Affinity image editing software now free

[Sharktooth]

Affinity has just announced that their latest image editing sofware will now be provided free.

That was a big surprise. I, like many others, were expecting that Affinity could move to a subscription model, like Photoshop. Instead, they're still going to provide new software for free. The only gotcha is that the new Artificial Intelligence tools will require a subscription to Canva. That's O.K. by me, since I don't have any burning desire to use AI.

Here's the link to the announcement on YouTube, that also describes some of the new features too.

For those of you not familiar with Affinity, they have been providing image editing software for several years now, and it is a low cost competitor to Photoshop. Affinity also includes Desktop Publishing as well as Drawing features, along with the image editing component. I've been using it for a few years now, and find it quite good.
Now that it's being provided for free, it will be a good alternative to Gimp, which is also free, but doesn't have the greatest user interface.

 

[koraks]

I gave it a spin last night when I read about its release. I think I'll keep using it; it seems to perform significantly better (faster) than GIMP for filter/adjustment layers and the masking procedures for these layers are also more effective and easy to use. The feature set/functionality is more limited to GIMP's, so I'd consider them complementary. For instance, Affinity's color management is rather crude.

 

[ezphotolessons]

Their Customer Service is abysmal.

 

[gbroadbridge]

My concern is that although it is free right now, I've been burnt in the past by similar promises that were 'amended' later and turned into subscriptions.

I have a perpetual license for all 3 affinity products at the moment, and don't think I'll migrate any of my work over to the new platform whose file formats are not backwards compatible.

 

[Don_ih]

I have a perpetual license for all 3 affinity products

I have the same thing. And, given my totally unsophisticated needs of the software, I'd be fine if they never even updated it.

 

[Hassasin]

My concern is that although it is free right now, I've been burnt in the past by similar promises that were 'amended' later and turned into subscriptions.

I have a perpetual license for all 3 affinity products at the moment, and don't think I'll migrate any of my work over to the new platform whose file formats are not backwards compatible.

Does not look like anyone will have a choice. This appears to have been part of the update to what you , I , and countless others, paid for. Canva will take Affinity login details and integrate. It's probably too fresh to see if this will have meaningful impact on those who have paid lifetime entry fee for the Affinity Suite.

Taking it further, first it looks like there is a deal between Affinity and Canva, one having acquired the other, or some sort of mutual integration. I'm not bothered by this at all, but will be if at some point later the money I put into Affinity will have become as having no value at all, or if I'll be forced to start paying (i.e. for Canva account). Affinity has been very at providing high quality design software for a long time at a fraction of expected price point. WIll this be a start of corporate greed? Time will tell.

If any of my worries will have direct link to use of Ai features and opting out will remain on teh table, without losing functionality of non-Ai version, then I'm good.

 

[Hassasin]

Well, I need to walk back my last comment, for now at least. This New Affinity as an all-in-one software, and could be an interesting proposition, especially for anyone into publishing, as all functions are integrated into one application. I think I'll get it to see what the difference is from the Suite.

There is a good chance this all-in-one is NOT same as stand alone software. Affinity had done in the past, offering older versions for nearly free, after newer version was already out. That approach gave users really cheap way of getting still a high quality software, even it was not the latest.

 

[Hassasin]

My concern is that although it is free right now, I've been burnt in the past by similar promises that were 'amended' later and turned into subscriptions.

I have a perpetual license for all 3 affinity products at the moment, and don't think I'll migrate any of my work over to the new platform whose file formats are not backwards compatible.

Affinity states full compatibility with V1 and V2.

 

[gbroadbridge]

Affinity states full compatibility with V1 and V2.

Sure, it can read them, but anything you save with the new version is not compatible with, and cannot be read with earlier versions.
So you are then trapped into the new version. And if it becomes subscription later, you have an issue.

Been there before.

 

[Hassasin]

Sure, it can read them, but anything you save with the new version is not compatible with, and cannot be read with earlier versions.
So you are then trapped into the new version. And if it becomes subscription later, you have an issue.

Been there before.

View attachment 410310

I have not checked with actual files but if this the case, then it is not full compatibility as they claim.

 

[gbroadbridge]

I have not checked with actual files but if this the case, then it is not full compatibility as they claim.

In their FAQ

 

[Alan9940]

I have a license to Affinity Photo 2, only, and have no use for the Designer or Publisher pieces. Thinking that the disk space hit for the new Canva suite would be significantly more than my current install of AP 2, I'm planning to stay where I am for now.

 

[retina_restoration]

My concern is that although it is free right now, I've been burnt in the past by similar promises that were 'amended' later and turned into subscriptions.

I remember when Google acquired Nik Silver Efex editing software and made it free, then DxO purchased it from Google and suddenly it was a product you had to pay for (which I did), but at least it was being updated for operating system changes, etc. However, DxO now updates it annually and so to stay current/compatible, you have to fork out another $99.99* USD every time.
I don't trust any software developer anymore. They will all eventually want to squeeze more money out of you (Yeah, I'm lookin at you, Adobe) and there's no avoiding it unless you abandon all software tools entirely. Believe me, I consider that a viable option sometimes. There's no such thing as truly free tools.

*the current price for the upgrade, up from about $70 in recent years.

 

[Hassasin]

This download ends up, after extraction, around 3.5 GB on Mac, vs. just under 3 GB each of V2 (so under 9GB total).

Next, New Affinity apparently requires Canva login to run, even without Ai use. I'm still struggling with the way it starts.

 

[Hassasin]

Now I can add New Affinity starts with Canva login, without it will not move ahead, so it appears. They ask to track usage data, which can be refused. That's as far as I got today.

There's going to be some interest in having an all-in-one design package.

 

[koraks]

his download ends up, after extraction, around 3.5 GB on Mac, vs. just under 3 GB each of V2 (so under 9GB total).

On Win11. It's just the new Affinity install; I had no prior Canva products on this machine.

 

[Sharktooth]

In their FAQ

View attachment 410311

Affinity V2 is able to read Photoshop files, and it's also possible to export V2 files as Photoshop files. If anyone has the new version of Affinity, see if you can export or save your Affinty file as a Photoshop file or a V2 file. This would allow you to create a compatible "backup" in a readable format.

 

[Sharktooth]

I just checked the system requirements for the new Affinity.

Here's the link https://www.affinity.studio/help/introduction-system-requirements/?query=system requirements

If you have a Mac, you'll need at least Catalina or newer. It runs natively on Apple Silicon or Intel.

For Windows it will run on 10 or 11. If you're still using 10 it needs to be a recent update.

 

[Hassasin]

I just checked the system requirements for the new Affinity.

Here's the link https://www.affinity.studio/help/introduction-system-requirements/?query=system requirements

If you have a Mac, you'll need at least Catalina or newer. It runs natively on Apple Silicon or Intel.

For Windows it will run on 10 or 11. If you're still using 10 it needs to be a recent update.

System requirements make sense. FIle after extraction for Mac before installation is about 3.5 GB. I'm on the new Tahoe 26.

 

[Hassasin]

OK it's clear on file type. Affinity Designer saves all work under one extension .AF and this cannot be opened by any other software. When I make adjustments of a .jpg file, when saving there is no file type choice at all only name and location.

Any manipulation done to a file remains under same .af extension. So it is easy to do vector/layout/pixel work in same window space, but it's no replacement for what V2 is capable of.

 

[Sharktooth]

OK it's clear on file type. Affinity Designer saves all work under one extension .AF and this cannot be opened by any other software. When I make adjustments of a .jpg file, when saving there is no file type choice at all only name and location.

Any manipulation done to a file remains under same .af extension. So it is easy to do vector/layout/pixel work in same window space, but it's no replacement for what V2 is capable of.

Affinity V2 has a "Save As" or "Save" menu option that only saves as the Affinity file type. To save as a different file type you have to use the "Export" menu option. When you "Export" an image file you'll get the option to save as other file types, such as jpg, psd etc.

 

[koraks]

when saving there is no file type choice at all only name and location.

Can't you select the 'Export' option instead?
(@Sharktooth beat me to it)

So it is easy to do vector/layout/pixel work in same window space

I think the fact that this happens all in basically the same workspace/domain brings an inherent challenge since pretty much everything else out there is natively either vector or raster, but not both. So there's no file format that natively supports both well enough. Sure, vector formats allow embedding bitmaps and the opposite is likely also true for some formats (PSD?), but that's likely a bit of a kludge internally.

 

[Hassasin]

OK, export does give all file choices (forgot about that entirely), so in that sense you can save to image file of your choice.

 

[Sharktooth]

I think I paid about $50 for the universal license of V2 a couple of years ago. I have that loaded on several of my Macs and Windows machines. It was money well spent, in my opinion. I've had absolutely no problems getting it loaded on all my machines, and getting updates. It also came with the desktop publishing, and drawing software components, but I've only used the drawing component once.

The only downside for me is that it won't work on my older Mac which I still use frequently with my old scanner. I paid a lot of money for Adobe Photoshop CS3 back in the day, but it doesn't work anymore on my old Mac after Adobe cut off support. That pissed me off to no end.

I"ll probably try out the new version of Affinity later, after the initial rush. Free definitely works for me.

 

[Hassasin]

I think I paid about $50 for the universal license of V2 a couple of years ago. I have that loaded on several of my Macs and Windows machines. It was money well spent, in my opinion. I've had absolutely no problems getting it loaded on all my machines, and getting updates. It also came with the desktop publishing, and drawing software components, but I've only used the drawing component once.

The only downside for me is that it won't work on my older Mac which I still use frequently with my old scanner. I paid a lot of money for Adobe Photoshop CS3 back in the day, but it doesn't work anymore on my old Mac after Adobe cut off support. That pissed me off to no end.

I"ll probably try out the new version of Affinity later, after the initial rush. Free definitely works for me.

I agree on V2, it's well integrated, updates keep coming and process is painless. And it also goes onto iPad for those few times when all I can use is it.