Have you ever wanted to create a Gmail signature to send with your emails, but don’t want to have to pay for an application to do so? In today’s tip, I’m going to show you how you can create one using FREE tools!

If you prefer to read…

Disclaimer: The links below may be affiliate links. If you purchase any products after clicking on these links, at no additional cost to you, Called to Design will receive a small commission for making you aware of these important resources.

Step one: create a circle image in Canva

This is optional, but I liked the look of my image within a circle!

In Canva, start a new square image. In the example, I used the Logo style which is 500 x 500 px.

To make the creation of the circle image easier, look for Elements -> Frames, and select the circle.

Resize the frame so it fills most or all of the space.

Now go to your uploads and find your (square) photo image. Click and drag that within the frame, and it should automatically “snap” the image to within the circle.

In the example photo above, I added a border to the frame to make it obvious how the square image is contained within the frame. To add or remove a border, look for the lines in the settings above and change to no border (circle with a line through it), or specify a border type and width.

Click on Share, Download. Make sure it says PNG (or another image file type) and click the Download button.

Step two: create a Google Doc

In Google Drive, create a new Google Doc document that is empty. Rename to “signature” or something you’ll remember later.

Go to Insert -> Table -> and specify a 2×1 table:

Paste your image into the left box and resize the image and column to a smaller size. Then type in your contact information in the right box and format accordingly.

I added some formatting such as using the Satisfy font for my name, Poppins for the other text, and some black and white icons to the left of the text.

As you can see, the table has lines around the cells which is less than ideal. To remove these, right click anywhere on the table and select Table Properties. Under Color, change the Table Border to 0 pt, and the borders disappear!

Select all of the text/image in the table and Copy them into the clipboard for the next step.

Step three: create a Gmail signature

In Gmail, go to Settings and “See all settings”.

Under the General settings will be a section for signatures. Click on the Create New button and give it a name.

Paste in what you copied from the Google Doc table.

Note: If all you need to do is change or add the text, but not mess with the formatting of the signature (i.e. the table itself), you can change that directly in the Gmail settings. You do not need to go back to the Google doc. For example, I added a note to one of my signatures because I’m going to be out of the office soon.

DON’T FORGET!!

You have to scroll to the bottom to click Save Settings for your signature to be saved for later.

How to use the Gmail signature feature

To add a signature to your Gmail or Google Workspace email, click Compose

Look for a pen icon at the bottom of the New Message window. Click on that to see what (if any) signatures have been created. Select one to add to your message.

Note: You can also go directly to “Manage signatures” from here (not shown in the video) to update or add Gmail signatures.

Got a fun signature you’ve created? I’d love to see it!