DeviantArt is one of the most popular art websites for creative professionals. The platform has a great community. You can connect with other artists and see what others are doing. You can also share your digital art within the relevant community and across social media.
However, DeviantArt doesn’t exist in a vacuum. There are several viable alternatives to DeviantArt.
This article will focus on 10 of these alternatives. I’ll walk you through each of the sites. You’ll discover the best features of each platform. By comparing each alternative against DeviantArt, you can choose the one that best suits your needs.
Before we look at each site in greater detail, let’s take a snapshot view of all ten.
Snapshot of DeviantArt Alternatives
Here are the ten best social networks used by your fellow artists and other creative people. The table compares their strengths and weakness as a platform.
| Website | Free or Paid | What we like | What could be better |
| ArtStation | Free+Paid plans | Focused on matching artists with clients. | More functionality in the free plan. |
| Behance | Limited period free trial + Paid plan | Site’s ability to attract top clients. | Expensive Pro plan. |
| Free | Broadest range of audience. | Tough to get noticed in the noise. | |
| Free | Purely a visual platform | More creative inspiration than selling. | |
| Free | Idea sharing and collaboration. | Limited client artist interaction. | |
| Dribble | Paid. $19-199 pm | The best site for UI/UX designers. | Limited utility for other art forms. |
| Pixiv | Free + Paid | Large community | The user base is primarily from Japan. |
| ConceptArt | Free | Good job board. Well organized site. | Overcrowded. |
| Ello | Paid | Ad Free | Limited functionality |
| Tumblr | Free | Great visual | Strict content policy |
Now that we have a broad overview of the ten best DeviantArt alternatives, let’s look at each in greater detail.
ArtStation
Think of ArtStation as LinkedIn for creative people. The site is the premier platform for 2D and 3D aspiring and established artists. It is a place for people in the gaming, film, media, and entertainment industries to showcase their work.
Kevin McDowell, art director for Creative Assembly, says, “We look for artists who produce the kind of work we are looking for.” He stresses that artists and creative people should showcase their portfolios.
ArtStation has a free and paid plan. The free plan gives you access to basic features. You can create a personal site on a subdomain of the site; yourname.ArtStation.com. You can also do professional networking.
You can sell your work through the platform if you use either the Pro or Plus paid plans ($6.99 and $9.95 accordingly). Affiliate sellers get 70% of a sale from the Top Products in the online marketplace.
The Studio plan at $14.99 is for companies with multiple users.
Behance
Behance positions itself as a visual arts platform. It is focused on artists looking to showcase their work to prospective clients. According to Scott Belsky, CEO at Behance, “Our mission is to empower creative careers with a powerful and efficient platform to showcase your work.”
How it Works
Behance is a place for you to showcase your project, sketches, research work, and portfolio. The site has a nice user interface and is simple to navigate. It attracts more industry professionals than DeviantArt.
Source: FutureCDN
Anyone can join Behance and showcase their content. The portfolio website is a great resource for fashion, paintings, digital art, traditional 2D art, sketches, and other forms of creative content. There are many talented people on the platform, so you’ll need to fight it out for views.
Twitter is a great platform for artists, art professionals, and creatives. It’s a place for articles to connect and share visual content like pictures, videos, GIFs, and creative infographics.
How it Works
Twitter is a place to share your portfolio, network, and seek clients and jobs. It is also is a great platform for starting (or joining) conversations. Find the hashtags that are relevant for your niche and get involved. If you have a good sense of humor, you can get a lot of attention.
Concept art can be really popular on Twitter. Fan-made renditions of upcoming products like smartphones, gaming PCs, shoes, and other consumer products are always popular.
Instagram is one of the top social networks. Lots of creatives use the platform to share their drawings, concept art, and videos. You will find a lot of feeds with beautiful pictures and funny Instareels. It’s easy to spend a few hours browsing Instagram.
How it Works
Instagram is great for photographers, animators, painters, and concept artists. Create and share your content. You can make your content more engaging by sharing how you create your stuff alongside the final result.
Source: GraphicMama
Instagram is also a great place for inspiration. Check out what other creatives in your niche are up to.
Pinterest is a visual social bookmarking site. It’s a great place to collect photos and imagery. You’ll find a lot of architects create visual boards on the platform. Marketers also use it to promote blog content and generate referral traffic to their blog. It’s used by marketers, homemakers, aspiring artists, craftsmen, lovers of all things DIY, amongst others. It is a great source of referral traffic.
How it Works
Pinterest has “boards,” which are like categories. Favorite your images and link them up to the board. The site is a great resource to create and showcase your work. However, unlike Behance and ArtStation, it’s not geared to selling products.
Dribbble
Dribble is a favorite with UI/UX designers who showcase their work on the site. It’s not exclusively for UI/UX designers. All sorts of artists use the platform.
How it Works
Dribbble is an open design website. Sign up, upload your work, and connect with other people. You can pitch to clients, secure work, and share your UX product portfolio on the site.
Pixiv
Pixiv is a popular platform for the online art community. The site is Japan-centric and caters primarily to a Japanese userbase. It isn’t as well known as say DeviantArt or Behance, though.
How it Works
Pixiv is a place to share illustrations and other similar digital art mediums. The platform shares many of DeviantArt’s features. You can share artwork and get feedback from other community members who can comment and rate your work. If your content gets a good rating, a lot of people will see it.
While Pixiv was developed for a Japanese-speaking audience, users can set the default language to English.
Pixiv is a creative space. You can’t sell your work on the site as you can do on platforms like Dribble or Behance.
ConceptArt
ConceptArt is one of the best online art communities. Millions of people post on the forum every month. It’s a thriving community of digital artists, illustrators, designers.
How it Works
ConceptArt is an online platform like DeviantArt or Dribbble. It is built around a community of creatives who make stills, videos, and animations. You can network and share your work through the platform.
The site also has a great job board as well. You can apply for jobs with some pretty awesome companies.
In short, ConceptArt has everything you need to succeed as a visual designer.
Ello
Ello is one of the largest platforms for digital art and photography globally. Creative professionals use the site to share their work and engage with others through the online art forum.
How it Works
The Ello UI is clean, minimalistic, and functional. All projects are well organized and laid out. You can comments, like, and share other people’s work.
Arguably, Ello’s best feature is the competitions hosted on the site. The platform has various competitive events for creative professionals and artists. You can also sell your art on the website.
In a sense, it’s a bit like Etsy for artists.
Tumblr
After Twitter, Tumblr is probably the most widely used platform on this list.
Tumblr is popular with professional artists and photographers, and countless bloggers. Post content and share your work.
How it Works
Unlike some sites like Ello and Behance, Tumblr posts are sorted according to subject topics and hashtags. The platform is best suited for people who create original content and fan art.
Tumblr has a chat functionality. You can exchange private chats and direct messages with other users. Users can comment on people’s work, reblog, or like posts.
The platform has come under fire lately because of its strict guidelines on content. It has given user warnings and censored posts. So, if your art style leans more towards the risque side of things, you’re better off on other sites.
In Conclusion
Whether focused on crafts, painting, illustration, 2D and 3D art, every artist needs an online community where they can source inspiration, build their portfolio, search for lucrative opportunities, and sell their work. Many of the platforms identified above provide these features and more.
So, what are you waiting for? If you’re a DeviantArt user, take this opportunity to expand your artistic horizons beyond its borders and reap the myriad of benefits afforded therein. For a broader perspective on the creative world, make sure to delve into the Envato Elements blog, where you can discover all things creative, from tutorials and trends to expert interviews and guides.
I hope you liked this shortlist of the best sites like DeviantArt. For more Launch Space articles, check out our guide to the best ISO Creators, the best Wayback Machine alternatives, and the best paraphrasing tools.
