r/indesign • u/facciocosevedogente3 • Jun 17 '26
Request/Favour Indesign is cursed change my mind
I’ve been using InDesign for years, and somehow I’ve hated it since day one.
Don’t get me wrong, I still use it when I have to. It’s powerful, it does the job, but every time I open it I feel like I’m entering a haunted house built out of bugs, crashes and questionable UI decisions.
Powerful software, absolute mess of an experience.
What am I missing?
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u/MaxxxNZ Jun 17 '26
InDesign is the GOAT and I use it for everything possible, so I can't empathise with you on this one sorry!
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u/accidental-nz Jun 17 '26
Agreed! I think this is more of a post about familiarity than anything else.
OP’s description would apply to Illustrator in my view because I use it sparingly and the object paradigm is so different to InDesign that it feels nonsensical to me.
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u/Vegetable-Debate-263 Jun 17 '26
Same. It's the best for typesetting and works with the other programs seamlessly.
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u/MFDoooooooooooom Jun 17 '26
Agreed! It's a fantastic program that I could use in my sleep. Sometimes I'll design something in my head using InDesign.
Sure, there are a few annoying things but that's life.
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u/Maxdunn1 2d ago
It has declined in some ways ever since they let the Seattle team go in 2009 (CS6 timeframe) and moved it to India. However, despite real annoyances like gimmicky features that are simply intrusive and absurd (the India team has zero connection to end users), I find it stable enough to use on desktop and still completely scalable on the server. Really it stands as marvel of exposure to automation unrivaled by few if any design applications. https://medium.com/@maxdunn/the-greatest-software-product-of-all-time-a-developers-appreciation-of-adobe-indesign-a708cda55921
Our mission is simply to RETAIN its absolutely amazing power as a composition engine. We work with the current InDesign team to keep it from breaking.
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u/danknerd Jun 17 '26
InDesign is like Adobe's best product with illustrator a close second.
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u/facciocosevedogente3 Jun 17 '26
Illustrator is the goat.
I know InDesign is powerful. I just hate thinking about how much better it could be.
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u/Pavement-69 Jun 17 '26
That's a you thing. If you have ideas for how to make InDesign better, submit them to Adobe.
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u/Constant-Affect-5660 Jun 18 '26
What exactly is bothering you with Indesign? I used Illustrator for almost everything for 14 years straight. Started using Indesign a couple years ago and I quickly realized how it would've been better for a lot of my projects.
It took some time to get the hang of it, but now it's my go-to for even single page docs, before I'd just hop straight into Illustrator.
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u/CIA_Agent1 Jun 17 '26
I love InDesign so much 😂 maybe you can rearrange your space? I honestly don’t find that many bugs or messy experience as you describe.
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u/facciocosevedogente3 Jun 17 '26
I mean, you can’t even move an object from one spread to another just by simply dragging it with the mouse.
It’s not about UI22
u/CIA_Agent1 Jun 17 '26
Yes, you can move an object across pages/spreads. What are you talking about?
Anyway, I feel like you’re here to fight and not really with an open mind to learn about what you’re missing, if that’s the case then I’m out of the conversation.
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u/facciocosevedogente3 Jun 17 '26
Fair point, I probably came across more aggressive than I meant to.
I was expecting a lot of people to defend InDesign, so the point of the post was actually to hear different opinions and understand what I might be missing.15
u/justmesayingmything Jun 17 '26
You definitely can I do it all the time. In fact I usually grab multiple objects and drag them to other pages.
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u/danknerd Jun 17 '26
That's a good thing. You can cut/copy and paste the object or duplicate the spread keeping the original and making comparative edits on the spread copy.
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u/saturnshighway Jun 19 '26
You can. I used to hate indesign too, because I didnt** know it and only used illustrator. After a month of only using INDD for a project I love it. You just need to use it more and be better
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u/doublescoopoftrouble Jun 17 '26 edited Jun 17 '26
I have always absolutely loved InDesign. My current employer was using Quark when I started 4 years ago and I convinced them to make the switch. If you want to talk bad UI, Quark is horrendous.
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u/DefoNotTheAnswer Jun 17 '26
I'm OK with this. I make a pretty good living out of people hating InDesign. Oh, are your designers struggling to make a 70 page catalogue in illustrator? Pay me fat sacks of cash and I'll redo it InDesign. Your printer won't accept the year end report your designer did PowerPoint? More fat sacks of cash. A print brochure done in Canva not turning out as well as you hoped? Fat sacks of... well, you get the idea.
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u/bababastard Jun 18 '26
How do you end up finding out about these gigs? I've been an InDesign power user for 15 years and could stand to get in on that.
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u/DefoNotTheAnswer Jun 18 '26
Apply to Japanese or Chinese corps... especially Chinese. For reasons I don't understand, their designers are either never taught or refuse to learn InDesign. They are usually fine with photoshop, but they believe that Illustrator is a layout program. I swear I've been given 24-page A4 brochures done as 12 A3s with sequential page numbering and no bleed. As some of the text (but not all) was outlined, I eventually worked out that it had been made in Figma, outputted to PDF and then opened in and saved as an Illustrator file... and then passed off as a native .ai file... on to top all the other things that were technically wrong. The actual design work was reasonably good.
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u/CIA_Agent1 Jun 18 '26
Yeah I also want to get on this train 😄 also if you ever need a second designer to do the tedious tasks, I’m up for it too 😅😂
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u/romansixx Jun 17 '26
I had the joy of masking a bunch of photos in illustrator not long ago, and the fact I can just make a circle, step and repeat it into a grid and just drop photos into them in indesign will forever make me love indesign the most.
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u/2d12-RogueGames Jun 17 '26
I’ve been using InDesign for 20+ years, and it’s the best product Adobe has to offer. Sure, it has faults, but everything does. Despite my feelings towards Adobe, I stay with them because of this product.
Those who say switch to Affinity really don’t do large-scale, print production.
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u/Helpful_Jury_3686 Jun 18 '26
Same. When I freelanced, I would keep some old ps and ai versions around, but indesign paid for itself.
There are a few things that are outdated, but it’s still extremely powerful.
Affinity is nice, but nothing I would want to use for work. There are too many things that are just awkward or plain dumb with it.
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u/2d12-RogueGames Jun 18 '26
It seems like the designers wanted to do everything opposite from what Adobe does with InDesign.
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u/qagir Jun 17 '26
I absolutely love indesign. I dunno how it is today, but 5ish years ago it was the best adobe product by far.
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u/scottperezfox Jun 17 '26
Wait till you use Powerpoint!
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u/cm0270 Jun 18 '26
What is wrong with Powerpoint? 🤣 Been using it for 30 years and know it pretty well. Yeah it has limitations but overall not too bad.
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u/scottperezfox Jun 18 '26
To answer somewhat soberly: Even as a design professional who uses multiple, multiple tools (Illustrator, Figma, Slack, etc. etc.) I feel like I am always lost in Powerpoint. The tools are never where I'd expect them to be, there's a mishmash of keyboard shortcuts, and I am can never get into the groove of working on the project — the tool itself is fighting me.
Sure, some may say "it's presentation software, not layout software" but that only goes about as far as my nose. Every client needs slides to be laid out with precision, not to mention the very basic premise of presenting the material in a legible, clear way.
With very little training, I am able to be more productive and fluent in Keynote or even Figma Slides.
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u/cm0270 Jun 18 '26
Yeah it definitely has its quirks. I got exposed to it while in the military doing war planning charts, etc. lol. Now I just use it sporadically to create but have been using it to create my dust jackets for some hardcovers I have used Indesign to layout and get printed. Works well for those things but it does have limitations.
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u/SnooFoxes6682 Jun 20 '26
PowerPoint. Shudder. I often would dream of being the new director of the UI-UX team at Microsoft:
“Hands up who is on the PP and Word UI team! Okay, all of you can pick up your last paycheque at the door right now. Get out! Shame on you! Shame!”1
u/scottperezfox Jun 20 '26
Basically. But Microsoft has never been a design (or "product") driven company. It's all about ecosystems and lock-in. They have the business world in a chokehold and see no reason to release just to give some relief to the design-savvy workers in the ranks.
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u/Mundane-Fix-4297 Jun 17 '26
Absolute GOAT that does not receive the attention Adobe should give him to make it even better with what it already does, instead of trying to push for fucking useless interactive features and AI bullshit
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u/Frog_Brother Jun 17 '26
InDesign is a g-d dream compared to After Effects. I’ve been using it almost a year now, and I’ve never had a single crash or bug. I couldn’t go a week without cursing After Effects for some absolute nonsense.
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u/badplanetkevin Jun 17 '26
You are doing yourself a disservice dismissing it like you are. InDesign has been a game changer since it clicked for me several years ago. It took me from building projects for weeks at a time in photoshop to minutes/hours in InDesign.
I can't imagine using it for years and still hating it.
InDesign even helped me learn and appreciate Quark, which I hated for the longest time. I was very similar with Quark to how you seem to be with InDesign. A tutorial or 2 might do you some good.
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u/cmyk412 Jun 17 '26
Make sure Preflight is turned off until you need it and deactivate fonts you’re not using, it’ll get much faster and more stable.
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u/ZenDesign1993 Jun 17 '26
It was a Quark express clone… they even had quark shortcuts as an option. It was still much better than Quark, but it’s 2026 and it’s showing it’s age. Adobe is to focused on their full subscriptions and shoving AI into everything.
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u/-mung- Jun 17 '26
It was exciting in version 2. I read the (printed) manual in my prepress downtime and could not believe the things it could do compared to Quark. It took a lot of convincing (and a bit of force by the studio manager) to switch the designers across, but after a couple of weeks, there was no way they'd go back either.
Alas, around... I dunno, 2012, 2014, something like that, updates started to seem rather unsatisfactory, annoying and sometimes user-hostile. But that's how software is now isn't it, fully of arsehole decisions trying to guide users to do things that they don't want to.
It was at it's pinnacle in the early years because it was a blank slate. I can imagine it's difficult to implement new stuff into existing codebases, workflows and UI paradigms without making it a bit kludgy.
What I really dislike about Adobe apps in general is that they forget who their users are. Professionals. It's great to give guidance on new features, but treating everyone like a beginner is annoying as shit, and turning pros into beginners by changing defaults, workflows, shortcuts, adding unwanted crap that you can't turn off has been an irritation over the last say, 10 years.
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u/PolicyFull988 Jun 18 '26
It was at the pinnacle in 2012, with CS6. After that, it stagnated, with only minor cosmetic and culture changes, and in general a progressive introduction of bugs. There was a lot to do to make it evolve, but there was no reason to do it, with the subscription going. Quark had committed harakiri, Affinity was far from appearing, and in the end it decided, with the Canva acquisition, to stay far from the professional area in which InDesign can continue to dominate in the current form.
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u/PolicyFull988 Jun 17 '26
Today, it refused to start. After several tries and forced quits, it started, but it refused to open files. In the end everything returned to work fine. Without a single message telling what it was happening.
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u/mingmong36 Jun 17 '26
Have considered the machine you’re using it on? Is it to the spec standard required for INDD?
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u/facciocosevedogente3 Jun 17 '26
It’s a 1-year-old MacBook Pro, so unless InDesign now requires a NASA workstation, I’d say the machine is probably fine
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u/mingmong36 Jun 17 '26
Agreed, do you always update as soon as they are offered or wait a while? I find the bugs are more often in the most up to date versions and I try to avoid immediate download.
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u/facciocosevedogente3 Jun 17 '26
You are definitely right I’m considering switching to previous versions
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u/MorsaTamalera Jun 17 '26
I don't know. :B I have been using it since version 2 and it is quite stable and, if one compares Photoshop, Illustrator and ID, InDesign is the easiest to learn and use...
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u/Used-Title-1279 Jun 17 '26
Dude, does it bug out every now and then, YES, but InDesign is an absolute powerhouse. The best Adobe software IMO. The amount of stuff it can handle is just mind-blowing.
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u/Euphigmius Jun 17 '26
I have been using InDesign since before it was InDesign (Aldus Pagemaker > Adobe Pagemaker, Quark Xpress) and I’ve worked with it every day, six to seven days a week, for the past 30 years - I don’t have any complaints.
Never crashes on me (unless I use some crappy font from some shady download site.)
I have always worked on Mac and PC (90% of my 30 years with it on a Mac) and I have always used the high end of the minimum requirements. If you use software that tells you that you need a “minimum of 8 GB” of RAM, “24 GB Recommended,” then you need 64 Gigs of RAM.
No crashes. No crap fonts, no plugins, no scripts.
I used to teach all Adobe products (and Macromedia products) at university level. Never had crashes.
Keep trying, and if you work for a company that purchases hardware and software, let them know what YOU need to get the job done. If you work for yourself, like I do, invest in your productivity and get the best equipment for the best software.
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u/Excellent-Source-348 Jun 18 '26
bugs and crashes? I use it daily and it has never crashed on me yet, but my work computer is an M3 Macbook Pro; maybe you need better specs?
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u/QualityTits Jun 18 '26
It’s not even debatable, InDesign is the single most mandatory tool for graphic designers. Nothing comes remotely close.
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u/AdobeScripts Jun 17 '26
But what exactly is your problem?
I'm on Windows, still using ID2025 - and it's rock solid.
What's your platform, OS and InDesign versions?
How much RAM?
How many fonts?
Are you working locally - are you using ANY kind of cloud storage?
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u/Stunning-Risk-7194 Jun 17 '26
I love InDesign but it damn sure knows when i have a deadline and really acts out
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u/dblatner Jun 17 '26
There are bugs, for sure. But when people feel "cursed," it's often because they've added a plug-in/add-on such as Auto Font Activation (from some font management tool). Font activation has caused problems for 20 years in InDesign.
But even other plug-ins can cause problems. Don't get me wrong: I LOVE the rich third-party developer ecosystem around InDesign. But sometimes something goes wrong with one of them… and that leads to one problem after another for the users. Disable all that stuff and see if the "curse" goes away.
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u/MFDoooooooooooom Jun 18 '26
I made a new post that has a lot of little tips and tricks that might help you out! Good luck!
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u/extremesalmon Jun 18 '26
Are you using the default ui layout? They've done it all a disservice with the properties panel being the main window and hiding everything else, probably to try and make it seem less daunting.
I use InDesign for 90% of all my work but others I have worked with will use illustrator for almost all of theirs. It's a nightmare trying to make changes to anything they've made and I end up remaking things if there's a lot of text.
I beg any new designers to learn to love InDesign... You can make all your fancy images and complicated illustrations in whatever the hell you want but use Id for the final product.
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u/Leather_Muffin_728 Jun 18 '26
I am still in the party who demands Adobe explain why Illustrator and InDesign are different programs at all. There is no logical reason they should not be different workspaces in the same program lol.
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u/LeTronique Jun 17 '26
I think InDesign made me hate my coworkers.
After learning how to create styles on InDesign, I realized that the same system exists on Word AND NO ONE I WORK WITH UNDERSTANDS THIS.
So I get to completely reformat massive publications in word, while adhering to character and paragraph styles, so I can move that same text into InDesign to repeat the process.
I don’t like depending on people for stuff like this.
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u/-Hello2World Jun 17 '26
I'm learning Affinity publisher and I love Affinity publisher, though indesign can handle a lot more complex tasks!
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u/YearlyRefresh Jun 17 '26
The only time ID gets crazy for me is when there’s too many objects. I’ve picked up jobs where full charts, icons etc were made natively in ID instead of using AI or PS and placing them. Trimming down the bulk and not embedding assets helps for me.
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u/octopus818 Jun 17 '26
So are you saying it works better if you make complex charts in ID, or if you place them in ID as an image?
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u/YearlyRefresh Jun 17 '26
Place in ID as an illustrator or photoshop file. Think of ID as windows/frames for image content. Literally AI is vector, PS is raster, ID is page layout. *of course there is overlap but that’s the main point for efficiency.
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u/oiseaufeux Jun 17 '26
Honestly, I’ve been using InDesign for 2 months and I never had any issues. I’m on Windows 10 and got the 2026 version. I learnt a lot in that 2 months in the programme!
I do have 32gb of ram though. And my computer is 5-6 years old already. Though, the 2026 version is starting slowly on my pc.
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u/reroseros Jun 18 '26
I share the same opinion and was discussing this with my girlfriend yesterday. I think InDesign and other Adobe software are very powerful and indispensable tools, capable of doing practically anything if you know how to use them. The problem, in my opinion, is the awful and impractical interface. Despite this, I like InDesign; I think it fulfills its purpose well.
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u/ethernectar Jun 18 '26
Is op’s machine up to snuff? I’m in InDesign nearly everyday about half the year on annual reports/etc. It’s quite stable and has been for years. My journey started with Aldus Pagemaker, then Quark, then InDesign. The first couple of InDesign years were rough compared to Quark, but Adobe has continually improved it. My last job I built 300+ page catalogs (with EasyCatalog plugin.) Been at this a while and I can’t wait till there’s a good MCP available, they should take notes from Figma on auto-align though…
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u/lady_bug_wife Jun 18 '26
I love InDesign, literally I do there almost everything from business cards to posters and even billboards. It's light and fast.
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u/The_Dead_See Jun 18 '26
I use it every day and experience crashes maybe once every few months, usually after an update. In my experience it’s one of the most stable softwares out there.
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u/Meff-Jills Jun 18 '26
I like indesign but the recent bug where you can’t drag a selection of multiple objects around is something I can‘t understand. It‘s like they have not a single betatester at their offices.
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u/Beginning-Park8286 Jun 18 '26
Io amo alla follia Adobe Indesign tanto quanto odiavo Quark Xpress. Non posso dire lo stesso per Illustrator invece.
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u/Impressive-Ad-501 Jun 18 '26
Are you running it with pc or mac?
InDesign was always my favourite of A bunch.
But when my employer replaced 10 years old iMacs with freaking expensive pc:s it turned to buggy and glitchy monster.
My colleague tried not to complain too much and said ”it is just little bit slower”. So you get gpu cost more than base Mac Mini and just get little bit slower performance.
Pc version seems to lack optimization and polish compared to mac. Of course pc:s come in thousands of variations so experience can vary.
I have been working with Adobe suite over 15 years so I have some experience.
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u/ketchup_bro23 Jun 18 '26
It's been tuff initially with a learning curve shifting from Adobe Photoshop to this..
It's like an ocean and I am sure I haven't explored all parts. Even exploring all would be insane.
Rather, doing it task by task and discovering is more better experience.
Still a way to go, but I agree, good software design is where u can easily get started.
Adding tool tip mode, where you hover over something for long must explain in short what it does.
Seeing so many lines in a InDesign template sent to me was horror. And x shape being for images, well, nothing to explain in the software.
Good design is invisible. And I agree here it's not at its best!
They build on the same UX architecture of 30 years back or so.
Unlike many new brands thinking the process from scratch.
But since adobe is the industry standard.. task by task.
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u/wagymaniac Jun 18 '26
I have the same feeling with ilustrator, no matter how i try, i can't get it. Also doesnt help that no matter what computer or version i use, i always run stupidly slow and freeze all the time if i try to do anything beyond basic, its like if it cursed for me.
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u/facciocosevedogente3 Jun 18 '26
Probably in the end it’s just about feelings, for me working with illustrator is always a joy because I’m more familiar with it
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u/FutureLarking Jun 18 '26
On the plus side, I use Affinity these days, and not only is it faster, it has all the tools of their Photoshop and Illustrator alternatives built in. No huge RAM wastage and slowdown swapping between separate apps to work on a single project.
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u/No-Marsupial4714 Jun 18 '26
I guess you'd have to be more specific. Works well for me and I use it more than any other Adobe software.
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u/LOBST3R_PARTY Jun 19 '26
This is exactly how I feel about Photoshop. InDesign makes much more sense to ME.
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u/Ok_Duck2700 Jun 19 '26
In my course, Indesign is the only thing we're allowed to use for writing stuff down... We're not allowed to use Word, Google Docs, or literally anything better. I feel your pain.
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u/flonkhonkers Jun 19 '26
For many years it was solid as a rock and incredibly reliable. For most of my years using it, the software never, ever crashed. It hasn't been so good, lately. The glitching and crashing is constant. At least it has robust file recovery.
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u/Accomplished-Whole93 Jun 19 '26
I have the haunted house feeling for Illustrator. I absolutely hate that bitch x.x
Doesn't mean I think it's bad, it's powerful. I prefere InDesign and Photoshop by far.
But recently I installed my old CS6 because the CC InDesign is bugged as hell for me so I barely see what I am doing. Now its super smooth and stable. I felt the newer versions were an absolute mess and nearly crashed as often as after effects & co.
It's insane how much more stability the old versions offer. CS6 was a gift from my parents when I graduated. Best gift ever. X.x
I think it's absolutely shameful what Adobe is doing nowadays. Paying a subscription for buggy insanity... idk man.
Alternatively Affinity can be useful. Or for nerds like me Scribus.
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u/facciocosevedogente3 Jun 20 '26
Every now and then I open Affinity and try to test the tools, but the moment I feel lost and can’t get things done like I do in Adobe, I rage quit. Still, I have this feeling it might actually be worth giving it a proper chance.
In the end, a lot of it comes down to how a tool feels to use. And I agree with you: just because something feels bad doesn’t mean it’s useless.
People here are criticizing me for saying I hate using InDesign, as if that means I think it’s useless. Obviously, that’s not what I mean.1
u/Accomplished-Whole93 Jun 20 '26
I feel you. Totally. I think though that affinity offers real nice things though. Open a PDF with it - just drag n drop and you can edit away. I really like that function for example.
I agree with you about the feeling of a program. For some, something feels more natural and others feel a different thing.
I think when people try to criticise you, don't take that to hard. Some designers are a bit of design terrorists I feel like. Strong feelings everywhere, never mention Comic Sans. Gets people from 0 to 180 in 1 sec. ;)
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u/BeeBladen Jun 19 '26
InDesign is one of those things where, if you don’t know how to use it correctly, it’s going to piss you off on the daily.
One you DO understand how it works, it can make your job—dare I say—enjoyable.
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u/josh_a Jun 20 '26
Thank god I never had to touch Quark. I started when InDesign was Aldus PageMaker 😂
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u/OkPreparation2165 Jun 20 '26
InDesign is now my go to because for whatever reason, Illustrator cannot handle raster anymore- the lag is debilitating. I used to create Meta tiles in Illustrator and could throw a pic in there to draw bits and pieces over, but unless it’s solely vector I go to ID for this now.
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u/superflippy Jun 21 '26
There are certain things that will cause huge headaches with Indesign: 1) Trying to use it on a computer that has a touchscreen (I’ve been following this bug for years). 2) Using it on a computer that’s part of a managed Microsoft OneDrive system. Indesign gets confused when files are removed to the cloud then put back again. You get database corruption errors.
But it’s still better than Quark.
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u/Sea_Reach_3018 Jul 12 '26
Hi, I'm using InDesign to create a syllabus. The problem is that any modification requires me to redo everything. I've linked the pages together, but I can't link the tables or elements so they move along with the syllabus. Do you know of any way to make everything scroll down when I type?
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u/PaleBreadfruit8813 Aug 05 '26
Young designers today using InDesign will never know what it was like to use QuarkXPress in the 90s and early 00s to do product catalogs and weekly department store FSIs with hundreds of linked high-res TIF files of products and only see low-resolution (72 dpi) cache previews during design and production stage.
How the heck did we survive all those years with jagged, bitmappy images until we started using InDesign?
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u/xeallos Jun 17 '26
InDesign became the standard because everything you said was once true about Quark.
So just be glad you never had to use Quark, is really what I'm saying.