Domestika Review: Is This The Best Platform for Creatives?

Are you bored and need something to do with your time? Why not pick up a creative hobby? This could be the year that you learn a new skill that will bring you joy.

Learning new skills can be expensive especially if you want to have quality courses. This is especially true for creative courses.

If you are struggling to find great, affordable courses, I want to introduce you to Domestika. This is a leading course platform that targets creative minds with courses in arts, crafts, music, writing, and many more.

With Domestika Plus, you can binge on over 1,000 creativity-based courses without breaking the bank.

In this article, I will give you a detailed review of the Domestika course platform so that you can decide whether the platform is for you.

I will give you my first-hand impressions of the site as well as some hacks and tricks that you can use to get the most value and that will make your experience of using the platform as smooth as possible.

Some of the topics I will cover include:

But before we get deep into the weeds, let’s quickly go through the key takeaways.

Later in the article, I will go through how you can overcome some of these disadvantages.

1. What is Domestika?

Domestika is an online learning platform that was founded in Spain around 2002 by Julio Cotorruelo, Tomy Pelluz, Gabriel Suchowolski, and David Duprez. Initially, Domestika was an online community for creatives before it ventured into online learning.

Over the years, Domestika has grown to be one of the biggest online course providers and it currently has more than 8 million members who have collectively taken more than 13 million courses. In 2021, the company was valued at $1.3 billion (source).

The company is currently headquartered in Berkeley, California, with multiple offices worldwide.

What all this shows is that Domestika is a legitimate company with strong fundamentals, which means that it will continue to expand in terms of quality and quantity of courses.

2. Which Courses Are Available At Domestika?

Domestika is the leading course platform for professional creatives and hobbyists. If you are into art, music, performance, writing, crafts, design, or photography, this is the platform for you.

Domestika currently offers more than 2,000 courses, created by 1,300 creative professionals, and it’s adding on average 110 new courses every month, covering subjects as diverse as crocheting techniques, painting animals, and editing for Instagram.

Here are the kinds of courses you can expect to find on Domestika

3. How  Do You Get Started with Domestika?

For you to buy a Domestika course, you will first need to create a Domestika account. This account is free and you only need to register with your mail address.

Once you have your free account, you can log in and explore the courses you like before you make a purchase.

Even if you don’t plan to buy a course immediately, it is worth creating your Domestika account because you will need it for almost anything you do on the Domestika platform. Also, you get the following perks.

Here is how to create a Domestika account:

Step 1: Go to the Domestika home page and then Click Log In.

Step 2:  Once you click log in, a modal window will open. Here, you will have the option of logging in with your Facebook or Apple account. Alternatively, you can log in using the email address and password you created when signing up. If it is your first time using the Domestika platform, you will need to create an account. To do this, click on Join for Free.

Step 3: This will open another modal window where you can fill in your email address and password that you would like to use to create an account. Then click Join for Free.

4. How Much Domestika Courses Cost

Domestika has two pricing models, you can either purchase a course individually or pay for a subscription where you get unlimited access to thousands of courses.

Here is how much it will cost you for the different payment options.

#1. Domestika Plus Cost

Domestika Plus is a subscription service that Domestika launched in 2014. With Plus, you get access to 1,000+ courses for US$99 for a year’s subscription (this equates to around $8.33 a month). You can also pay for Domestika Plus on a month-by-month basis but this is a bit more expensive at around $15.99 a month. So you save roughly 48% by paying yearly instead of monthly. To learn more about Domestika Plus, click here.

#2. Cost of Purchasing Individual Courses

Purchasing a single course will cost you about $59.99 for most courses. At the moment, most of the courses are heavily discounted so you can get courses for as low as US$6 (90% Discount).

Domestika are on an expansion drive and are offering their courses dirt cheap. You can take advantage of this to learn as much as you can right now. The strategy of heavily discounting courses was successfully used by Udemy, but if you check Udemy now, most courses go for $75.

5. Should you get Domestika Plus or Buy individual courses?

Each pricing model has its pros and cons but for me, I prefer the subscription model. When I’m learning a skill, I prefer to go through as many courses as possible to get the one I like and then focus on it.

When you buy an individual course, you are stuck with it, good or bad.

Here are the Pros of Domestika Plus

Here are the cons of Domestika Plus

6. How Is the Domestika User Experience?

Here are some quick thoughts about the learning experience on Domestika.

7. Which Are The Most Popular Domestika Courses?

There are many popular courses on Domestika and many have hundreds of thousands of students. I’m listing a few below so that you can go and explore why they are so popular with students.

#1. Portrait Sketchbooking: Explore the Human Face

This course will teach you the fundamentals of drawing facial features.

You can find out more about the course here.

#2. Content Creation and Editing for Instagram Stories

This course will teach you how to take photographs for social media

You can find out more about the course here.

#3. Introduction to Adobe Photoshop

This course will teach you the fundamentals of Adobe Photoshop from scratch.

You can find out more about the course here.

8. Who Are The Domestika Instructors?

Unlike many other course platforms, not everyone can create a course on Domestika. To be an instructor, you have to pass through a vetting process. This ensures that courses are taught by people who are experts in their fields.

Instructors on Domestika include Pulitzer Prize Winners, National Geographic Illustrators, and winners of the National Design Award.

Here are some of the notable instructors.

#1. Ji Lee. He is the executive vice president of the Global Marketing Center at Samsung Electronics. Before that, he was the former Creative Director at Facebook, Google, and Droga5. You can check out his course on Transforming Your Creative Ideas Into Personal Projects.

#2. Carlinhos Brown. Carlinhos is a Brazilian percussionist and record producer. He has won the Latin Grammy twice and has been nominated for the Academy Awards. You can check out his course on Introduction to Percussion.

#3. Leo Fallas. Leo is a film post-production specialist from Mexico who has worked on 15+ movies including a Netflix original. You can check out his course on Introduction to DaVinci Resolve.

9. What Are The Biggest Disadvantages of Domestika?

Domestika courses are generally of high quality and well-produced. The tutors are excellent and knowledgeable in their field.

However, there are a few disadvantages that can be annoying. But not to worry, in this section, I will give you some hacks to get around the biggest of these disadvantages.

#1. Autorenewal on Domestika Plus subscription

Domestika has a policy of auto-renewing subscriptions that have lapsed for the Domestika Plus subscription. Also, if you sign up for the 30-day trial, you will be charged for a year’s subscription unless you cancel before the trial ends.

To be fair to Domestika, this is a trick that most businesses that use the subscription model use (including most course platforms). They hope that you will forget to cancel your subscription beforehand.

#2. Certificates are only available on Plus.

Unfortunately, if you need a certificate, you can only get for free it on a Domestika Plus subscription. This means that if you buy a standalone course, you will not get a certificate for free.

#3. Support Can Be Slow

Their customer support team can be a little slow in responding to customer queries. Also, you can only contact them through a contact form on their website. There is no phone or chat support.

This can be a bit frustrating especially if you need answers fast.

#4.  Non-English Content

Domestika got its start in Spain so you will naturally have a lot of courses in Spanish as well as other non-English languages.

The non-English courses will have English subtitles or be dubbed over in English to help you follow along. I don’t mind sub-titles but for some people, this can be distracting.

Also, in some courses, you can still hear the original language alongside the English dubbing which can make it hard to focus on what is being said.

With that said, many non-English courses are taught by top experts so you will be missing out if you ignore them.

10. How Does Domestika Compare With Other Learning Platforms (i.e. Domestika Alternatives)?

In this section, I will compare Domestika with three other popular platforms for hobbies and craft-related courses. These are Udemy, Skillshare, and Craftsy.

In terms of flexibility, affordability, and variety, Domestika manages to strike a good balance compared to the other courses.

Below is a detailed comparison of the course platforms.

#1. Domestika Vs Udemy

Udemy is one of the leading course providers and a great place to get high-quality courses. Here is how it compares with Domestika.

#2. Domestika Vs Skillshare

Skillshare is a popular learning platform for a variety of skill-based courses. Here is how it compares with Domestika.

#3. Domestika Vs Craftsy

Craftsy is another popular course platform that focuses mainly on crafts but has many other courses. Here is how it compares with Domestika.

11. Some Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) About Domestika

In this section, I will try and answer some of the common questions you may have about Domestika.

#1. How Do You Get Domestika Customer Support?

At the moment, it appears that the only way you can get in touch with customer support is through a contact form on their website here.

You can also send them a DM through their social media channels (Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram ) for help.

They also have plenty of articles on their site that can help to to resolve many of the problems by yourself. Check out their resources page here.  You can also look at section 12 for important Domestika resources.

#2. How do you cancel a Domestika Plus subscription?

Domestika will auto-renew your Domestika Plus subscription once your current subscription period ends (or at the end of a trial period). If you want to avoid this, you can cancel your Domestika Plus subscription anytime before your subscription lapses (or before the end of a trial period) to avoid being charged for a recurring purchase.

Even after you cancel your subscription, you will continue to enjoy the services until your current subscription period ends.

For more on canceling your subscription, check this resource here.

#3. How can you get a refund for Domestika courses?

If you buy a standalone course, you can request a refund within 14 days after you have purchased it.

The 14-day refund policy does not apply to Domestika Plus users. However, if you had signed up for a 30-day trial but forgot to cancel, you get a 7-day window t from the day the renewal took place to request for a refund.

For more details on getting a refund, check their refund resource here, here, and their terms here

If you are unable to get your refund using the method above, you can contact customer support using their web form or social media accounts.

#4. Can You Get Domestika Courses for Free?

Currently, there are no free Domestika courses. However, they have a 30-day trial period for Domestika Plus where you get free access to over 1,000 courses.

This is a great option if you want to sample many different courses so that you can decide if you will want to pay for the service.

#5. Which Languages Are The Courses Offered In?

Domestika courses are offered in multiple languages with English and Spanish being the majority. However, you will also find courses in Portuguese, German, Italian, and French among others.

Where courses are offered in non-English languages, you will have subtitles in English or the audio will be dubbed into English.

#6. Do You Get A Certificate With Domestika?

At the moment, it appears that you can only get a certificate if you are a Domestika Plus member (see here). If you buy a standalone course, this will not be available.

You will get your certificate once you have completed your course. The certificate will have your full name, course, teacher’s signature, and a QR code that links back to your course project.

You can download your certificates as PDFs or share the link online. Certificates include your full name, the course you’ve completed, a QR code that links to your course project, and the teacher’s name and signature.

For more on certificates, check out this resource

#7. How long are Domestika courses?

Most Domestika courses are between 2 and 4 hours but you will find some that last over 10 hours. I think this is a good sweet spot. Long enough to master the basics without things getting boring and drawn out.

#8. Is Domestika a legit company?

Domestika is indeed legit and is one of the leading course platforms. The company has its headquarters in Berkeley, California, with multiple offices worldwide.  Over 8 million members have collectively taken more than 13 million courses.

12. Some Important Domestika Resources

Here are some links to important resources on the Domestika website. I will try to keep the links on this list updated.

Wrapping Up: Summary and Key Takeaways

If you are a creative or hobbyist, Domestika is definitely a course platform that you should check out. It is a solid platform with some standout features such as:

With that said, there are a few disadvantages that you should be aware of.

I have already given you hacks that can help you deal with some of these disadvantages (see the section on the disadvantages of Domestika). If you follow the advice and tips in this article, you should have a smooth experience with Domestika