Adobe has long been the leading maker of software for creators with tools including Photoshop, Premiere Pro, Illustrator, and many others. With monthly plans starting around ten dollars per month for individual programs or around 55 dollars per month for their Creative Cloud Suite, those costs can add up throughout the year. Coming up, I’ll guide you the best free alternatives for 10 of Adobe’s most popular programs that will help you get the job done without breaking the bank, most of which are available for Windows, Mac, and Linux.
Photoshop Alternatives
GIMP
The raster graphics editor Photoshop is perhaps the most well-known of Adobe’s products. While the feature set is impressive, just like most of Adobe software, it’s quite honestly overkill for most people. The absolute best free alternative to Photoshop is GIMP. Despite its goofy name, this professional quality cross-platform image editor is packed full of so many features you likely won’t miss using Photoshop. It includes the ability to work with layers, tons of filters and effects, numerous drawing tools, and a whole lot more. It supports most of the popular file formats including Photoshop PSD files. This online image editor works in any web browser and may be more suitable to those of you that want a layout that more closely resembles Photoshop. It’s also 100% completely free.
Illustrator Alternatives
Inkscape
The vector graphics editor Adobe Illustrator is used by designers to create diagrams, illustrations, logos, charts, and other types of art. The key advantage to vector graphics is they’ll never lose their quality when scaled up or down. The best free alternative to Illustrator when working with vector graphics is Inkscape. It includes a massive set of tools for object creation and manipulation and is 100% compliant with the SVG file format, making it an excellent option for file generation and editing. When getting started with Inkscape, I’d recommend that you check out the useful tutorials on their site.
Premiere Pro Alternatives
DaVinci Resolve
Adobe Premiere Pro is a timeline-based and non-linear video editing program that is widely used by creators of YouTube videos and content found on other services. For this one, I’ll recommend two alternatives to Premiere Pro. First of which is DaVinci Resolve. When compared with our other pick, it does have a steeper learning curve. This high-quality video editor has been used by professionals to edit many popular TV shows and movies. It supports multicam editing with advanced trimming features and supports most file formats. With its Fairlight tools built in, it offers tons of options for mixing and editing audio. The free version of DaVinci Resolve will be all that most people would ever need. If you need additional features including a dense noise reduction and multi-user collaboration, DaVinci Resolve Studio will cost you a one-time fee of 295 dollars.
Shotcut
Another alternative to Premiere Pro with an easier learning curve than DaVinci Resolve is Shotcut. This open-source video editor is great for beginners, includes a ton of features, and is 100% free. It supports resolutions up to 4K, includes various audio and video effects with support for most of the popular media formats.
Lightroom Alternatives
RawTherapee
Adobe Lightroom is a non-destructive photo editing tool and management system that supports working with raw image formats. For this one, I have two free alternatives to share with you. First of which is the open source RawTherapee. As the name suggests, it supports working with raw image files along with most other image formats. Its interface has improved quite a bit over the last few years and allows for non-destructive editing that will keep the original image separate while editing, saving the edited image as a new file.
Darktable
Another excellent alternative to Lightroom that’s popular with some people is Darktable. It’s also open source, supports raw files and most image file formats, and offers non-destructive editing so your original images are never modified.
After Effects Alternatives
Blender
Adobe After Effects is a popular tool for creating motion graphics and visual effects. It’s widely used in the post-production process of filmmaking, television production, and video games. While no free alternative can truly match the feature set of After Effects, many professionals do opt for using Blender instead to create 3D visual effects and animated graphics. It’s one of the most impressive open source programs available. Instead of directly comparing it to After Effects, I like to think of it as an all-in-one production suite. It includes tons of tools for creating motion graphics, has a compositor, and also has an easy-to-use video editor built in.
Audition Alternatives
Audacity
Adobe Audition is a digital audio workstation that’s used for recording and mixing audio. Its popular use cases include video post-production, podcasts, and restoring audio. At this time, the best free alternative to Audition is Audacity. I say at this time because, as I’ve mentioned in other videos, a couple of years back Audacity had some issues that upset their community. Thankfully, those issues have been resolved. Audacity is open source, offers various themes to change the look, and includes just about every feature you would ever need. It supports most of the popular audio file formats and offers plugins that can increase the functionality while using it.
Acrobat Alternatives
Adobe Acrobat includes a set of tools to view, create, and edit PDF files. This program, out of all mentioned in this blog, is the one I probably get the most questions asking: “Is there a free alternative?” Sadly, the short answer is no. There are no free alternatives to Acrobat with all its features. But I can offer a solution that I’ve recommended to many people. First, download and install the free version of Foxit PDF Reader. This will let you view, fill in forms, annotate, and sign PDF documents. If you ever need a tool not found in Foxit PDF Reader, go to the website tools.pdf24.org.
InDesign Alternatives
Scribus
Adobe InDesign is a desktop publishing and page layout designing software that is used to create magazines, posters, brochures, flyers, books, presentations, and so much more. The best free alternative for those that don’t want to pay for InDesign is Scribus. It offers just about every feature that you’d ever need, including color profiles, font management, and supports vector drawing tools.
Express Alternatives
Canva
Adobe Express has been gaining in popularity over the last couple of years. The web app is an all-in-one solution to edit photos and videos and create designs. A better alternative to Express that is available with both free and paid plans is Canva. It’s also web-based and can be used in any browser. It includes thousands of pre-designed templates to help you out or provide inspiration when getting started on a project. Also included is a simple-to-use free online photo editor along with a free online video editor that’s great for small projects. The free plan for Canva may be suitable for many people. For those needing additional features, their Pro Plan is around 120 dollars per year.
Animate Alternatives
Synfig Studio
Adobe Animate is used to create 2D animated content for games, cartoons, TV shows, apps, and other interactive content that can quickly be published to multiple platforms. The best free alternative to Animate is Synfig Studio. This open-source program provides a great set of tools to produce high-quality 2D animations. It offers layer support with various types of filters along with vector tweening to save time from drawing each and every frame. Synfig Studio, just like many of the free alternatives mentioned, depends on the donations of its users. So if you can afford to throw a few bucks their way, I’m sure they would appreciate it. Otherwise, you can still download and use these programs absolutely free.
