Adobe Express Tutorial:
The Complete Beginner Series
If you're new to Adobe Express, this is the place to start. The Complete Beginner Series walks you through the platform, from navigating the homepage to scheduling your finished designs out to social media. It's free, it's on my YouTube channel, and it's designed so you can follow along at your own pace.
The series is for small business owners, content creators, and anyone who wants to learn Adobe Express properly without piecing it together from scattered tutorials. Each episode focuses on one part of the platform. Getting started, design essentials, brand kits, creating your first design, the AI features, how Express works with Adobe Firefly, and publishing your content. By the end of the series, you'll know your way around Adobe Express and have the skills to create and share content with confidence.
I'm Darren Meredith, an Adobe Express Ambassador and the founder of Better Content Creators. This series is sponsored by Adobe Express, but as always, all thoughts and opinions in the videos are my own.
Episode 1:
Getting Started with Adobe Express
Episode 1 Goes Live 1st June 2026 - 13:30 BST
Start here. Episode 1 is a guided tour of the Adobe Express homepage, so you know exactly where everything lives before you start creating.
What you'll learn in this episode:
How to navigate the Adobe Express homepage and the new AI Assistant
The Quick Actions menu: background remover, QR code generator, video captions, PDF tools, and more
How to import your existing work from Canva, Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, and Google Drive
Using Your Stuff to organize your files and folders
How Projects work for sharing and collaborating with clients
Favoriting templates and elements you'll come back to
If you're brand new to Adobe Express, this episode gives you the foundation that everything else in the series builds on.
Episode 2:
Templates, Stock Photos & Text Layouts
Episode 2 Goes Live 3rd June 2026 - 13:30 BST
Episode 2 gets into the building blocks of any design: templates, stock media, and text layouts.
What you'll learn in this episode:
How to find and filter templates from the homepage and inside the design window
Using region and language settings to uncover even more template options
Working with Adobe Stock photos and videos included in Adobe Express
How to filter stock media by orientation, free vs premium, and people vs no people
Design assets, backgrounds, and stickers
Adding and editing text layouts
Favouriting anything you want to come back to later
This is the episode you'll return to when you're looking for the right starting point for a new design.
Episode 3:
Brand Kit Setup
Episode 3 Goes Live 5th June 2026 - 13:30 BST
Brand kits are how you keep every design consistent without starting from scratch each time. Episode 3 walks you through setting one up from the ground up.
What you'll learn in this episode:
How to create a brand kit in Adobe Express from scratch
Choosing where to save your brand kit: personal storage or shared with a project
Adding your logo with primary and secondary versions
Building brand color palettes using hex codes
Adding brand fonts and assigning header and body roles
Adding the graphics and assets you reuse most often
Duplicating your brand kit as a backup
If you create content regularly or work for a business with brand guidelines, this is probably the most useful episode in the series.
Episode 4:
Create Your First Design
Episode 4 Goes Live 8th June 2026 - 13:30 BST
This is where everything comes together. In Episode 4 we take a template and build a finished design from start to finish, then apply the brand kit we set up in the previous episode.
What you'll learn in this episode:
Choosing and opening a template in the Adobe Express design window
Naming your file and individual pages
Working with layers and grouping
Applying your brand kit with one click and cycling through colour options
Replacing template images with your own brand graphics
Editing text, fonts and font weights
Using the Styles panel to quickly change the whole look
Adding a paper texture effect
If you've watched the first three episodes, this is where it all clicks.
Episode 5:
Every AI Feature Explained
Episode 5 Goes Live 10th June 2026 - 13:30 BST
Episode 5 goes through every AI feature inside Adobe Express, and it's not just image generation. There are some genuinely useful tools that go well beyond making pictures.
What you'll learn in this episode:
Generating images and choosing between different AI models
What "commercially safe" actually means in AI image generation
Generating video and templates with AI
Creating your own custom text effects
The Rewrite tool for rephrasing your copy and creating A/B variations
Removing backgrounds and unwanted objects
Inserting new objects into existing images
Generating similar images to keep a consistent style
Translating designs into other languages with one click
By the end you'll know exactly what the AI features can do and when each one is the right tool for the job.
Episode 6:
Adobe Express Meets Adobe Firefly
Episode 6 Goes Live 12th June 2026 - 13:30 BST
This episode is for anyone using both Adobe Express and Adobe Firefly. It's not a guide to Firefly itself (that's a separate playlist on the channel) — it's about the connection between the two.
What you'll learn in this episode:
How to open a single Firefly image directly in Adobe Express
Bringing multiple Firefly images across as separate pages using boards
Adding a whole Firefly artboard onto one page in Adobe Express
The current limitation with projects (and how to work around it)
If you're generating content in Firefly and finishing it in Express, this is the episode for you.
Episode 7:
Schedule & Publish Your Content
Episode 7 Goes Live 15th June 2026 - 13:30 BST
The final main episode in the series: getting your finished designs out into the world.
What you'll learn in this episode:
Resizing a design for multiple platforms in one click
Downloading single pages, multiple pages, or full projects
Choosing the right file format - PNG, JPEG, PDF, or MP4
Ordering prints through Zazzle directly from Adobe Express
Using the built-in scheduler to post to Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, LinkedIn, and Pinterest
Generating captions with AI
Connecting Metricool for analytics inside Adobe Express
Using social safe zones so nothing important gets hidden behind the app interface
This is the episode that turns Adobe Express from a design tool into a complete content workflow.
Bonus Episode:
Animation & Video Editing
Episode 8 Goes Live Late June 2026 - 13:30 BST
A bonus episode dedicated to animation and video editing in Adobe Express is being added in June, covering the timeline, Clip Maker, Enhance Speech, captions, transitions, and exporting video.
Frequently Asked Questions
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Yes. Adobe Express has a free plan that includes a large number of features. There's also a Premium plan with additional features and Adobe Stock content. The 30-day free trial of Premium is linked in the description of every episode.
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Yes. Adobe Express is one of the most beginner-friendly design tools available, with templates, an intuitive interface, and built-in AI features that make creating content much easier. This series is designed specifically with beginners in mind.
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Both are excellent tools. Adobe Express has stronger integration with the wider Adobe ecosystem (Photoshop, Illustrator, Firefly), built-in Adobe Stock content, and a powerful scheduler. Canva has been around longer, but it feels more confusing with every update. The right choice depends on your existing tools and workflow. If you already use Adobe products, work with a designer, or want a user-friendly interface, Adobe Express is the natural fit.
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No. The series is built for complete beginners. Each episode is short and focuses on one part of Adobe Express, so you can follow along at your own pace.
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A free Adobe Express account, which you can sign up for at adobe.com/express. The series uses the web version of Adobe Express, though most features are also available in the mobile app.
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Yes. This page is updated as Adobe Express adds new features, and the series itself is refreshed annually so it stays relevant. Sign up to the newsletter to be notified when updates go live.