Despite being expensive and having long-term subscription plans that are difficult to cancel, Adobe has monopolized the creative design industry. I’ve curated the perfect list of free alternatives to all of Adobe’s top creative software applications so you can pursue your creativity without paying a penny.
1 Free alternative to Illustrator: Inkscape (free, open source)
Inkscape is a great alternative to Illustrator, offering a similar interface along with similar tools and capabilities. It is a free and open source program available for Windows, Mac and Linux. You’ll save hundreds of dollars over the course of a year if you switch from Adobe Illustrator to Inkscape.
The price point is certainly the biggest pro of using Inkscape, and it also has a lot to offer. You can create vector and raster bitmap images, and Inkscape can also be used to create logos and brands. While the save options focus on SVG formats, you can also save or export to many other formats.
The biggest difference between Illustrator and Inkscape is the lack of AI tools. Most of Illustrator’s AI tools help with things you can easily do by hand, like recoloring vector graphics. Not having access to AI isn’t necessarily a bad thing for a designer.
2 Free Photoshop Alternative: GIMP (Free, Open Source)
Photoshop is one of Adobe’s most popular programs, so there are many Photoshop alternatives available. GIMP is the best free alternative to Photoshop for a number of reasons.
GIMP offers many of the same tools and features as Photoshop; however, its interface is less intuitive than Photoshop’s. You can easily manipulate images with GIMP by creating composites, retouching or making digital artwork. Whether you’re a digital painter or a photo retoucher, GIMP has everything you need for free.
You can also use it to create interface graphics, models and frameworks for programming such as C++ and Python. It even offers basic desktop publishing features similar to InDesign. This free program offers a lot of use and can save you money instead of subscribing to a variety of Adobe software.
Photopea is another free Photoshop alternative. Photopea is ad-supported, but has a more intuitive interface that some people may find easier to use.
3 Free Lightroom Alternative: RawTherapee (Free, Open Source)
Although there are many software applications for editing RAW photos, there are not many of them that are free and offer excellent results. Enter RawTherapee, a free and open source photo editor available for Windows, Mac and Linux.
While you can edit other formats in RawTherapee, such as JPEG, you’ll get much better results when you edit your RAW images in RawTherapee.
The interface takes a little getting used to. There are many features available, such as exposure settings, shadows and highlights, tone equalizer, tone mapping, dynamic range compression, filters and adjustments. You can create beautiful photos with this software.
4 Free Alternative to After Effects: Linearity (Freemium)
Linearity is the best alternative for After Effects, but it can also be a great alternative for Illustrator—a two-in-one software situation. Linearity Curve is a vector-free drawing tool and comes with Linearity Move—an animation tool that’s similar to After Effects.
The free version of Linearity apps only allows a limited number of projects at once, but you can create great animations despite these limits.
One of the downsides of Linearity compared to After Effects is that Linearity Move does not support audio in its animations. This isn’t a problem if you’re creating animations for GIFs, UX/UI elements, or just having fun animating. Audio is expected to be available in the future.
Linearity’s free plan lets you edit only your three most recent projects. The paid plan starts at $9.99 per month. Overall, Linearity is a great free tool to replace most of your Adobe workflow.
5 Free Alternative to Premiere Pro: DaVinci Resolve (Freemium)
DaVinci Resolve is a freemium video editing software. The free version offers many video editing tools, but is somewhat limited by its export settings that are limited to 4K at 60 FPS, despite being able to handle higher import settings.
You may find fewer options for color grading, noise reduction, and AI tools in the free version of DaVinci Resolve, but for a free video tool, it certainly has its merits. You can purchase a perpetual license for the paid version, DaVinci Resolve Studio, complete with future updates included for $295.
Another alternative to Adobe’s video editing tools—both Premiere Pro and its mobile version, Premiere Pro Rush—is CapCut. CapCut video editing software is available on both desktop and mobile and offers an extensive free account or a CapCut Pro subscription.
For hobbyist video creators, CapCut is a good alternative to Premiere Pro, but DaVinci Resolve has more editing flexibility for an even better alternative.
6 Free alternative to InDesign: Scribus (free, open source)
There aren’t many affordable alternatives to InDesign. Other desktop publishing applications are usually as expensive as Adobe’s, such as QuarkXPress or Affinity Publisher—although these alternatives offer perpetual licenses, which are preferable to Adobe’s long-term subscriptions.
Scribus is a free and open source desktop publisher that is comparable to Adobe InDesign’s offerings. In addition to being available for standard Windows, Mac and Linus systems, it is also available for FreeBSD, PC-BSD, NetBSD, OpenBSD, Solaris, OpenIndiana, Debian GNU/Hurd, OS/2 and variants, and Haiku to provide all computer users have access to it.
Whether you’re designing page layouts, books, or resumes, Scribus and its tools make it the perfect free candidate for creating PDFs and other formats. Like InDesign, it offers support for CMYK color gamuts, spot colors, and ICC color management, so you can design high-quality layouts and send them to printers.
7 Free alternative to Adobe Express: Canva (Freemium)
Adobe Express allows you to quickly and easily create templates for use in social media, digital marketing or fun graphics projects. Including access to many AI tools in Express, Canva is the perfect alternative to this Adobe software.
Canva’s free plan offers layout tools, graphic and font libraries, some free AI tools, various export options, and animation tools. Canva is the leading tool for digital marketing, despite Adobe’s monopoly on other creative software.
The free plan is great, but the Pro plan is also affordable and offers more tools and export options. Canva routinely offers free Pro trials, so it’s worth giving it a real Adobe Express rival.
With Canva you can also create videos, some basic animations and document layout design, which means Canva can also replace programs like Premiere Pro, After Effects and InDesign along with Express.
8 Free alternative to Acrobat: Sejda (Freemium)
Although Adobe Acrobat is not considered a creative tool, there are many reasons you may need to use Acrobat in your creative workflow. If you’ve made a layout design in InDesign (or Scribus), you can open or edit it in a PDF reader. Most PDF readers—like Acrobat—require a subscription to edit PDF files and are often limited in what you can do beyond opening a file.
Sejda is a freemium PDF reader and editor. For the free version, you are limited to 200 pages or 50 MB per project and are limited to three tasks per hour. The free version is only available in the browser, while the paid version can be downloaded as a desktop application. Within these limitations, you can do a lot with your PDFs.
You can add text or images to your PDF—which you can also do in Mozilla Firefox’s PDF reader—but Sejda’s biggest selling point is the ability to edit existing text in a PDF and fill out forms.
With these free programs, you can build your own creative toolbox without adding to Adobe’s monopoly. Free alternatives not only provide great results for your needs, but also help developers create better products and give you creative freedom and control.