For aspiring graphic designers, an internship is the best way to get their foot in the door and build valuable connections that could lead to a full-time job. A graphic designer intern usually works under the supervision of an experienced graphic designer that explains the tricks of the trade to them. Interns get to participate in design campaigns and work on projects such as logo redesigns. They gain practical experience with technical tools that many graphic designers use, such as HTML and InDesign. However, interns also need to take care of basic administrative tasks such as communicating with clients and updating databases.
The average salary for a graphic designer internship is $32,215 a year. However, many internships are unpaid or offer only class credit as compensation.
Most graphic designer interns either have a bachelor's degree in graphic design or are college students. Since this is an entry-level position, interns don't need many years of professional experience. However, it helps to have a few graphic design projects in their portfolio to make their application stand out.
Graphic Designer Internship Overview
Graphic Designer Internship Careers
There is more than meets the eye when it comes to being a graphic designer internship. For example, did you know that they make an average of $21.39 an hour? That's $44,500 a year!
Between 2018 and 2028, the career is expected to grow 3% and produce 8,800 job opportunities across the U.S.
What Does a Graphic Designer Internship Do
There are certain skills that many graphic designer interns have in order to accomplish their responsibilities. By taking a look through resumes, we were able to narrow down the most common skills for a person in this position. We discovered that a lot of resumes listed analytical skills, artistic ability and communication skills.
When it comes to the most important skills required to be a graphic designer internship, we found that a lot of resumes listed 18.7% of graphic designer interns included graphic design, while 10.4% of resumes included adobe creative suite, and 7.5% of resumes included company website. Hard skills like these are helpful to have when it comes to performing essential job responsibilities.
When it comes to searching for a job, many search for a key term or phrase. Instead, it might be more helpful to search by industry, as you might be missing jobs that you never thought about in industries that you didn't even think offered positions related to the graphic designer internship job title. But what industry to start with? Most graphic designer interns actually find jobs in the education and media industries.
How To Become a Graphic Designer Internship
If you're interested in becoming a graphic designer internship, one of the first things to consider is how much education you need. We've determined that 77.9% of graphic designer interns have a bachelor's degree. In terms of higher education levels, we found that 3.8% of graphic designer interns have master's degrees. Even though most graphic designer interns have a college degree, it's possible to become one with only a high school degree or GED.
Choosing the right major is always an important step when researching how to become a graphic designer internship. When we researched the most common majors for a graphic designer internship, we found that they most commonly earn bachelor's degree degrees or associate degree degrees. Other degrees that we often see on graphic designer internship resumes include master's degree degrees or high school diploma degrees.
You may find that experience in other jobs will help you become a graphic designer internship. In fact, many graphic designer internship jobs require experience in a role such as graphic designer. Meanwhile, many graphic designer interns also have previous career experience in roles such as internship or sales associate.
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Graphic Designer Internship Career Paths
As you move along in your career, you may start taking on more responsibilities or notice that you've taken on a leadership role. Using our career map, a graphic designer internship can determine their career goals through the career progression. For example, they could start out with a role such as designer, progress to a title such as project manager and then eventually end up with the title senior manager of marketing.
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Average Salary for a Graphic Designer Internship
Best Paying Cities
Recently Added Salaries
Job TitleCompany  | Company | Start Date | Salary |
|---|---|---|---|
Santa Clara Valley Water District Summer Internship Graphic Design Summer Internship Graphic Design | Santa Clara Valley Water District Santa Clara Valley Water District | 01/26/2021 01/26/2021 | $54,90901/26/2021 $54,909 |
Veterinary Emergency Group Graphic Design Internship (Paid)-Spring 2021 Graphic Design Internship (Paid)-Spring 2021 | Veterinary Emergency Group Veterinary Emergency Group | 01/07/2021 01/07/2021 | $31,30501/07/2021 $31,305 |
Salt Lake City Corporation Mayor's Office Graphic Design Intern Mayor's Office Graphic Design Intern | Salt Lake City Corporation Salt Lake City Corporation | 12/23/2020 12/23/2020 | $22,68612/23/2020 $22,686 |
Reingold Inc. Winter 2021 Graphic Design Internship Winter 2021 Graphic Design Internship | Reingold Inc. Reingold Inc. | 12/03/2020 12/03/2020 | $33,39212/03/2020 $33,392 |
Pacific Sunwear Graphic Design Intern Graphic Design Intern | Pacific Sunwear Pacific Sunwear | 11/20/2020 11/20/2020 | $31,30511/20/2020 $31,305 |
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Graphic Designer Internship Resumes
Designing and figuring out what to include on your resume can be tough, not to mention time-consuming. That's why we put together a guide that is designed to help you craft the perfect resume for becoming a Graphic Designer Internship. If you're needing extra inspiration, take a look through our selection of templates that are specific to your job.
Learn How To Write a Graphic Designer Internship Resume
At Zippia, we went through countless Graphic Designer Internship resumes and compiled some information about how best to optimize them. Here are some suggestions based on what we found, divided by the individual sections of the resume itself.
View Detailed InformationTop Colleges for Graphic Designer Internships
1. University of Pennsylvania
Philadelphia, PA • Private
2. Carnegie Mellon University
Pittsburgh, PA • Private
3. University of Southern California
Los Angeles, CA • Private
4. Harvard University
Cambridge, MA • Private
5. Duke University
Durham, NC • Private
6. Northeastern University
Boston, MA • Private
7. New York University
New York, NY • Private
8. Boston University
Boston, MA • Private
9. Northwestern University
Evanston, IL • Private
10. University of Michigan - Ann Arbor
Ann Arbor, MI • Public
Top Skills For a Graphic Designer Internship
The skills section on your resume can be almost as important as the experience section, so you want it to be an accurate portrayal of what you can do. Luckily, we've found all of the skills you'll need so even if you don't have these skills yet, you know what you need to work on. Out of all the resumes we looked through, 18.7% of graphic designer interns listed graphic design on their resume, but soft skills such as analytical skills and artistic ability are important as well.
- Graphic Design, 18.7%
- Adobe Creative Suite, 10.4%
- Company Website, 7.5%
- Blog Posts, 5.7%
- Photoshop, 5.6%
- Other Skills, 52.1% See All Graphic Designer Internship Skills
Best States For a Graphic Designer Internship
Some places are better than others when it comes to starting a career as a graphic designer internship. The best states for people in this position are Washington, Oregon, New Hampshire, and Rhode Island. Graphic designer interns make the most in Washington with an average salary of $47,704. Whereas in Oregon and New Hampshire, they would average $43,682 and $41,330, respectively. While graphic designer interns would only make an average of $40,846 in Rhode Island, you would still make more there than in the rest of the country. We determined these as the best states based on job availability and pay. By finding the median salary, cost of living, and using the Bureau of Labor Statistics' Location Quotient, we narrowed down our list of states to these four.
1. Washington
$47,704
Avg. Salary
2. Oregon
$43,682
Avg. Salary
3. New Hampshire
$41,330
Avg. Salary
How Do Graphic Designer Internship Rate Their Jobs?
2.0
2.0
What do you like the most about working as Graphic Designer Internship?
The ability to communicate with letters and images for to me its the loudess means of communication. Show MoreTop Graphic Designer Internship Employers
We've made finding a great employer to work for easy by doing the hard work for you. We looked into employers that employ graphic designer interns and discovered their number of graphic designer internship opportunities and average salary. Through our research, we concluded that The Walt Disney Company was the best, especially with an average salary of $60,978. Indesign follows up with an average salary of $48,164, and then comes CBS with an average of $54,287. In addition, we know most people would rather work from home. So instead of having to change careers, we identified the best employers for remote work as a graphic designer internship. The employers include Tesla, NBCUniversal, and Gao Tek Inc.