A digital planner is still one of the best first products you can build in Canva – it sells for $8-$25, costs nothing to make once you know the steps, and people buy the same file over and over while you sleep. The catch is that most beginners build a pretty PDF and forget the one feature that makes buyers actually choose it: working hyperlinked tabs.
The direct answer: to make a digital planner in Canva you set up a landscape 1920x1080px document (or 8.5×11 for a printable version), design 3-5 master pages – cover, monthly, weekly, daily, notes – duplicate them to fill out the year, then add hyperlinked tabs so users can tap between sections. Export as a PDF and list it on Etsy as an instant download. The hyperlinks are what separate a $5 printable from a $20 interactive planner.
The demand is real and growing. The digital planner market was valued at $3.42 billion in 2025 and is projected to hit $10 billion by 2035, and the digital planner segment has been growing around 12% year over year while physical planners crawl along at 4%. Search “planner” on Etsy right now and you’ll get roughly 1.6 million results – which sounds scary until you realize how many of them are lazy, un-hyperlinked PDFs you can easily beat.
What Is a Digital Planner and Why Sell One in Canva?
A digital planner is a PDF designed to be written on inside a note-taking app like GoodNotes, Notability or Samsung Notes, with clickable tabs that jump between sections. Unlike a printable, the buyer never prints it – they import the file into their tablet and reuse it forever.
Canva is the easiest place to build one because you already know the interface, it handles the hyperlinking natively, and it exports a clean multi-page PDF in one click. Canva passed 220 million monthly active users in 2024, and a big chunk of the planner sellers on Etsy are building entirely inside the free version.
Here’s why it’s a smart first product: you build it once, and every sale after that is close to pure profit. On Etsy the “printable” category alone now accounts for about 28% of all digital transactions, and planners sit right in the middle of that demand.
How Do You Make a Digital Planner in Canva Step by Step?
Start by creating a custom-size document, design your master pages, duplicate them out, hyperlink the tabs, then export as PDF. Here’s the full workflow.
Step 1 – Set Your Canva Document Size
Open Canva, click “Custom size,” and set your dimensions. For a tablet digital planner use 1920 x 1080px (landscape) – this matches most tablet screens. If you’re making a printable version instead, use 8.5 x 11 inches (portrait), the standard US letter size.
Pick one and commit. A landscape interactive planner and a portrait printable are two different products, and trying to make one file do both is how planners end up looking awkward on every device.
Step 2 – Design 3-5 Master Pages First
Don’t design 60 pages one at a time. Build your core layouts once:
- Cover page – your title, a clean graphic, your shop name
- Yearly/index page – the home base every tab links back to
- Monthly spread – a full-month calendar grid
- Weekly spread – your main selling page, so make it good
- Daily page – time blocks, top 3 tasks, notes
- Notes/extras – dot grid, habit tracker, goal page
Keep it consistent: two fonts max (one heading, one body) and two to three colors. If you want fonts and graphics you can legally sell with, this is where a commercial-use library saves you – I pull most of my planner fonts, cutesy icons and seamless patterns from Creative Fabrica (https://earnwithdesign.com/creativefabrica) so I’m never guessing whether an element is licensed for products.
Step 3 – Duplicate Your Masters to Build Out the Year
Once your masters look good, duplicate them. Right-click a page, hit “Duplicate,” and repeat until you have 12 monthly pages, 52 weekly pages, and however many daily pages you want. This is why the master step matters – fix the design once and every duplicate inherits it.
Step 4 – Add the Hyperlinked Tabs (The Part That Sells It)
This is the step most beginners skip, and it’s the whole reason someone pays $20 instead of $5.
Add a row of tab shapes down the side or top of your pages – Jan, Feb, Mar, or Cover / Monthly / Weekly / Notes. Then link each one:
- Click the tab shape
- Press Ctrl+K (Windows) or Cmd+K (Mac), or click the Link icon
- Choose “Page” as the link type and pick the destination page
Make the tabs big enough to tap without zooming, with strong contrast – dark text on a light tab or the reverse. Copy your finished tab row and paste it onto every page so navigation is consistent throughout.
One critical warning: Canva links to page numbers, not page content. If you reorder pages after linking, every link breaks. So finalize your page order before you hyperlink, and don’t rearrange after.
Step 5 – Export as a Hyperlinked PDF
Click Share, then Download, and choose PDF Standard (Print is overkill and creates huge files). Canva keeps your hyperlinks live in the exported PDF automatically. Open the file and tap a few tabs to confirm the links jump correctly before you ever list it.
How Do You Sell a Digital Planner on Etsy?
Create an instant-download listing, upload your PDF, and write a title packed with the words buyers actually search. Etsy delivers the file automatically, so there’s nothing to ship.
A few things that move the needle:
- Mockups over flat images. Show your planner on a tablet with a stylus. A flat PDF screenshot looks like a free download – a tablet mockup looks like a product. I break down exactly how to make these in my mockups post linked at the bottom.
- Keyword-stuffed title (the good kind). “2026 Digital Planner GoodNotes iPad Hyperlinked Daily Weekly Monthly Planner” tells both buyers and Etsy’s search exactly what it is.
- A quick demo video. A 15-second clip tapping through the tabs proves the hyperlinks work. I edit these fast in CapCut (https://earnwithdesign.com/capcut) – screen-record your planner, trim it, add one caption, done.
And here’s the move most sellers miss: start collecting emails from your buyers so you’re not renting your whole business from Etsy. Even a simple “get a free bonus page” opt-in through a tool like Systeme.io (https://earnwithdesign.com/systeme) turns one-time buyers into people you can sell your next planner to directly. I go deep on the off-Etsy side in Thursday’s post.
How Much Can You Charge for a Digital Planner?
Interactive hyperlinked planners typically sell for $12-$25, while simple printables sit around $4-$8. Price on the value of the system, not the number of pages – a tightly designed 40-page planner that solves one problem outsells a bloated 200-page file every time.
If you’re brand new, launch at the lower end of the interactive range to get your first reviews, then raise the price once you have social proof. Ten five-star reviews are worth more than the extra few dollars you’d have made holding out for full price.
Here’s my channel if you want to watch how I build and list these from scratch:
https://www.youtube.com/@RachelYeong
Grab My Free Resource
Want a simple weekly system for planning your product launches and content instead of guessing what to make next? Grab my free 30-Day Action Content Planner for Canva: https://earnwithdesign.com/30-day-action-content-planner-canva/
You can also grab my free digital planner starter templates over at https://lead.earnwithdesign.com to get a head start on your first build.
FAQ
Can you really make a digital planner in Canva for free? Yes. The free version of Canva includes custom sizing, page duplication, hyperlinking and PDF export – everything you need to build and sell a planner. You only need Canva Pro if you want specific premium elements or the background remover.
What size should a digital planner be in Canva? Use 1920 x 1080px landscape for a tablet planner used in apps like GoodNotes, or 8.5 x 11 inches portrait for a printable. Pick one format per product rather than trying to make a single file work for both.
Do the hyperlinks work after exporting from Canva? Yes, as long as you export as a PDF – the links stay clickable. Just don’t reorder your pages after linking, because Canva links to page numbers, so rearranging breaks every tab. Always test the exported PDF before listing.
How long does it take to make a digital planner? Once you’ve designed your 3-5 master pages, building out a full year takes a couple of focused sessions – most of the time goes into the initial design, not the duplicating. Budget one deep-work block for the masters and one for hyperlinking and export.
Is it legal to sell planners made in Canva? Yes, as long as your design is your own and any fonts, graphics or elements are licensed for commercial use. Canva’s own free and Pro elements are fine within their license, and a commercial-use library like Creative Fabrica keeps you safe on fonts and graphics.