How to earn your certificate

Work your way towards your certificate for this course by following these simple steps.

  • Watch the course videos
  • Complete the Class Projects - look out for the videos marked with
  • Upload your class projects into the My Projects area in your account
  • Complete and pass the Knowledge Quiz (Merit level courses only)
  • Complete the Distinction Certificate Project (Distinction level courses only) - look out for the video marked with
  • Upload your Distinction project to the My Projects area in your account
  • Request your certificate when you've completed the requirements for the certificate level you're working towards

Good luck!

Pass certificates

We're awarding 'Pass' level certificates for this course.

You can work your way towards your 'Pass' certificate by following these simple steps.

  • Watch the course videos
  • Complete the Class Projects - look out for the videos marked with
  • Upload your class projects into the My Projects area in your account
  • Don't forget to request your certificate when all your projects are complete

Good luck!

Merit certificates

We're awarding 'Merit' level certificates for this course.

You can work your way towards your 'Merit' certificate by following these simple steps.

  • Watch the course videos
  • Complete the Class Projects - look out for the videos marked with
  • Upload your class projects into the My Projects area in your account
  • Complete and pass the Knowledge Quiz
  • Don't forget to request your certificate when you have passed the quiz and completed all your projects

Good luck!

Distinction certificates

We're awarding 'Distinction' level certificates for this course.

You can work your way towards your 'Distinction' certificate by following these simple steps.

  • Watch the course videos
  • Complete the Class Projects - look out for the videos marked with
  • Upload your class projects into the My Projects area in your account
  • Complete and pass the Knowledge Quiz
  • Complete the Distinction Certificate Project - look out for the video marked with
  • Upload your Distinction project to the My Projects area in your account
  • Don't forget to request your certificate when you have passed the quiz and completed all your projects

Good luck!

Downloads & Exercise files

Transcript

Hello.

In this video we are going to cover everything you need

to know to get started with fonts and type inside of Canva.

Loads to cover. Let's jump in.

Alright, uh, scroll down to the page that we made earlier.

Okay. With the kind of watermark on the background.

If you haven't done it, just do any old text box.

It doesn't matter. Okay. I want to add a text box.

We can click on the text and click add text box.

I though just hit the tiki. Okay.

The tiki is a shortcut just

to adding text box really common.

Okay? The one thing though is the tiki doesn't work.

If you're typing, watch this.

If I want to add the text box

and I hit t, you can see just types in the text box

so it can hit escape on my keyboard, okay?

Or just click in the background and then hit the tiki.

Another text box. I'm going to click off,

delete him and grab this one.

So, um, I'm going to get it so that I'm gonna like,

we've done resizing, right?

Resizing text can be a little tricky when you can't see the

corners, but you can kind of see there.

I can get in there and resize it still,

even though the box was quite small.

I'm gonna resize it a bit. I'm going to add some text. Okay?

So from our exercise files,

there's a file in there called reopening quotes.

Okay? It looks like this.

Um, I've just given you some text to copy, okay?

You can type it in. It doesn't have to be the same. Okay?

It's the, oh my god, it's really great.

This is such, it's the, oh my goodness, this is super good.

I can't believe the shop is so amazing in the redesign.

Add whatever you like. There are some examples there.

So the reason I wanna show you sizing is like,

I quite often use this just to resize

and that's great for headings,

but when you need it to be a certain width, okay,

covering this background weirdly right now, little bug is,

there's normally a little move icon there.

It's gone away, gone.

If I hit the tiki, see

that move thing there, that's normally there.

It's gone away from me. If yours goes away, dunno,

I bet it's just a bug for today while I'm teaching.

If that ever happens to you, you just click off

and just kind of click and drag it.

Okay? You don't have to use the move icon.

I'm gonna get mine 'cause I want it to be this width,

but I don't wanna resize it using this

because I want it to be that width.

So what we can do is select all the text.

So I just double clicked it. Sometimes you might have

to triple click it, make sure it's all blue

and we can use this, okay?

To make it bigger, there is a really common shortcut, okay?

It's command shift and the greater than

or less than key on a Mac, on a pc,

it's control shift greater than and less than I use.

The greater than and less than.

They're kind of tied together next to the M key

with your comma and full stop.

So command shift greater than,

less than control shift on a pc.

They'll be in your shortcut sheet.

So I do that, I kind of hold down the key.

I'm like, eh, looking for a good line break where it kind

of fits nicely and reads nicely.

That'll do. So those are two good ways of resizing type.

You can type it in. Obviously a couple

of things I wanna show you is

that some fonts are really elaborate.

Like this one here, canvas sands, the default has bold

and italics and underline has all sorts of good stuff.

Okay? I am undoing that.

If I find something else and I go over here,

you can see I was experimenting already.

If I click on this, lemme go back to here.

If I pick something else, something kind of looking, uh,

come down and pick Brittany.

Okay. Oh, I picked Brittany

and it has, yeah, if I click on Brittany, okay,

and I select it here, you'll notice

that this doesn't have a bold or italic version.

You're like, oh, come on, just make it go bold. Okay?

So some font, not all fonts are creative equal.

Some have bolds, some italics.

This one has an underline very gross one,

but it doesn't have these other two.

So just know that sometimes they don't.

Some of them just come as capitals as well.

This one here has uppercase, okay?

And lowercase, some of them don't.

Some of them just have uppercase.

I'm not gonna cover every single one of these features,

but if you want to with the selected here,

I can go over here and I have a lot

more of the text options.

Okay? We all know bold, italic, underline, strike through,

put a line through the middle of it, okay?

Uh, this one here. Alignment. You just toggle.

So at the moment it's centered, you go left a line, uh,

justify right a line, okay?

And just kind of cycle through them all.

Um, I'm gonna be centered because that's the one I like.

Bullet points. The other one you will bump into is spacing.

Okay? So in this case, the line spacing here is quite,

you know, this font, Brittany is uh, let's have a look.

It's quite tight. Can you see these descenders?

That's these kind of like they whip down the

bottom here quite long.

And the as senders, so descend the line that it's sitting on

and ascend the line, which is kind of above it.

See this t's quite high, the G's quite low.

It's just this font you can see here.

They end up mixing together descenders as senders.

So I'm gonna have to go with this font

and say, all right buddy, you need to be spacing

and I can play around with the line spacing

and go, I probably need to drag it out to about there.

Lots of fonts though will be perfect

the way they are by default.

But you might end up adjusting them. Letter spacing.

Okay, not hard. You can put it into negative.

Okay, I'm just gonna get mine back to what it was.

What was it? Zero. That's what it was. Zero.

Now the next thing we do with

fonts is I'm gonna have it selected.

I'm gonna click on this the see all

and I'm gonna click on the word Brittany

and I want to find the say filters.

I wanna find kind of hand drawn fonts.

So instead of scrolling forever, you have

to scroll all the way to the top to see these.

If you can't find them, it's

'cause you'll kind of scroll down a little bit.

Either drag this up a, or use your scroll wheel

or whoever you scroll, get to the top

and there's these like little buttons here at the top.

So show me only handwriting, fonts please.

So it's gonna go through everything that's available inside

of Canva and go, oh, here's the handwriting ones.

You'll notice some of them have a crown next to it.

So that's for the paid people.

There's plenty though that are part of the free account.

Okay? And it's gonna allow me just to kind

of cut it down to these ones here.

Now the trouble with some of the hand drawn fonts is they're

a little bit hard to read.

You can see this one here is only uppercase.

There's no lowercase version of it.

That is a nice thing you can do. Okay, at the top here.

So I've kind of filtered by handwriting

and you can type it in there.

It's easier just to go

through this little one and say Display fonts.

Heading fonts. Okay, paragraph. Send serif.

Just a quick little one. Uh, we won't get too much.

Um, headings obviously good for headings.

It's gonna be a little bit more like exciting and bold.

Okay? Paragraph is gonna be stuff for your body copy.

Plain boring stuff, but very clear and easy to read.

Um, the only other two

that I'll talk about are San Serif and serif.

Serif are basically fonts that have kind

of the old worldy feet that zoom in.

Okay, these are serifs.

See this little guy here, he's a rif, that's a serif.

The other one in there. Sand serif.

Sand serif or sands is Latin fall without rifs.

So the serif font have the feet,

Sands serif without the feet.

So that's one thing you will be looking at

and we'll cover more and more in this course,

but sometimes you want this more, I don't know,

formal style font.

And then if you want San Serif, it's gonna give you fonts

that are a little bit more, yeah, don't have the serifs.

More modern, less old worldy.

But anyway, I ended up finding one that I liked.

It's called Coming Soon. You can type in the top.

Okay, it was called Coming, coming Soon. I liked it.

It was kind of, do I like it? I don't like it anymore.

I liked it when it was preparing.

It's too much comic sensy for me, but I like it now.

But we're stuck with it now. Um, so find your font.

One of the other common things when you're doing text is you

can do like, let's say

that I type in my name Dan Scott, I'm gonna put a return.

Dan Scott is the speaker of this quote.

You can go in here and change the font

and the size of different parts of the text,

but it's very hard to kind

of control Dan Scott separately from this box.

So you will find in Canva is really common,

especially when we're working in say an Instagram design is

to, I'm gonna get rid of that

and it's really common to click off in the background,

hit the tiki and just have it in a separate text box.

I'm gonna type Dan Scott, Dan Scott

and kind of use that as a separate, oh, he's back, okay.

As a separate text box so that I can rotate it

and then I might go through

and say, all right, fonts, I'm gonna say not coming soon.

I'm gonna say handwriting. I'm gonna find something

that looks like it was done with a pen.

Oh no, that looks like it was done

with a pen, but you get what I mean.

Okay? It is very common to have headings

and separate boxes from your paragraph text,

which is separate from this one.

The other things is, I really wanna put a hyphen in here,

but I know it does default to trying

to make hyphens bullet points.

So there's a little bit of a workaround,

but you can kind of do it.

It's a little bit of a hack to try

and put the bullet point in

and then type in another hyphen, delete the bullet point.

That's what I'm looking for. I'm gonna rotate this around.

I'm gonna spend way too long picking a font. You wait there.

Oh, didn't take very long at all. Really liked that one.

Looks like I did it with my brush.

Alright, another thing while we're in here with fonts is

that once you've picked one, you're like, oh, I like that.

Can I use it over here? You can.

So what you can do is you can select on it

and you can say, see this little uh, copy style

or over here it's the same thing.

Whereas it copy style, it doesn't matter.

You've copied it from the thing you have selected.

Now you've gotta rub it on something.

Look, rub it on there, okay?

So have it selected, hit copy

and then paste it on something else where you, boop, okay,

it's gonna pick the same font in the same size.

So I'm gonna undo that 'cause I like them how they were.

But if you do find that, you've gotta

find, you're like, oh, I like that.

Instead of having to go through

and type it in every single time with the same font

and the same size, you can use the this thing here,

the copy style roller thing.

Alright? Uh, that's gonna be enough

for fonts for this, uh, video.

We've covered loads here.

We'll get more and more

advanced as we go through the course.

But here you go. I'll see you in the next video.

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