The Golden Ratio in Design

The Golden Ratio is a mathematical ratio. It is commonly found in nature, and when used in a design, it fosters organic and natural looking compositions that are aesthetically pleasing to the eye. But what exactly is the Golden Ratio and how can you use it to improve your own designs?

But don’t let all the math get you down. In design, the Golden Ratio boils down to aesthetics— creating and appreciating a sense of beauty through harmony and proportion.

This harmony and proportion have been recognized for thousands of centuries: from the Pyramids in Giza to Da Vinci’s Mona Lisa; and from the Pepsi logo to the Twitter logo.

Ways to apply the GR to your designs
1. Layout - set your dimensions with the golden ratio (main column and sidebar)
2. Spacing - contextual to itself
3. Images - rule of thirds
4. Forms - twitter and pepsi logo
5. Typographic Scales - scale and line height

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[JesseShowalter]

How do you use the Golden Ratio in your design work? I would love to know 👍🏼

[rawr-asmr]

Thank you for existing, sir ! I am learning so much :)

[KyleMerl]

Awesome. This is the best explanation of the Gold Ratio I have seen and now I understand it well enough to actually use it. Thanks!

[blau]

Thanks for this Jesse, very well explained! How you finding the switch to Figma? ;)

[kwade]

As a mom of a computer-aided drafting student and a new part-time art instructor, I appreciate your description of the golden ratio. Your video had just enough math to explain what it is without becoming too overwhelming as I've seen in a few other videos that attempt to explain the golden ratio. I am a trained photographer but many of my students are studying graphic design. Thank you for providing a succinct connection to design.

[gregrinehart]

Turn off the background music. You have a good thing but the music makes it hard to follow.

[conmms]

Dude you change my life with this video. I mean, I work doing digital marketing and this will save me tons of hours. Thanks ✌🏻

[christianjames]

golden ratio limits your creativity and is very restricting i don't like like it

[swobman]

Hey Jesse
amazing video! helps me a lot.
what confuses me though is that you also have a video about baseline grid.
to stay on the grid you multiple everything by 2, 4, 6, 8 ...
by using the golden ration you would break that rule and be "off-grid". or am i missing something here?

thank

[ablespectrum]

I'd be interested to know how often you use the Golden Ratio in your design Jesse. Is it every day? Every month? Once in awhile?

[KookieMuhretti]

Thank you!!! You are the first person who has broken it down for me to really understand! Thank you super duperly very much!!!

[sebastiaangamelkoorn]

Hi Jesse! Awesome work again. You inspired me to do more video also. What's you gear setup in de intro? Camera & Mic wise? Cheers and thanks for sharing.

[muneeba]

Love your teaching style :). Keep doing the good work.

[suyogb]

Cool video. You should start a Design School or something u teach stuff so good.

[bafriesen]

Nice to see a designer talk about using math (esp the "GR") in their work....because let's face it, if you're not using math it's just art...right?

[kelosama]

0 dislikes



*balanced, as all things should be*

[hieunguyennhu]

I've been watch a lot of video talk about golden ratio but I still don't understand what it is and how to apply it till I watch this video. Thanks you!

[adebiyial]

Jesse, thanks for this. But I think you didn't go in-depth on how to "really" use the golden ratio. Typography, I'll say that's fair enough to understand, but Layouts, and Forms (and the rest) still beats me. For example, I've been seriously trying to learn about how to use grids in a layout - how do I know what Max-Width to use at first, grids column...to use. I know this might be really subjective, but it'd be nice to learn more about this. Again, thanks for this video.

[MarkWhiteartist]

this was so helpful. I do well with guidelines.

[aryanasdf]

You have the second best intro on youtube after Peter McKinnon