A digital product is anything sold and delivered entirely online with no physical shipping — ebooks, templates, courses, planners, software, or design files. The appeal is structural: no inventory, no shipping cost, and profit margins that typically run 70-95% per sale once the product exists, since the marginal cost of each additional download is close to zero.
Most "best digital products" guides list the same five categories in the same order — ebooks, courses, planners, templates, printables — and stop there. This one covers those, but also covers a category most of them skip entirely: print-on-demand design bundles, which sit in an unusual spot as both a digital product themselves and the raw material for someone else's physical product business.
What counts as a digital product
A digital product is any good delivered electronically rather than physically — the buyer downloads a file, gains access to a platform, or receives a link, and no shipping is involved at any point. This includes ebooks, online courses, software, digital planners, Canva/Notion templates, stock design assets, music, and print-on-demand design files (which are digital at the point of sale, even though the buyer's customer may eventually receive a physical printed product).
Why digital products are profitable
The short answer: near-zero marginal cost per sale. Once a digital product exists, selling the hundredth copy costs almost nothing beyond payment processing and platform fees, unlike a physical product where each unit carries its own material and shipping cost.
That structural advantage is why margins in this category commonly run 70-95% net, well above most physical-goods categories. The global print-on-demand market alone — one slice of the broader digital-and-print-adjacent products space — is valued at roughly $15.19 billion as of 2026 and projected to reach $46.43 billion by 2031, according to Printful's industry data, which gives a sense of how much room there still is for new sellers entering with design-based digital products specifically.
The tradeoff sellers underestimate: low marginal cost doesn't mean low competition. Ebooks and templates are the easiest digital products to make, which is exactly why they're also the most saturated. Categories requiring slightly more specialized input — well-curated design bundles, niche software, or genuinely original courses — tend to face less direct competition per listing.
The beginner-friendly list
Ebooks remain the most commonly recommended starting point because they require no software beyond a word processor and a PDF export, and profit margins are close to 100% once written. The tradeoff is that ebook markets are extremely saturated and discoverability is difficult without an existing audience.
Online courses represent a genuinely large market — a global category worth roughly $200 billion according to industry estimates — but require far more production effort (video, structured curriculum, sometimes a cohort or community layer) than most other entries on this list.
Digital planners and templates consistently rank among the best-selling digital product categories on marketplaces like Etsy, particularly fillable, interactive PDF planners that buyers can use directly on a tablet rather than print. Margins stay above 90% since production cost per template is close to zero after the first one is built.
Notion and productivity templates have grown quickly as Notion's user base expanded — buyers regularly pay $10-$50 for a well-built template, and the production skill floor (learning Notion's block system) is lower than learning video editing or illustration.
Printables — wall art, planners, checklists — earn less per individual sale than templates or courses but cost almost nothing to produce, keeping margins above 90% even at low price points.
POD design bundles: the overlooked category
This is the category most "best digital products" lists skip, and it's worth explaining why it belongs here. A t-shirt design bundle — a packaged set of editable, commercial-licensed graphic files — is a digital product in its own right (you're buying and downloading files), but it also functions as the raw material for a second, physical business: printing those designs onto apparel and selling the finished product.
For a true beginner with no design skill, buying a design bundle and listing print-on-demand products is often a lower-effort starting point than writing an ebook or building a course, since the creative bottleneck (making the actual artwork) is already solved. The Whole Shop Bundle for POD Business covers every major niche — anime, streetwear, car & bike, typography, and kidswear — in a single purchase, which is a reasonable way to start a POD shop without committing to one narrow niche first. Sellers who want to test a specific niche before going broad can start with just the anime, streetwear, car & bike, or typography category instead.
Most profitable digital products by effort
The short answer: printables and design bundles are lowest-effort, courses are highest-effort but highest ceiling, and templates/planners sit in the middle.
Apparel-based POD products specifically run 30-60% net margin once print and platform fees are accounted for, according to POD-industry margin data, with the wide range depending on niche competitiveness and whether the seller offers personalization. That's lower than a pure digital-only product like a template (90%+, since there's no print cost at all), but the design-bundle-to-POD path also converts into an actual physical product a buyer receives, which some sellers find easier to market than an abstract digital file.
Comparison table
| Product type | Effort to create | Typical margin | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ebook | Low | ~90-100% | Writers with existing audience |
| Online course | High | 70-90% | Subject-matter experts, video-comfortable |
| Digital planner/template | Low-medium | 90%+ | Design-comfortable beginners |
| Notion template | Low-medium | 90%+ | Productivity-niche creators |
| Printables | Low | 90%+ | Fast, high-volume low-price listings |
| POD design bundle → apparel | Low (design bought, not made) | 30-60% (after print/platform fees) | True beginners with zero design skill |
Frequently asked questions
There's no single universal answer, but printables, templates, and buying a pre-made design bundle to launch a print-on-demand shop are the three lowest-skill-floor options, since none require original creative production from scratch.
Yes — buying a pre-made, commercially licensed design bundle (like the ones covering anime, streetwear, or typography niches) removes the design-skill requirement entirely, since the artwork is already made.
A pure digital product is delivered and consumed digitally — an ebook, a template. A print-on-demand product starts as a digital design file but ends as a physical item once ordered, so it sits between digital and physical categories.
It varies widely by category. Design bundles for a POD shop start at a relatively low one-time cost — check the shop page for current pricing — while building a course from scratch has a much higher time cost even if the direct financial cost is low.
Some categories are — generic ebooks and basic printables face heavy competition. Less saturated angles usually involve narrower niches or a layer most competitors skip, like curated, high-quality design bundles organized by specific sub-niche rather than generic mega-packs.
The standard digital-product list — ebooks, courses, planners, templates, printables — is still accurate, but it usually skips print-on-demand design bundles, which are arguably the lowest-skill-floor entry point for someone with zero design or writing background. Margins run lower than pure digital products (30-60% versus 90%+) once print and platform fees apply, but the barrier to starting is also lower, since the creative work is already done. Browse the full shop or the whole-shop bundle to see what a ready-made starting catalog looks like.