Express Yourself
4 Trends That Will Be All Over Your Social Feeds In 2023
Get your camera phone ready.
In a world of micro- and even nano-trends that seem to change faster than you can type anythingcore, it can be hard to parse out which cultural fixations are momentary and which will truly define our time. Whether you’re a career graphic designer, a freelance illustrator, or an aspiring social media trendsetter, all of this background noise can be distracting.
Well, 2023 is just around the corner, and luckily Adobe Express has our back. No doubt one of the most central tools in any digital creative’s content-creation arsenal, Adobe has taken a close look at emerging creative trends — from the work of celebrated fashion designers to the creations of everyday users — to identify what’s on tap for next year’s social feeds. Read on to find out four of the key creative trends that’ll be popping up across digital spaces in 2023.
Real Is Radical
Authenticity is in. If those capture-and-share-in-2-minutes-or-less apps have taught us anything, it’s that social media is no longer exclusively for the most curated versions of our lives. The “Real Is Radical” trend predicts a shift toward posts that display the unfiltered rawness of life just as often as they do the most glamorous moments.
Fortunately, Adobe Express offers thousands of templates that feature life-like crinkled paper backdrops, fonts that appear as if scrawled across the screen, and other visual motifs that evoke the handmade, a style that naturally communicates a move away from artificiality. Communicating the ethos of the trend is just as much about powerful imagery and text as it is about these more subtle elements.
Beyond templates, Adobe Stock has a curated collection of stock images that can be used to evoke the “Real Is Radical” trend. Candid images of people experiencing an array of emotions — whether that be a women dancing joyfully on the street or same-sex couple having tender moment during a perfect sunset — are on hand via the trend’s landing page. Additionally, a range of illustrations that feature people of all backgrounds and gender expressions are available, too. Ranging from rebellious, aggressive, and provocative to deeply vulnerable, “Real Is Radical” visuals create powerful connections and inspire a sense of community across media channels and platforms.
Psychic Waves
Where “Real Is Radical” embraces current life and celebrates artists speaking their truths in the moment, the “Psychic Waves” trend conjures visions of different dimensions and realities, and offers an imaginative alternative to IRL living. Color wise, “Psychic Waves” indulges in gradients, bold colors, and captivating neon hues across the rainbow. It’s evocative and allows creatives to explore nuanced experimentation with visuals while representing the growing prioritization of expanded awareness across mental, emotional, and spiritual realms.
Brightly colored liquid abstractions, saturated illustrations of Mars landscapes, otherworldly pink-tone rooms, double exposure portraits — the list of imagery that is in line with “Psychic Waves” is as long as it is distinct. One thing that can be counted on as a viewer of this trend is the sensation of being transported. More than anything, “Psychic Waves” feels like a visual language that encourages freethinking and imagination in all aspects of life.
As such, the trend lends itself to anyone looking to celebrate uniqueness and bold choices. Whether you’re making a band poster, creating expressive images to share with your loyal followers, or simply posting inspirational quotes, the templates available via the experts at Adobe Express make it easy to stay ahead of the curve and communicate the meaning and values of “Psychic Waves” with your audience.
Animals and Influencers
From pixelated cat gifs to comic sans-adorned Shiba Inu memes, animals have always been a mainstay of digital sharing, but times have evolved dramatically since the days of 8-bit art and smartphone pet photography. Similar to the instant user engagement that comes from featuring animals, the use of cutesy digital figures, human-like but not intended as realistic avatars, also drives engagement.
Whether animal, human-like, or completely imagined beings, this evolving “Animals and Influencers” trend is all about whimsical, expressive, and funny characters that can support a wide range of messages and drive interest in just about any product. In a world of saturated news feeds, it’s a relief to rest your eyes on a cutesy avatar or to see a connection between pets and people.
Not quite escapism, not quite reality, the “Animals and Influencers” trend allows what’s on screen to instantly resonate without evoking the negativity of the “real world.” Since the trend is so broad, it has many uses, whether you’re accessorizing assets for your tech-y YouTube channel with a waving friendly robot, or centering a cafe logo on an overjoyed cat illustration.
Retro Active
It’s no secret that the styles of the ’90s and early aughts are en vogue, but Gen Z wouldn’t be Gen Z if we didn’t put our own spin on things. The “Retro Active” trend takes cues from the aesthetic perspectives that defined the world 20 years ago, but it presents them in a modern way using tools that weren’t yet available at the time: AI-generated art, 3D renderings, and virtual influencers.
Like “Psychic Waves,” “Retro Active” embraces bold colors and futurism, but it does so through a perspective of the future that existed in the past. Chunky and colorful personal computers, early-aughts excitement for flip phones, and instant messaging emoticons all feel spiritually linked to “Retro Active.” And with the rise of generative art, “Retro Active” looks, textures, and hues are as popular for avatars and virtual influencers as they are for real models.
So what does this look like in practice? Adobe Express makes it easy to get started. Think digitally-made illustrations featuring old (and now reborn) styles like chunky sneakers and chokers, 3D renderings of quaint-seeming tech, and imagery of people embracing nostalgic fashion and beauty trends through a modern lens. “Retro Active” doesn’t aim to simply recreate the past—it intends to create an even bolder, more inclusive, iteration for our times.
