Affinity is free now: do designers still need Adobe?

Most designers can do logos, layouts and photo editing in the free Affinity app and drop Creative Cloud. The exceptions are people whose clients require editable Illustrator or layered Photoshop files, and anyone doing motion work. The free app needs a Canva account, and its AI tools need a paid Canva plan.

What Canva actually changed

Canva folded the three separate Affinity programs into one free app. MacRumors reported the relaunch on October 31, 2025: a single app with Vector, Pixel and Layout modes, free to download, running on Mac and Windows, with an iPad version planned.

Before this, Affinity sold Designer, Photo and Publisher as separate programs with one-time prices, which already made it the budget alternative to Adobe. The new version removes the price and the split. You switch between vector, pixel and page layout inside the same document, so a logo can go onto a brochure page without a trip between apps.

Affinity's own site says the app is free for individuals. Gizmodo's guide puts it more precisely: all the design and editing features are free, and only the AI tools require payment.

So this is not a trial or a cut-down version. It is the full design toolset at no cost. Whether that is enough for your work is the next question.

What the free app covers

If you design logos, social graphics, brochures, packaging, illustrations, print layouts or retouch photos, Affinity covers nearly all of it. Vector pen and node editing, non-destructive layers, masks, RAW development, and master pages for long documents sit in one window.

The part that matters most when you leave Adobe is file exchange. Affinity's help pages list Photoshop PSD, PDF, SVG and EPS as formats it can both open and export. Illustrator AI is listed as open only. The page I checked covers Affinity's iPad apps, so read it as a guide and not a guarantee for the desktop app. Photoshop text is rasterised on export.

That has a practical meaning. You can open a client's Illustrator file and keep working. You cannot send a native, editable AI file back. If a client hands you a PSD, you can edit it and return a PSD, but live text will be flattened.

It also means you should test a real project file before promising a smooth handoff. Complex effects, 3D layers and heavy smart-object structures are where problems show up first.

What the app does not do is everything else Adobe sells. There is no video editor, no motion graphics, no photo library with cloud sync and no PDF tool such as Acrobat. Affinity handles still images and layout. If your work stretches beyond that, you are comparing a design app with a whole suite.

The two strings attached

Free comes with two conditions: you need a Canva account, and the generative AI tools cost money.

First, the account. MacRumors says a Canva account is required but signing up is free. Gizmodo says the same. For most people it makes no difference. If you chose the old Affinity because it asked nothing of you and never contacted anyone, this is a real change.

Second, AI. MacRumors reports that Canva premium subscribers get Generative Fill, Expand and Edit, and Remove Background inside Affinity. The core app has no restrictions. The AI layer on top is the paid part.

If you lean on generative fill all day, add a Canva subscription to your budget. If you mostly work by hand, you may never need it. This is an ordinary freemium arrangement, and the mistake is reading "free" as "everything Adobe's AI does, at no cost."

What still justifies an Adobe subscription

Keep Adobe when a client's workflow depends on it, and not out of habit. Three situations come up.

Format requirements. If a client or a collaborator insists on an editable AI file or a fully layered PSD with live text, you will either stay in Adobe or argue about formats on every job. Ask what the client really needs. Many are happy with a PDF, an SVG or a flattened export, and the format request is just what they have always said.

The rest of the suite. If you do motion design or video editing, Affinity has nothing for you, and a photographer whose catalogue and presets live in Lightroom would have to rebuild that.

Shared libraries. If you work inside an agency that shares Adobe cloud libraries, leaving alone means leaving the team's workflow.

On cost, Adobe's prices vary by country and change often, so check the current figure. On Adobe's German plans page, a single app such as Photoshop or Illustrator costs €25.99 a month, Creative Cloud Standard €61.95 a month and Creative Cloud Pro €77.99 a month after an introductory discount. Over a year, a full plan is a few hundred euros. That is the number to weigh against a few format edges and a learning curve.

For a solo designer who works mostly on logos, brand systems and print layouts, the trade tends to favour Affinity. For a motion designer or an agency contractor on shared Adobe files, it does not. Our comparison of Canva, Figma and Adobe Express for design work covers the other tools in this decision.

How to switch without hurting a live project

Switch on a new project and not in the middle of one. Copying over a half-finished job is how files break.

A safe approach:

1. Keep your Adobe plan for one more billing cycle. Do not cancel yet.
2. Pick a small paid job and do it entirely in Affinity.
3. Open three or four old client files in Affinity and check fonts, effects and layers.
4. Write down every format your clients actually ask for. This list tells you whether you can switch fully.
5. Cancel Adobe only when two or three jobs have gone through without trouble.

Fonts are the usual surprise. A file that uses a font you do not have installed opens with a substitute. Check this before you tell a client the file is ready.

If you are weighing subscriptions across tools and not only design, our post on one-time versus subscription software has the longer version of this maths.

What to do with the money you save

Spend part of the saving on the part of your business that clients see between the design work: how you quote, how you share drafts, and how you get paid. Designers lose more money to loose scope and slow approvals than to software.

Our guide to presenting deliverables to clients goes through the habits that matter, and the next section shows how to set that up in one place.

How Delivvo handles the client side of a design project

Delivvo does not make design files. It runs everything around them, from the inquiry to the final invoice, so a designer using Affinity or Adobe looks organised either way.

Here is the flow:

1. Clients ask for work through your inquiry form, which can include a file field for briefs and references (up to five files, 10 MB each by default).
2. The request lands on your lead board. You send a quote built from your packages and add-ons, such as a logo package with a number of revision rounds.
3. The client signs the contract with a typed or drawn signature and pays the deposit. Delivvo records the signing with a SHA-256 hash, IP address and device, and archives a PDF.
4. You share drafts and finals in the client portal. Clients open it with a one-time code, with no password. Files are versioned, and each deliverable can be approved there.
5. Large files are not a problem. On the Pro plan and above you can upload files of up to 50 GB, with resumable uploads, which suits big layered files and exports.
6. The balance invoice goes out and the client pays you through your own gateway.

Two details matter for a designer. Delivvo takes 0% of what clients pay you, and every invoice and contract has a verification code. The approvals trail also answers the question "did the client sign off on version three?" without digging through email.

You can start on the free plan with no card. Read more about sending large files, client approvals and the client portal.

Next, look at contracts and e-signatures or how the CRM fits around it.

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