Creative Fabrica vs Design Bundles – Which Should You Get?!
Creative Fabrica and Design Bundles are two well known craft marketplaces. They sell digital products like SVG cut files, sublimation designs, printables, templates, stickers, and so much more. Whether you are crafting for personal use or you’re planning to sell products, there may come a time where you’d rather purchase a design instead of creating it yourself.
Both websites offer a subscription service as well as one-off purchases. How each marketplace does this is totally different though, so let’s chat about Creative Fabrica vs Design Bundles to see which one is right for you.
*Disclaimer: affiliate links may be used below. By clicking on a link I will make a small commission if you choose to purchase, however your purchase price stays the same.
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Okay, let’s get right into it!
How does the Creative Fabrica Subscription work?
With the Creative Fabrica subscription you are paying a monthly fee to be able to download anything from their website. Every product listed for sale on Creative Fabrica is included in their monthly subscription. You can then use those designs to create products you plan to sell. Make sure to read the full terms of their license before selling.
Related: selling on Creative Fabrica
One thing that gets a lot of crafters confused is that when you cancel your Creative Fabrica subscription you can no longer use those designs to make products you sell. In other words, you no longer have the licensing for those downloads and you would need to delete them from your computer. I would recommend creating a folder on your computer for your CF Subscription downloads, then if you cancel the membership you would just delete that entire folder.
Two things to clarify here:
- Products that you purchase outright (or without a subscription) can still be used. You still have the licensing for that, regardless if you have a subscription or not.
- Any products you have already created and are selling, you can continue to sell. You just can’t make new graphics with downloads from the subscription if you cancel.
In the last year I’ve seen Creative Fabrica’s offerings expand a TON! They have something called Spark which is their family of AI tools. You can create art, patterns, have them write copy, and so much more. I haven’t fully played around with each tool but so far it’s fun to test them out!
Paying Designers
As a designer I can tell you that you make pennies per sale if someone downloads your product from their subscription. So if you’re wondering why your favorite designer doesn’t have all their products up on Creative Fabrica, this might be why. In my many talks with designer friends, we’ve pretty much all said we only put our oldest work on CF, usually only singles, and we don’t update as frequently as other marketplaces.
This is changing for some of us, but it can be really hard to give products away for less than $1, when you’ve spent a lot of time designing it!
Because of their payout, I’ve noticed the quality or products is a lot lower on Creative Fabrica. That’s not to say you can’t find great things, but it does mean that you might have to work a little harder to find those gems.
Side note: I think their website needs a redesign. It’s really hard to use and navigate.
How does the Design Bundles Subscription work?
With a Design Bundles Plus Membership you get monthly credits to use on the Plus products. The amount of credits you get depends on the tier you subscribe to. The Design Bundles subscription is only for their Plus products. When I say “only” I mean the 230,000+ products, so you’re definitely not limited by any means.
Related: selling on Design Bundles
With the Plus Membership you can still use the products you’ve purchased with your credits even if you cancel the membership. However, it should be noted that you lose remaining Plus credits at the time of cancellation. So if you are planning on cancelling, make sure to use up those Plus credits first!
Another perk to the membership is you get 24 hours to shop the monthly $1 deals! This comes in handy during their Ultimate $1 Deal which is the week of Black Friday. You also get the weekly freebies added to your account so you don’t have to remember to download them each week.
Paying Designers
Design Bundles does a much better job paying their designers. Plus Designers are specifically designing for the Plus Membership and I know they get paid a fair rate. So if this is something you care about, I would lean more towards Design Bundles.
Creative Fabrica vs Design Bundles – which should you get?
At the end of the day only you can decide which marketplace subscription is right for you. A subscription is not required for either site. There are incredible designs on Design Bundles that are part of the regular marketplace. If Design Bundles were to make it so you could use Plus credits on those products, I think they’d be the clear winner. As long as they pay designers fairly, designers will keep their products on the site. We’ll see what happens I guess!
Creative Fabrica
- Entire site is included in the subscription
- Pays their designers hardly anything
- License to use products is only valid during active subscription
- IMO: lower quality products
- Annual plans available
- Runs discounts on plans frequently
Design Bundles
- Only Plus products are included in the subscription
- Pays their designers a fair wage
- License to use products is lifetime (regardless of subscription status)
- IMO: higher quality products
- Only monthly plans at this time
- Doesn’t advertise discounts on their site (maybe other places?)
Have any questions about these two memberships? Feel free to drop a comment below! I hope this post help you determine which subscription is right for you between Creative Fabrica and Design Bundles.