What’s new for designers, December 2015

Default avatar.
December 09, 2015
What’s new for designers, December 2015.
In this month’s edition of what’s new for designers and developers, we’ve included lots of startup apps and resources, educational resources, marketing tools, design resources, icons, WordPress tools, and much more. And as always, we’ve also included some awesome new free fonts! Almost everything on the list this month is free, with a few high-value paid apps and tools also included. They’re sure to be useful to designers and developers, from beginners to experts. If we’ve missed something that you think should have been on the list, let us know in the comments. And if you know of a new app or resource that should be featured next month, tweet it to @cameron_chapman to be considered!

Notablist

Notablist lets you search through over 5 million email newsletter campaigns from over 400,000 publishers. You can see trends, daily digests, and more. notablist

Iconcrafts

Iconcrafts has a huge icon library that allows you to select only the icons you need (in both stroke and fill versions). Just add the icons, pick a background (or not), customize, and download. iconcrafts

Stock Up

Stock Up gives you access to more than 9,000 free stock photos from 26 different websites in one place, with one search. stock up

Engagemaster

Engagemaster lets you convert your visitors to customers through tracking, interacting, and reacting. It includes intelligent campaign targeting, personal engagement tools, and more. engagemaster

Smartcasual

Smartcasual makes it much easier to network with other creative pros. It includes LinkedIn integrated profiles, a community of professionals, and more. smartcasual

Trello Tasks

Trello Tasks, for Google Chrome, lets you add one simple feature to Trello: checkboxes! This turns Trello into a much more effective tasklist. trellotasks

Kong

Kong is easy, free ecommerce software for creating a professional online store. It’s easy to customize, with flexible themes, and is 100% mobile ready. kong

Nova Icons

Nova Icons are a set of 350 free Material Design-style icons. They’re perfect for a variety of mobile apps, websites, and even desktop apps. nova

Seeby

Seeby is a startup marketing assistant. It helps with finding leads, tweeting relevant content, proofreading emails, and tons of other marketing tasks startups can have trouble managing. seeby

EasyRedir

EasyRedir makes it easy to manage your URL redirects. It allows you to use marketing domains to then forward visitors to more deeply nested pages on your main site, lets you maximize your SEO, protect your brand identity, and more. easyredir

HTML to WordPress

HTML to WordPress makes it easy to convert an HTML website design into a WordPress theme. Just locate the folder you want to convert, drop it onto the website, and it will convert it for just $9/page. html to wordpress

ZenHub for Firefox

ZenHub for Firefox makes it easy to manage your ZenHub project management from Firefox. It includes task boards, to-do lists, burndown charts, and more. zenhub for firefox

Cast

Cast is your one-stop-shop for recording, editing, publishing, and hosting your podcast. It includes a studio for recording, an editor for perfecting it, and a publisher for making it available (with hosting and analytics at no extra charge). cast

Teamwave

Teamwave is a unified platform for collaboration, sales, marketing, and support. It includes project management, time tracking, contact management, reports, marketing automation, and more. teamwave

Torch

Torch is an AI platform for automating and growing your business. It includes a website builder, SEO, smart shopping cart, email marketing, inventory management, file storage, CRM, and analytics, among other features. torch

Color Palette Manager

The Color Palette Manager, from CoffeeCup, makes it easy to create, manage, and share all of your color palettes across apps and projects. color palette manager

Azendoo

Azendoo is a Subject Calendar that lets you organize, visualize, and manage your team’s tasks. It integrates with a variety of apps, including Salesforce, HubSpot, MailChimp, GitHub, and many others. azendoo

Layers CSS

Layers CSS is a style-agnostic, unobtrusive CSS framework aimed for practical use cases. It was a small footprint, sensible defaults, progressively enhanced columns, and more. layers css

BatchedInbox

BatchedInbox lets you schedule when your emails are delivered in Gmail. It lets you save time by scheduling emails around your workflow, and end distractions from emails coming in at random intervals. batchedinbox

CodeCode Ninja

CodeCode Ninja are flashcards for programmers. They’re interactive and include syntax highlighting and more. codecode ninja

Dewdrop.io

Dewdrop.io lets you send files in real-time for free. Just drag and drop a file to share it with anyone. dewdrop.io

Unslider

Unslider is a simple jQuery slider. It comes with a variety of standard configurations, including an automatic slider, vertical slider, fade animations, and more. unslider

ResponsifyJS

ResponsifyJS lets you add responsive images to your layout that adapt in real-time. responsifyjs

Fyuse

Fyuse 3.0 is an app for taking 3D photos. It’s easy to use and works on iOS and Android. fyuse

Figma

Figma is a collaborative interface design tool. It lets you do your design work online, with simultaneous editing, version control, and cross-platform support. figma

Onion Omega

The Onion Omega is an invention platform for the internet of things. It’s wi-fi enabled and supports Python, Node.JS, and other popular languages. onion omega

Avalanche

Avalanche is a super clean, Sass-based CSS grid system. It’s powerful and responsive, with real-world breakpoints and a flexible, easy naming convention. avalanche

Gridlex

Gridlex is a simple CSS grid system for quickly creating modern layouts. It’s based on Flexbox, and includes Less and Sass files. gridlex

DoneDone

DoneDone is a simple, effective issue tracker. It includes tools for everything from planning to testing. donedone

Flexbox Froggy

Flexbox Froggy is an awesome, fun way to learn about CSS’s Flexbox properties. There are 24 lessons in all, with increasing difficulty in each one. flexbox froggy

What Web Can Do Today

What Web Can Do Today is a quick reference for the types of features that are available in your current browser on a given day. It shows support for things like Bluetooth, offline storage, ambient light, foreground detection, battery status, and more. what web can do today

Jump.js

Jump.js is a dependency-free smooth scrolling library. It’s small and modern, easy to install, and completely open source. jump.js

Uideo

Uideo has over 470 video talks for designers from 63 UX/UI conferences around the world. There are videos from Mike Monteiro, Brad Frost, Sarah Parmenter, Gary Vaynerchuk, and nearly 400 others. uideo

Case Study Club

Case Study Club curates case studies from a variety of sources, for building tons of different kinds of products. There are case studies for UI, UX, branding, and more. case study club

Freelance Rate Explorer

The Freelance Rate Explorer from Bonsai lets you see what the average hourly rates are for both designers and developers. You can filter based on skills, experience, and location. freelance rate explorer

Gary

Gary is a free display font based on the Art Nouveau style. It’s free for personal and commercial use. gary

Nazaré

Nazaré is a condensed uppercase font with hand-drawn lines and a bit of a tribal touch. It was inspired by the town of the same name in Portugal. nazare

Logoista Bold

Logoista Bold is a font in progress. It has a hand-drawn, comic book-style look. logoista bold

Rockfire

Rockfire is a geometric display font. It’s free for personal and commercial use. rockfire

Abys

Abys is an uppercase brush font originally created by Ioana Archontaki. abys

Fofer

Fofer is a free handwritten font. It’s simple and unique. fofer

Scriptkulus

Scriptkulus is a unique hand-drawn typeface that’s great for signage, logos, and packaging. scriptkulus

Tessellate

Tessellate is a display sans serif typeface that combines geometric circles and "rivers" flowing off of some characters. tessellate

Break Fill

Break Fill is a modern sans serif typeface based on Break. In this version, all of the gaps (breaks) are filled. break fill

Now Alt

Now Alt is an alternate version of the Now typeface, with a difference in the lowercase “a”. now alt

Cameron Chapman

Cameron Chapman is a freelance writer and designer from New England. You can visit her site or follow her on Twitter.

Read Next

10+ Best Resources & Tools for Web Designers (2024 update)

Is searching for the best web design tools to suit your needs akin to having a recurring bad dream? Does each…

3 Essential Design Trends, April 2024

Ready to jump into some amazing new design ideas for Spring? Our roundup has everything from UX to color trends…

How to Plan Your First Successful Website

Planning a new website can be exciting and — if you’re anything like me — a little daunting. Whether you’re an…

15 Best New Fonts, March 2024

Welcome to March’s edition of our roundup of the best new fonts for designers. This month’s compilation includes…

LimeWire Developer APIs Herald a New Era of AI Integration

Generative AI is a fascinating technology. Far from the design killer some people feared, it is an empowering and…

20 Best New Websites, March 2024

Welcome to our pick of sites for March. This month’s collection tends towards the simple and clean, which goes to show…

Exciting New Tools for Designers, March 2024

The fast-paced world of design never stops turning, and staying ahead of the curve is essential for creatives. As…

Web Tech Trends to Watch in 2024 and Beyond

It hardly seems possible given the radical transformations we’ve seen over the last few decades, but the web design…

6 Best AI Productivity Apps in 2024

There’s no escaping it: if you want to be successful, you need to be productive. The more you work, the more you…

3 Essential Design Trends, February 2024

From atypical typefaces to neutral colors to unusual user patterns, there are plenty of new website design trends to…

Surviving the Leap from College to Real-World Design

So, you’ve finished college and are ready to showcase your design skills to the world. This is a pivotal moment that…

20 Mind-Bending Illusions That Will Make You Question Reality

Mind-bending videos. Divisive Images. Eye-straining visuals. This list of optical illusions has it all. Join us as we…