How to create ASCII designs in 2026

When I was a kid, mobile phones were just starting to appear and the only pixel-based imagery I could create was a two-frame animation made of dots and dashes in a text message on my Nokia 5110.
To be honest I only wanted that phone so I could design inappropriate animations to send to my mates during the most boring classes.
Little did I know then that I’d grow up to be a pixel pusher. I never imagined this tech would evolve so far beyond recognition, becoming the universal building block for everything we see, even by reinventing the pixel itself.
Fonts: Tobias by Displaay, NaN Tragedy Display Mono & NaN Serf A Display by NaN.xyz
Icons by Noun Project, Meat by Thuy Nguyen, Owl by Pinky, Cat and snake by Kim Sun Young, Cheese by Visual Language

1:00

Additional visuals