If Adobe Photoshop is out of your budget, then you should find a free Photoshop alternative. Photoshop is an expensive software, and the new subscription-based service can be a turn-off, especially for beginners.
This article will list the best Photoshop alternatives to help you find a free solution to your digital editing needs. Some excellent options are available that can perform similar tasks and produce great results.
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What is Photoshop?
Adobe Photoshop is the industry-standard digital manipulation software. Photoshop allows you to edit photos as well as create graphic designs. It has revolutionized the way we interact with our images.
It has done this by allowing the user to select specific parts of the images for editing. Cutting out, resizing, and editing an area different from the rest of an image is a unique experience Photoshop brings to the user. This makes enhancing your photographs much easier.
On top of editing, Photoshop has many tools to manipulate and skew your images to make special effects. Thanks to this software’s continued development, only your creativity can limit the outcome of your photos and designs.
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What is the Best Free Photoshop Alternative?
Let’s now look at the options for the best free Photoshop alternative available today. Each program takes a different approach, so the top option may not be the best one for you.
Pick by the job you need doing. Affinity is the choice if you want a full professional editor on your desktop. Photopea is the choice if you want the Photoshop interface in a browser tab with nothing to install. GIMP suits deep, technical edits and Krita suits painting and illustration. Pixlr Editor and Adobe Express are for quick beginner edits and social graphics, and Photo Pos Pro is the simple all-in-one option if you are on Windows.
Affinity is the most capable free Photoshop alternative you can install. The suite used to cost real money as Affinity Photo, Designer and Publisher. Under Canva’s ownership it is now free for individuals, and the pixel, vector and layout tools sit in a single desktop app for macOS and Windows.
It is the closest thing here to a like-for-like Photoshop replacement. Affinity imports PSD files with their layer structure preserved, so you can open work a Photoshop user sends you, and it reads AI, IDML and DWG files too. Non-destructive editing is the default rather than a smart-object workaround, so adjustments, masks and live filters stay editable, and you can even save your undo history inside the file. We compare the two in more depth in our Affinity Photo vs Photoshop article.
The photo toolkit is deep. You get unlimited raster, vector and text layers, curves on RGB and on individual channels, spot healing, inpainting and clone stamp, a refine-edge workspace for hair and fur, over 30 blend modes with a live on-canvas preview, and liquify, mesh warp and lens correction filters. RAW Develop applies lens profiles and noise reduction, and HDR merge, focus merge and astrophotography stacking are built in alongside macros and batch processing.
There are catches worth knowing before you download. You need a free Canva account to install it. The generative AI tools, including Generative Fill and Generative Expand, only unlock on a paid Canva plan, so the free app has no AI. And there is no iPad version yet. It is also a full professional application, so if you only want to crop a photo and drop some text on it, Photopea or Adobe Express below will get you there in far fewer clicks.
Photopea is the best free Photoshop alternative you can run in a browser tab. Its design and workflow are more similar to Photoshop’s than any other alternative here. So, it is best for beginners, those who want to move to Photoshop later, or those who already know how to use Photoshop.
Photopea opens and saves PSD files, and it reads over 40 other formats including AI, PDF, SVG and Figma files. It also develops raw files from DNG, CR2, CR3, NEF, ARW, RW2, RAF and ORF, so you can set exposure, white balance and shadows before you start retouching. Layers, masks, layer styles, smart objects, adjustment layers, channels and paths are all there. The adjustments are not as high-end as Photoshop’s, but they still perform to a good standard.
It has AI too. Background removal is a single click, and you can describe a change in words and have Photopea replace part of the picture. Everything runs on your own machine rather than on a server, so your files never leave your device. The one downside is the display ads in the application, which is a small price to pay for free software. Many photographers prefer Photopea to GIMP purely because the workflow is quicker to pick up.
GIMP is another great free Photoshop alternative thanks to its open-source approach. By making the application an open-source software, GIMP allows you to make custom adjustments and changes to the program. You are then able to share these online. The main advantage of this is that someone may have already made a change that is needed for your specific editing style.
GIMP has also moved on a long way from the 2.x releases most tutorials were filmed in. GIMP 3.0 landed in 2025 and GIMP 3.2 followed in 2026, bringing non-destructive layers, vector layers you can restyle and transform without rasterising, and link layers that behave like Photoshop’s linked smart objects. The current release is GIMP 3.2.4.
The software has a wide selection of filters, textures, brushes, and more. These tools are equipped to work with photo editing or graphic design. The interface is fully customizable but can be hard for beginners to navigate, and there is one real gap for photographers: GIMP still cannot develop raw files on its own. You have to open them in darktable or RawTherapee first and hand the result over.
GIMP is the most popular free Photoshop alternative. It is taught in places where Adobe Photoshop is not affordable for a wide range of people. Thanks to its open-source approach, you can find many tutorials online on how to perform specific edits. We look at how closely it matches Photoshop in our GIMP vs Photoshop comparison.
Pixlr Editor is a free web-based application that is a Photoshop alternative. It is a stripped-back version of Photoshop, which includes a wide range of crucial photo editing tools. It includes adjustments as well as clone stamp and heal brushes.
A big positive is that the interface is simple and easy to navigate around. This is particularly relevant if you are familiar with Photoshop. If not, Pixlr Editor can be a good way to get familiar with the Photoshop interface. The trade-off is the free account. Pixlr’s cheapest paid tier sells itself on being ad free with unlimited saves, so expect both an advert and a cap on saves if you stay on the free plan.
In addition to basic Photoshop features, you will also find some auto photo editing tools. Auto Adjust, Auto Pop, and Auto Black and White are ideal for beginners to help with their edits. Be careful with the AI tools, though. Generative fill, AI noise removal, the background remover and the upscaler all run on credits, and a monthly credit allowance only comes with the paid plans. Treat them as a paid extra rather than part of the free package.
Adobe Express is not really a Photoshop alternative but is free and allows you to create and customize various graphic designs. You can use your photos and videos to create graphics ready for social media content, posters, and many more.
Adobe Express is a web-based application, so there is no need to download anything and no payment card is needed to open a free account. It only performs a few photo editing tasks, but the ones it does are the important ones. You can remove a background, crop, build a collage, run the Photoshop-powered adjustments and effects, and export a PNG with a transparent background. The free plan also gives you over 268,000 templates and more than 4,000 Adobe Fonts.
Adobe Express even has Firefly AI generation on the free plan, though it runs on a daily allowance rather than an unlimited one, and the paid plan swaps that for a monthly pool of credits. It is a great free Photoshop alternative if you are a complete beginner and you want to make simple photo edits, from adding text onto an image to combining a couple of different photos into one document. It is the wrong tool if you need pixel-level retouching, layers or masks.
Krita is an excellent free Photoshop alternative specifically for digital illustrators. It features brilliant brush controls, which some say are better than Photoshop. It is another open-source software that allows you to create your own tools as well as download some from the community.
Even though it is primarily for illustration, photographers can use this software for photo editing. This is not advisable for beginners, as you have to get creative with the tools you can access. It is also still very actively developed, with both Krita 5.3 and Krita 6.0 shipping updates through 2026.
Overall, Krita is a great free Photoshop alternative if you are a digital illustrator. There are unique features that will make your workflow and designs much easier. I suggest this program to anyone who uses the brush as their main tool in Photoshop.
Photo Pos Pro is another free Photoshop alternative, and the current version 4 is free for personal and commercial use. That commercial clause matters if you sell your images, because plenty of free editors stop at personal use only.
Photo Pos Pro aims to be an all-in-one photo editing software. This means you will be able to perform basic and more complex edits in the same program. It supports layers, masks, curves, scripts and raw files, and it includes a good background removal feature and an easy way to remove unwanted objects. You will also find an easy way to add frames or make greeting cards.
The program takes a while to get used to the interface. This learning curve can be a turn-off, especially as there are fewer helpful tutorials online compared to other software on this list. It is also Windows only. Mac users need a Windows emulator to run it, which is enough reason to pick Affinity or GIMP instead. For a Windows machine, though, Photo Pos Pro still functions as a good free Photoshop alternative.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is There a Free Version of Photoshop?
No. Every Adobe plan that includes Photoshop is a paid subscription. The free routes are the alternatives on this page, and Adobe Express is the only free Adobe app among them.
What Is the Best Free Photoshop Alternative in 2026?
Affinity. It is a professional desktop editor for macOS and Windows that Canva made free for individuals, and it imports PSD files with their layers intact. If you would rather not install anything, Photopea is the best browser-based option.
Can Free Photoshop Alternatives Open PSD Files?
Some can. Affinity imports PSDs with their layer structure preserved. Photopea both opens and saves PSD files and treats the format as its own. Pixlr Editor stores its projects as PXZ files, and Adobe Express is built around templates rather than layered documents.
Can I Use Free Photo Editing Software Commercially?
Usually, but it is worth checking each one. GIMP and Krita are open source with no restriction on commercial work. Affinity is free for individuals, with a separate route for companies. Photo Pos Pro states outright that it is free for personal and commercial use.
Which Free Photoshop Alternative Is Best for Raw Files?
Affinity, because RAW Develop applies lens profiles and noise reduction inside the same app. Photopea and Photo Pos Pro also read raw files. GIMP does not develop raw on its own, so open the file in darktable or RawTherapee first and hand the result to GIMP.
Conclusion: Free Photoshop Alternative
From this list, we can see that there are some great options to avoid paying for Adobe Photoshop. Each software has its unique approach and offers a different solution to photo editing in the absence of Photoshop.
If you only take one thing away, download Affinity. It is a professional editor that now costs nothing, it opens your PSD files, and it is the pick for most photographers reading this. If you would rather not install anything, open Photopea in a browser tab instead. If neither suits, our roundup of the best Photoshop alternatives covers the paid options too.
Thanks to the internet, there are many ways you can learn to use each software exactly how you want to. There is likely a video explaining exactly the actions you want to perform in each software. So, if you can’t justify paying for Adobe Photoshop, these free Photoshop alternatives will still allow you to create brilliant photo edits.
