Affinity vs Adobe: what switching actually costs
Affinity is free now. This tool shows exactly how much you keep by leaving Adobe Creative Cloud — and the features you give up if you do.
Affinity suite
$0
Adobe All Apps / yr
$719.88
Keep over 5 yrs
$3,599
TL;DR — the cost comparison in one line:
Since October 2025 the Affinity suite is free, so the real question is no longer one-time price vs subscription — it is whether free Affinity covers your work. For photo editing, vector design and layout it does, and you keep the entire Adobe bill (about $720/yr on All Apps). For video, motion graphics, or a Lightroom-style cloud workflow it does not, and a hybrid setup or staying on Adobe is the smarter call. The calculator below gives you the number and an honest verdict.
Your Adobe setup
Everything updates live. Nothing is stored.
Switch and keep $3,599.40 over 5 years
Affinity Photo, Designer and Publisher cover everything Creative Cloud All Apps gives you for this use case — at $0. Over 5 years you avoid the entire $3,599.40 Adobe bill (1 seat).
Adobe / yr / seat
$719.88
Affinity total
$0.00
Money avoided
$3,599.40
Cumulative cost, year by year
| Year | Adobe (cumulative) | Affinity | Kept in your pocket |
|---|---|---|---|
| Year 1 | $719.88 | $0.00 | $719.88 |
| Year 2 | $1,439.76 | $0.00 | $1,439.76 |
| Year 3 | $2,159.64 | $0.00 | $2,159.64 |
| Year 4 | $2,879.52 | $0.00 | $2,879.52 |
| Year 5 | $3,599.40 | $0.00 | $3,599.40 |
Ready to drop Adobe? Line up the rest of your stack next.
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Affinity (covers your plan) priced at $0 — free since Canva's October 2025 release.
How the Affinity vs Adobe cost gap works
Adobe Creative Cloud is a pure subscription — you never stop paying. The All Apps plan runs $59.99/mo month-to-month, or an effective ~$49.99/mo if you prepay annually, which is roughly $600–720 a year per seat. Multiply by your team size and your time horizon and the number gets large fast: a four-person studio on All Apps spends well over $14,000 across five years.
Affinity used to fight that with a one-time perpetual license. Since Canva made the suite free in October 2025, the comparison collapsed: the Affinity line on the chart is a flat $0 forever while the Adobe line climbs every year. So the “break-even” is immediate — every dollar you would have sent to Adobe is money kept, the moment you switch. The only thing standing between you and that saving is whether Affinity does what you need.
What you give up by leaving Adobe
Free does not mean identical. Affinity covers roughly 85–90% of what most Photoshop, Illustrator and InDesign users actually do, but there are two hard gaps. First, video: Affinity has no Premiere or After Effects equivalent — none. If you cut video, you keep an Adobe seat or move to DaVinci Resolve. Second, cloud collaboration: there are no Creative Cloud Libraries, no real-time shared documents, and no Lightroom catalog with cloud sync. Teams that live in shared libraries feel this most.
The calculator above turns those two gaps into checkboxes. Tick either one and the verdict can never be a clean SWITCH — it drops to HYBRID (keep one minimal Adobe seat, do the rest in Affinity) or, for the cheap Photography plan, STAY.
Who should switch and who should stay
Switch: freelancers and students doing photo editing, vector art, and print/PDF layout. The All Apps or Single App bill disappears with no real workflow loss.
Hybrid: small studios and creators who need occasional video or share files in Creative Cloud Libraries. Move design work to free Affinity, keep one Single App or light Adobe seat for the gap. You still drop most of the spend.
Stay: photographers built around Lightroom’s catalog and cloud sync on the $9.99/mo Photography plan. It is already cheap and Affinity has no equal — this is the one case where the honest answer is to keep paying Adobe.
How I tested this
I run SubSaver and have paid for Adobe Creative Cloud for years, so this is not a clean-room comparison. After Canva made Affinity free in October 2025 I installed Affinity v3 (Photo, Designer, Publisher) on the same machine I use for client work and ran my actual pipeline through it for a few weeks: opening existing PSD and AI files, redoing two recent layout jobs, and exporting print-ready PDFs.
What held up: PSD files opened with layers intact, the Designer vector tools were a one-evening relearn, and Publisher handled a 12-page PDF without drama. What broke my flow: a couple of smart-object heavy files lost fidelity round-tripping back to a client on Adobe, and I genuinely missed Lightroom’s catalog for culling photos. The pricing in the calculator is Adobe’s published US rates (All Apps $59.99/mo, Photography $9.99/mo, Single App $22.99/mo) as of April 2026, cross-checked against my own invoices; Affinity is the $0 free release. Capterra ratings (Affinity Photo ~4.7/5) are pulled from public user data, not my own scoring.
Affinity vs Adobe at a glance
| Factor | Affinity (free) | Adobe Creative Cloud |
|---|---|---|
| Price | $0 (since Oct 2025) | $59.99/mo All Apps · $9.99/mo Photography |
| Photo editing | Affinity Photo (~4.7/5 Capterra) | Photoshop + Lightroom |
| Vector / layout | Designer + Publisher | Illustrator + InDesign |
| Video editing | None | Premiere Pro + After Effects |
| Cloud collaboration | None | CC Libraries + cloud sync |
| File compatibility | Opens PSD / AI (some round-trip loss) | Native |
Frequently asked questions
Is Affinity really free now?
Yes. Canva acquired Serif (the maker of Affinity) and made the entire Affinity suite — Photo, Designer and Publisher — free to download in October 2025, no account or subscription required. The single combined app released as Affinity v3. Canva has publicly said the free model is its long-term customer-acquisition play, though it has not ruled out paid cloud or enterprise tiers later.
What does Affinity not do that Adobe does?
Two big gaps. There is no Affinity equivalent of Premiere Pro or After Effects — Affinity has zero video editing. And there is no Lightroom-style photo catalog with cloud sync, and no Creative Cloud Libraries / real-time shared-document collaboration. If your work depends on any of those, the calculator pushes you to a HYBRID or STAY verdict rather than a clean switch.
Can Affinity open Photoshop and Illustrator files?
Mostly, yes. Affinity Photo opens most PSD files with layers intact, and Affinity Designer reads Illustrator AI files. Round-tripping complex files (smart objects, certain adjustment layers, advanced text) is where you can lose fidelity, so it is smoother for new projects than for handing files back and forth with Adobe users.
Will Canva start charging for Affinity?
Unknown. Canva has stated the free desktop apps are a long-term acquisition strategy, but whether it introduces paid tiers in 2026 or 2027 is genuinely uncertain. The likely monetization is through Canva Pro integration, cloud collaboration, or enterprise licensing rather than charging for the core desktop apps. The honest move is to get value out of the free suite now while the price is $0.
Is the Adobe Photography plan cheaper than switching?
Often, for photographers specifically. At $9.99/mo the Adobe Photography plan (Lightroom + Photoshop) is cheap, and Affinity has no real Lightroom replacement for catalog management and cloud sync. If that workflow matters to you, the calculator returns STAY — the few hundred dollars you would 'save' buys a worse workflow.
Do professionals actually use Affinity instead of Adobe?
Many do for image editing and layout. Affinity Photo scores around 4.7/5 on Capterra and is used by professional photographers and illustrators; Affinity Designer holds up well against Illustrator for vector work. The hold-outs are video, motion graphics, and teams locked into Creative Cloud Libraries — those are exactly the cases this tool flags as HYBRID or STAY.
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Pricing as of April 2026. Adobe figures reflect published US rates and may vary by region and promotion. Affinity is free as of Canva’s October 2025 release; pricing is subject to change. We are not affiliated with Adobe, Affinity, or Canva. Always confirm current prices before subscribing or switching.