With everything that’s going on this early 2023, everyone needs a good laugh from time to time.
Whether you’re naturally humorous or you just want to make someone’s day brighter, wearing funny t-shirt designs is totally a hip thing to do this 2023.
If you’re in the print-on-demand industry, you can definitely make numbers while making someone’s day brighter.
In this article, we’ll walk you through funny t-shirt design ideas in 2023 that you should totally add to your online store!
The Importance of Design
Young people today choose t-shirts as a staple casual fashion wear.
It is used by many to express personality and humor.
Marketers also turn to t-shirts when advertising as they see the impact of t-shirt advertising on their target audience.
Whatever your target niche/audience is, t-shirt design is a vital aspect of your product.
Aside from quality, the design will make or break your brand.

Great designs will make people want to wear your product multiple times.
When it comes to conceptualizing funny t-shirt designs, the key is to stay funny, unique, and timely.
Sorry to break it to you but some jokes could easily get stale.
There are what we call “seasonal jokes” which means that they only remain funny for as long as a significant event is still happening.
While seasonal jokes could still make numbers for your merch store, they aren’t evergreen.
You would want your sales to be consistent. Make sure your funny t-shirt designs won’t get stuffed into the back of your closet.
How to Choose the Right design for your Brand
When choosing the right design for your brand, there are many important aspects to consider.
The first important aspect is your niche of choice.
If you want your brand to stand out, you have to stick to a particular niche and specialize in it.
By sticking to a certain niche, it will be much easier to personify your brand and create an image that your target audience will remember. S
ay if your niche is in the food industry, start researching popular designs that are making rounds all over the internet.
Social media for example has a ton of design ideas that you can choose from.
Another important aspect to consider is your audience of choice.
If your target audience is adults, you can be comfortable incorporating adult (but not vulgar) content for your t-shirt designs.
Knowing your audience well is key to delivering the best products that they want. Remember that as a business, your role is to provide solutions to people’s needs.
This means that knowing your audience’s interests, buyer persona, demographics, and other important data is key to successfully delivering the right products.
Humorous T-shirt Design Ideas That You Should Add to Your Merch Store this 2023
Making people laugh is definitely a skill that is guaranteed to make numbers in whatever industry you may be in.
Adding in a bit of humor will instantly make your product friendly, attractive, and relatable. The following t-shirt design ideas will definitely give more reason for customers to buy your merch.
Food Elements
Food elements will never go out of style even in 2023.
A simple pun that relates to fruits and vegetables with cute designs is forever a humorous classic!
Tacos, steaks, burgers, pizzas, and cakes are definitely a crowd favorite and will be a great idea for merch designs.


Vegan jokes are never not-funny too! Just make sure they aren’t borderline offensive! The key is to keep your jokes relatable but respectful.
Pandemic-Related Elements
Although a global pandemic isn’t an object of laughter, adding a bit of humor to the new normal would definitely lighten things up a bit.
There are many pandemic-related elements that people can relate to in 2023.
Adding humor to protocols like social distancing is definitely a great idea to make people laugh while reminding them to be cautious.
One great example is the t-shirt statement “I’ve been social distancing since 1998.”
Adding simple yet profound graphics is a great addition to making your statement stand out even more! Another great idea is the state of working/studying from home.
Statements such as “That meeting should’ve been an e-mail.” is definitely a laughable t-shirt design idea that everyone can relate to!
Animal Designs
Animals are naturally funny- especially when they act like humans! This is the reason why it’s quite easy to create funny content from animals.
You can take anything from whales to lamas and axolotols and turn them into a funny and relatable t-shirt design!


You can also insert puns that are appropriate to these animals’ behaviors!
For instance, cats have a naturally funny way of being so irritable- which many people can relate to!
Political Elements
Politics as a pantomime that it is can also be naturally amusing!
With the recent turn of events, we can use a good laugh from popular political figures like Bernie Sanders!
Your content can be satire, comical, or simply just a relatable meme that you made.
You can create your own graphic for these political figures to avoid copywriting a photograph!
Extra Terrestrial Elements
There’s just something so unique and interesting about fictional elements- especially aliens and cyborgs!
If your niche is targeted at space enthusiasts and gaming fanatics, you can definitely utilize extra terrestrial elements to create funny conversations!


Visually, you can also be creative when it comes to playing with different color themes and design elements.
You will have the creative freedom to create anything weird that you might want to include in your design format!
Classic Dad Jokes
Dry humor is ironically humorous! That makes dad jokes forever a classic.
If your merch targets older audiences, fathers, uncles, granddads, and the like, this would be a perfect entry for you.
Examples of these classic statements are “Knock knock” jokes. They’re simple, straightforward, and timely.
You can use the same format to create fresh content.
Profession Shirt Designs
Everyone’s been adjusting to the new work setup.
For health workers, the pandemic has literally brought them to a whole new different game.
For professionals like architects, lawyers, and teachers, working from home has turned the office into a new digital workspace.
Profession shirt designs that make clean jokes about someone’s job are definitely hilarious!
While the adjustment may not be easy, wearing light-hearted tees can be a fun way to put a smile on people’s faces.
Workout Motivation Design
A new year signifies new resolutions- that includes the goal to start working out.
Everybody knows it isn’t an easy feat to accomplish so adding in a little sense of humor could definitely loosen up those who are struggling!


T-shirt statements such as “Gym and Tonic” and “No Pain No Ice cream” are fine examples of how you can loosen up a bit even while hustlin’ to get that dream bod!
Where To Buy Funny T-shirt Designs
For entrepreneurs who are just getting started, making the designs, doing the marketing, and keeping track of a merch store can be a handful.
The best course of action to boost your efficiency is to outsource the tasks that you can’t do, and, no, this does not necessarily mean hiring someone to do the job.
That would cost you more money.
License-free original designs for your merch store can be bought online, and they aren’t necessarily expensive especially for websites like Threadbasket.
Membership for Threadbasket is only 18 Euros per month and this can grant you full access to their archive of designs which are updated on a weekly basis.
You’ll have access to a library of designs that got almost all niches covered, otherwise, you can always request to make designs for the niches you need.

They also offer free membership but with limited access to their designs.
If you want to try out their services first, it should grant you enough designs to play around and work with to gauge whether a full membership will make sense for your business.
Besides, you don’t need to commit long term, you can simply sign up for a month’s membership just to get the ground running for your merch business.
You can have access to unique designs that are free to download.
You don’t need to spend anything to try out Threadbasket’s service.
Let’s Wrap it Up
Creating funny content while staying relevant and unique can be quite a challenge.
As the year 2023 brings new challenges, so does it bring new opportunities!
There are many funny t-shirt design ideas that you can utilize to level up your merch game this 2023.
It just takes the right amount of research, dedication, and commitment to make things happen!
Thank you for reading, and we hope you found this useful. If you have any questions or want to engage in a real-time discussion with us on this matter, follow us on Twitter.