This is probably the question I get asked most often, and I want to answer it honestly rather than just telling you what you want to hear.

Short answer: yes, but with a caveat. Let me explain.

What You Don't Need

You don't need a design degree. You don't need years of graphic design experience. You don't need to already know InDesign or Affinity. You don't need to have sold anything online before.

The people who do best in this space aren't necessarily trained designers — they're people who are willing to learn the specific skills required to make a good digital planner, and who have enough of an eye for layout and aesthetics to create something people actually want to use.

What You Do Need

A willingness to learn desktop publishing software. This is non-negotiable. Canva won't get you to professional quality — I explain why in the best apps for creating digital planners in 2026. You need to learn InDesign or Affinity, and specifically how to use master pages, data merge, and hyperlinks. These aren't things you'll figure out from a YouTube tutorial in an afternoon, but they're absolutely learnable with the right guidance. (Not sure which app? Here's my InDesign vs Affinity comparison.)

Basic design sensibility. You don't need formal training, but you need to be able to look at a layout and know when something feels off. Font sizing, spacing, color consistency — these things matter and customers notice them. The good news is this is a skill you can develop, and it improves fast once you start intentionally studying planners you love.

Patience with the learning curve. Your first planner probably won't be your best. That's fine. The goal of the first one is to finish it, learn from it, and make the next one better.

The Honest Reality of Starting Out

Your first few months will involve more learning than selling. That's normal and it's okay. The people who get frustrated and quit are usually the ones who expected to design a planner in a weekend and start making passive income the following week. (For a realistic look at the money side, read how digital planner designers make money on Etsy.)

The people who succeed are the ones who treat it like learning any other skill — with dedicated time, structured learning, and the understanding that results come after effort, not before it.

What Actually Levels the Playing Field

What I've seen consistently is that structured training closes the gap between "no experience" and "sellable product" way faster than figuring it out alone. When you know the right workflow, the right export settings, the right way to structure your hyperlinks — you skip months of trial and error.

That's exactly what Digital Planner Design Lab is designed to do. You don't need experience walking in. You just need to show up ready to learn.

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