Beautiful Pastel Backgrounds for Designers

If you’re looking for a light and understated background for your next project, pastel colors are a great option. But what exactly are pastel colors?

They’re usually pale and muted hues, made by adding white or another light color to a primary color. This results in a softer, dreamier shade that can be very modern and refreshing in design.

And speaking of design, pastel colors can be used in a variety of ways. They can create a calm and serene feeling, or they can add a touch of whimsy and fun. You can use pastels as the main color scheme for your project, or you can use them as accents to add a pop of color.

Either way, pastels are extremely versatile. One easy way to incorporate pastel into your design is with eye-catching pastel backgrounds.

Want more backgrounds? Check out these resources:

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Pastel Backgrounds

If you’re looking for some pastel inspiration, check out this collection of beautiful pastel backgrounds. From artistic watercolor textures to beautiful florals to abstract shapes and even soft-hued outerspace backgrounds, we’ve got something to suit every project. 

These backgrounds can be used for websites, invitations, presentations, packaging, and more. Pastel backgrounds can add a touch of elegance and sophistication to any project.

Pastel Watercolor Backgrounds

This huge collection of abstract watercolor background files includes 30 different handpainted, high-resolution JPGs with an authentic watercolor texture. All of them are in lovely, low-key pastel colors like pale purple, soft grey, butter yellow, faded teal, and more. 

Handmade Watercolor Pastel Backgrounds

This set of pastel watercolor backgrounds is perfect for creating colorful party invitations, children’s artwork, book covers, and more. You’ll get 12 high-res multicolored files in cool color combinations, like pink and purple, blue and orange, pink and yellow, and others. You’ll also get 12 multi-layered PSD files for advanced editing purposes. 

Mixed Pale Pastel Watercolor Washes

Here’s a set of 12 pastel color watercolor stain background files in soft, pale tones with the paper texture showing through. These backgrounds are perfect for adding visual interest to your invitations, posters, presentations, banners, and packaging.

Pastel Rainbow Watercolor Textures

This set of 12 pastel watercolor digital papers features soft rainbow colors and authentic-looking watercolor painted texture. They’re also seamless, so they’re perfect for your large projects, like posters, banners, textiles, and website backgrounds.

Seamless Watercolor Glitter Agate

This beautiful set of 6 digital backgrounds features soft-toned pink and blue watercolor background texture with realistic-looking gold glitter accents that make it look like agate. Each high-res background is 12″ x 12″ at 300 dpi resolution. They are perfect for scrapbooking, invitations, packaging, and branding.

Simple Bounce Pastel Backgrounds

Here’s a set of twenty abstract background illustration JPG files, all made with different shapes and gradients and colored with pastel yellow, orange, blue, and pink. The designs have a bit of a retro vibe. Use them for websites, presentations, textiles, packaging, and more. 

Pastel Texture Backgrounds

This massive collection of backgrounds has a whopping 80 different designs, all carefully hand-painted with pastels and then scanned in at high resolution. These are perfect if you have a colorful gradient background concept in mind for your project.

Pastel Hydrangea Patterns

If you’re looking for a floral seamless pattern, check out this sweet set of six pastel hydrangea patterns. They’re just perfect for wedding or party invitations, textiles, package design, or scrapbooking. It comes in high-res JPG and a transparent PNG so you can put them over a distressed background for a vintage look. You also get a beautiful flower spray element to use in your designs.

Pastel Shapes

Here’s a full-featured set for the pastel enthusiast! Not only do you get 4 abstract backgrounds, plus 7 seamless pastel background patterns, but you also get 100 pastel decorative elements (like shapes, squiggles, blobs, splotches, rainbows, and floral elements) and 16 pre-made vector logo elements. Imagine how many future projects you can use these elements with!

Scattered Stars Pastel Backgrounds

Party invitations, children’s book covers, packaging, and posters will look great with this fantastic background in pink, purple, green, yellow, and teal with vibrant glittery stars scattered about. It comes in ten different variations, so you’re sure to find the perfect one for your project. 

Pastel Patterns

Here’s another delicate floral design featuring 5 different designs with pastel colors on a white background. These seamless patterns are ideal for making fabrics, website backgrounds, invitations, gift wrapping, and more. 

Pastel Space Backgrounds

You might think space has to be shown in a deep, dark color palette, but this set of pastel space backgrounds proves otherwise. You get 10 different high-resolution JPG files in all different pastel shades with colorful sky and space details that are out of this world.

Pastel Nebula

You’ll be over the moon when you see this set of ten space-themed backgrounds in toned-down pastels. These are perfect for kids’ party invitations, posters, website backgrounds, packaging, and more.

Pastel Blend Gradient Backgrounds

This collection comes with 25 different cool gradient background files, in a range of tones from peaches and cream to soft blue hues and soothing greens. Use these high-res JPG and EPS files for everything from websites to book covers to business cards.

Pastel Gradients

When you demand full creative control, this is the set for you! You’ll get 20 different gradients in AI, JPG, and PNG formats, in versions with and without grain texture. That means these are easy to edit, resize, and adjust to your exact needs. They are perfect for branding and package design projects.

Related: Collection of Photoshop Gradients

Pastel Vector Gradients

Here’s another set of twenty vector gradients in pale pastels, just waiting for your next art project! You’ll get ready to use high-res PNG files and vector EPS files so you can edit both the color and size if necessary or use them as they come. 

Grainy Gradient Backgrounds

Use this set for a sophisticated with to add a bit of a grunge texture background to your project. You’ll get 15 fully customizable, grainy, gradients in PSD files. You can easily edit the colors, the amount of grain, and the blur to suit your project.

Grainy Gradient Backgrounds Vol. 2

Here’s another great set of fully-editable grainy gradient backgrounds. This set of 15 PSD files comes in shades of pastel greens and purples, but they are fully editable to whatever colors you want. These are great for social media posts, invitations, packaging, app backgrounds, and more.

Pastel Gradient Backgrounds

This set of pastel gradient backgrounds with grain texture includes 20 fully-editable PSD files, 20 high-res JPG files, and 20 high-res PNG files. You can easily edit the colors, grain intensity, and blur effects in Photoshop to suit your exact needs. 

Angeles Gradients and Shapes

Here’s a huge collection of gradients and textures that were created for use with the free design app, Canva, but anyone can use the JPGs. It comes with 90 ready-to-use backgrounds in 3 sizes for web and social media (landscape, story, and post). The backgrounds are also divided into 3 color libraries — vivid, calm, and natural. The calm library is all pastels!

Unicorn Vector Gradients

This set of 25 trendy, modern, soft, and whispy gradient backgrounds comes in fully-editable vector AI files and high-resolution JPG. Use them for social media graphics, posters, invitations, greeting cards, branding, packaging, or flyers.

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Color Fades

This Color Fades background collection is proof that pastel is not the same as boring! These designs are both soft and bright. Some of them are smooth, while others have noise and subtle texture. Use them for invitations, posters, greeting cards, packaging, business cards, and more. You’ll get six high-res designs.

Pastel Blur Digital Papers

This set of backgrounds comes with ten different silky smooth pastel gradients in “unicorn” shades — pink, purple, yellow, green, and blue. These digital papers come in 300 dpi resolution at 12″ x 12″ in size. Use them for everything from party invitations to scrapbooking to social media graphics.

Seamless Sprinkles Digital Paper

Here’s a fun seamless pastel pattern for you…sprinkles! But, gold sprinkles to keep it classy instead of childish. This pattern is perfect for party invitations, branding projects, packaging, website backgrounds, and social media graphics. You’ll get 18 different high-resolution JPG files to choose from.

Abstract Pastel Backgrounds

For when you know you want pastel and texture, but you can’t decide exactly what texture…this is the collection for you! You get a little bit of everything. There’s a pastel sky background, a floral background design, and gradient blur designs, too. You’ll get 12 different high-resolution backgrounds in JPG format. 

Abstract Textures Pastel Backgrounds

This set of abstract pastel backgrounds has the look of different colors of wet paint that need to be mixed. You’ll get 10 different high-res JPG files in perfectly pale pastel shades. Use them to create fresh, modern designs for packaging, flyers, greeting cards, book covers, and posters.

Hexagon Tile Pastel Patterns

Here’s a background pack that’s totally unique! These super high-res 3D illustrations of hexagonal tiles look so realistic. You’ll get 12 backgrounds in a variety of pastel and vivid tones. These are perfect for social media graphics, website backgrounds, fun party invitations, cool greeting cards, flyers, and packaging designs. 

Fresco Mist Background Collection

Fresh, modern, and ethereal. Those are all ways to describe the Fresco Mist background gradient collection. You get 20 different pastel gradients, with and without geometric wavy lines. These backgrounds are perfect for beauty and cosmetics packaging, branding projects, website backgrounds, and social media graphics.

Pastel Noise Backgrounds

It’s not often you see soft pastels combined with glitch elements, but here you have it! When you want a design that’s retrofuturistic and tech-centric, but still maintains a pastel color scheme, this is the set for you. It even has a bit of an ’80s vibe. You’ll get 15 different high-resolution JPG files to choose from.

Rainbow Clouds

Here’s another set of seamless pastel patterns for you. That means they’re perfect for your larger projects — posters, banners, websites, fabrics, wallpapers, and gift wraps. These 16 different backgrounds feature pastel versions of rainbow colors with silky smooth gradients. 

Pastel Rainbow Backgrounds

This set of eight pastel rainbow backgrounds is perfect for anything from social media graphics to posters to sticker designs. This set features a smooth rainbow-hued gradient over a variety of different textures, from bubbles to clouds, to canvas, and more. You’ll get 8 high-resolution PNG and JPG files.

Gold Foil Patterns

Soft and soothing yellow, peach, pink, purple, and green gradients are the background of this beautiful collection that’s overlaid with 6 different stylish gold foil patterns. These classy patterns are perfect for invitations, social media graphics, branding projects, and small product packaging designs.

Phantom Ink Backgrounds

This collection of 30 different hand-painted designs in a variety of vivid and pastel colors is perfect for wedding invitations, event posters, flyers, product packaging, social media graphics, and greeting cards. Your download includes 30 high-resolution JPG files.

Watercolor Seamless Backgrounds

Roses, stripes, and dots, oh my! This collection of seamless pastel backgrounds in 6 different subdued shades is great for mixing and matching. Use one of them in your design or combine several of them for a winning look. You’ll get 18 high-resolution JPGs — each of the three designs comes in six colors.

Blue Pastel Ink Textures

Probably the most beautiful background on our roundup, this blue and gold liquid ink painting almost has the look of sliced agate. Use it for wedding invitations, social media graphics, packaging, stationery sets, branding, and more. Your download includes eleven ready-to-use high-resolution JPG files.

Ombre Grid Digital Papers

If you’re working on a totally ’80s project that calls for a pastel background with a bit of a tech vibe, this might be exactly what you’re looking for. This unique set comes with 10 different high-resolution PNG files, ready to bring a smooth style and retro aesthetic to whatever project you’re working on.

Sweet Unicorn Digital Papers

Use this set of 12 unicorn-colored digital papers to add a bit of whimsy to your invitations, social media graphics, and craft projects. The swirly backgrounds come in great pastel color combinations, like pink and purple, pink and green, purple and yellow, and more. You’re sure to find the one that’s perfect for your needs. 

Abstract Creamy Pastel Backgrounds

These photorealistic 3D illustrations are truly impressive — and, of course, they come in a variety of soft-hued pastel colors to suit your needs. Use the high-resolution JPGs for social media, greeting cards, app backgrounds, flyers, presentations, and more.

Abstract Creamy Pastel Backgrounds Part 2

Here’s another set of photorealistic 3D illustrations in understated, delicate pastel hues. Use these twelve high-resolution backgrounds for party invitations, greeting cards, advertisements, Instagram stories, Facebook posts, and stationery. 

Abstract Pastel Backgrounds

Here’s a set of four different abstract pastel neon backgrounds. These are perfect for when you want something with a light tone and a modern, trendy vibe. Use these high-resolution JPGs for everything from posters, flyers, and banners to social media graphics, advertisements, and party invitations.

Start Using These Pastel Backgrounds Today

If you’re looking to add a touch of tranquility, some whimsy, or a bit of colorful character to your design projects, pastels are the perfect way to go. These soft and soothing colors can be used in a variety of ways, so feel free to experiment until you find the look that’s right for you. And if you need some inspiration, we’ve got you covered. Peruse this collection of pale pastel backgrounds and start using them in your projects today.