For many entrepreneurs and marketers, the go-to platform for getting great graphic design is Canva, and for good reasons. It’s easy to use with a very minimal learning curve, and of course, it’s free! However, when you look at other graphic design tools, it may pale in comparison. It can be more expensive in the long run, plus the free version offers limited features. If you’re in the market for something better, here are Canva alternatives you can consider.
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Canva Features and Pricing
Founded in 2012, Canva has been helping individuals, professionals, brands, and teams whip up fantastic designs. With over 100 million premium images, audio, and video graphics, this software is a favorite among teams.
Canva offers a user-friendly interface with a simple drag-and-drop feature. You don’t need a learning curve to start creating designs on this platform. Here are some of Canva’s top features:
- Unlimited content
- Branded templates
- Brand kit
- Animations
- Background remover
- Premium video
- Magic resize
- Content planner
- Design sharing
- Folders and storage
Pricing:
- Free plan
- Pro – $12.99 per month for one person
- Canva for Teams – $14.99 per month for five people
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12 Best Canva Alternatives You Must Try
If Canva isn’t what you want, try these top Canva alternatives for your branding and marketing visuals.
1. Penji
What makes Canva a cheaper option is that you create the designs yourself. But what if you don’t have the talent and skills to craft artful designs? While the platform has many tools to help you with this, nothing beats the help of a professional graphic designer.
This is what makes Penji the best Canva alternative. Our team of pro graphic designers with a wide array of skills and expertise will give you the exact designs you need. All you need to do is write your project brief and they’ll take care of the rest. No guesswork, 100% high-quality and original work.
Pros: Penji has a team of professional designers with the experience and expertise to craft amazing designs. All you need to do is write your project brief. The designs you’ll get will be uniquely yours; you won’t have issues with copyright or look like everybody else with Canva templates.
Con: It wouldn’t be cost-effective if you only need a few designs monthly.
See what Penji can do for your business. Click on this link to learn more.
2. VistaCreate
VistaCreate’s mission is to “give every human the freedom to create.” To date, the platform has helped over 10 million happy users. VistaCreate is an online graphic design tool that lets you quickly create blog, marketing, social media, and advertising designs. You’ll have access to 150,000+ ready-made animated and static templates.
This platform is for creators, social media managers, entrepreneurs, and designers who must make dazzling content. Moreover, VistaCreate also grants free plans to educational institutions and NGOs.
Pricing:
- Starter – Free
- Pro – $10 per month
Pros: It offers a more affordable premium plan, making it a budget-friendly Canva alternative. It also has a more generous number of free stock images and templates than Canva’s free version. It is backed by VistaPrint, letting you print your designs on physical products such as business cards and flyers.
Cons: Its asset library is smaller than Canva’s, limiting your design options. Additionally, it was created mainly for solo users, making Canva a better choice for team collaborations.
3. Snappa
If you want 100 percent royalty-free graphics, use Snappa for your non-commercial and commercial projects. You can get a head start with Snappa’s thousands of pre-made templates, resize your images, or remove backgrounds in one click. Add text, effects, and graphics in seconds, choosing from over 200+ fonts and 100,000+ shapes and vectors.
Snappa also offers 5,000,000+ free high-resolution stock photos if you want realistic non-cliche ones. You may also schedule your graphics by automatically sharing them on Twitter, Facebook, and other social media channels.
Pricing:
- Free – Three downloads per month
- Pro – $10 per month
- Team – $20 per month
Pros: Snappa’s interface is highly intuitive and beginner-friendly, making it suitable for non-designers. Also, its free version lets you download as much as you need, unlike Canva, which has restrictions.
Cons: Snappa has a smaller template selection, fewer advanced features, and limited collaboration options. It is also web-only, so you can’t use it to design on the go.
4. Piktochart
Eleven million users have joined the Piktochart community due to its all-encompassing graphic design software. Piktochart is one of the best alternatives for Canva, especially for brands and marketing teams. Create reports, videos, infographics, pitch decks, posters, and graphs with this design tool.
Piktochart takes pride in its easy-to-use interface that can whip up the most compelling infographics for your brand. This platform is undoubtedly a reliable graphic design tool with thousands of premium infographics templates.
Pricing:
- Free
- Pro – $14 per member per month
- Enterprise – Custom
Pros: Piktochart has specialized templates for creating infographics, reports, and data visualizations, something Canva doesn’t have. It also lets you import data from spreadsheets and effortlessly craft appealing charts and graphs.
Cons: Since Piktochart is niche-focused, Canva has better tools and features for creating a broader range of designs, like social media graphics, presentations, and marketing materials.
5. Stencil
Create beautiful branding and marketing visuals with this top Canva alternative Stencil. With over 1,300 unique templates and over 5,000,000 stock photos, Stencil lets you enjoy design creation with an easy-to-use design tool. Thinking about creating a typographical image? Choose from 5,700 Google web fonts!
Stencil also has 3,100,000 beautiful icons, which are royalty-free and perfect for personal and commercial projects. On top of these, you’ll also get easy add-ons for your browsers, quick Stencil imports, safe areas, and Bit.ly shares.
Pricing:
- Free
- Pro – $9 per month
- Unlimited – $12 per month
Pros: Designed for quick, on-the-go image creation, Stencil is the ideal tool for social media marketers who require fast turnaround times. Its minimalistic interface lets you design without distraction, making it suitable for beginners.
Cons: It lacks Canva’s more advanced features, such as animation, video editing, and complex layouts.
6. Visme
Visme is one of the most reliable Canva alternatives that has been around since 2013. This organization comprises a team of engineers, content creators, and passionate designers. This is your all-in-one graphic design tool for creating engaging and interactive pitch decks, reports and white papers, data visualizations, and branded content.
You’ll enjoy precise communication using Visme’s platform. Plus, you’ll have access to an asset management feature, allowing you to save your uploaded graphics in one place. Visme also strives to improve its platform, ensuring new features are added. Some are editing multiple text boxes, better zoom experience, improved rendering, and more.
Pricing:
- Free
- Starter – $12.25 per month
- Pro – $24.75 per month
- Visme for Teams – Custom
Pros: Visme offers more powerful tools for creating charts, graphs, and reports. It also has advanced features for crafting presentations, such as interactive elements such as animations, and clickable links.
Cons: Its advanced features may not be suitable for non-designers and beginners. Also, Visme’s premium plans can be more expensive than Canva’s.
7. Desygner
Deemed the most extensive platform with professional stock photos, Desygner is one of the top Canva alternatives. One of the top features of this graphic design software is making anything editable. For instance, you can edit a PDF the same way you would modify a Word Document.
You can also repurpose your content into various formats to diversify your marketing visuals. Resize any image into formatted graphics for display ads and social media. Achieve all these in just a few clicks.
Pricing:
- Free
- Pro – $4.95 per month
- Business $9.95 per month
- Enterprise – Custom
Pros: Desynger offers premium plans with competitive pricing. It even offers premium features that you can use for free. Its free stock asset options are broader than Canva’s.
Cons: While Canva’s templates number over 8,000, Desygner has fewer. It also lacks features like animations, video editing, and AI-powered design suggestions.
8. Fotor
Founded in 2009 and relatively older than Canva, Fotor has come a long way from an all-in-one photo editing suite to an AI editing tool. It recently launched many AI tools, such as AI background remover, AI photo enhancer, and AI image generator. Fotor has had notable media mentions from BBC, WebAwards, and Window Central, reassuring users it’s a top-notch Canva alternative.
Pricing:
- Free
- Pro – $3.33 per month
- Pro+ – $7.49 per month
Pros: Fotor’s advanced photo editing capabilities surpass Canva’s basic tools. Its AI-powered features are excellent for photo retouching, background removal, and one-tap enhancements.
Cons: Its focus is on photo editing and lacks design features for creating other visual assets. It also offers no option for collaboration.
Embrace the art of creation with Lunacy, a trailblazing graphic design tool that’s redefining the boundaries of digital design. Crafted for innovative minds, Lunacy brings the future of design to your fingertips. Whether you’re a budding designer or a seasoned pro, it is your go-to platform for designing everything from UI/UX to stunning graphics.
Boasting an extensive library of assets from Icons8, including vectors, icons, and photos, Lunacy streamlines your workflow. Plus, its multi-platform optimization and AI-powered tools ensure smooth performance, making design work feel like a breeze.
Pricing:
- Free
Pros: Lunacy is a standalone desktop application that allows you to work offline. It offers powerful vector editing tools, making it ideal for UI/UX designers.
Cons: Lunacy’s rich features make it more challenging to learn than Canva. Its ready-made templates are also limited.
9. Lunacy
Embrace the art of creation with Lunacy, a trailblazing graphic design tool that’s redefining the boundaries of digital design. Crafted for innovative minds, Lunacy brings the future of design to your fingertips. Whether you’re a budding designer or a seasoned pro, it is your go-to platform for designing everything from UI/UX to stunning graphics.
Boasting an extensive library of assets from Icons8, including vectors, icons, and photos, Lunacy streamlines your workflow. Plus, its multi-platform optimization and AI-powered tools ensure smooth performance, making design work feel like a breeze.
10. Adobe Express
Canva’s popularity stems from its accessibility as an alternative to industry-standard Adobe apps like Photoshop, Illustrator, and InDesign. If you’re serious about photo editing and graphic design, you’ll rely on Adobe products. Surprisingly, Adobe now makes a template-based Canva alternative called Adobe Express.
Both platforms provide simple ‘drag-and-drop’ editing features. While Adobe has fewer templates than Canva, hundreds of thousands still exist. The editor is more powerful and easy to use, too. In addition, Express integrates with other Adobe products, like the generative AI Firefly, Adobe Fonts, Adobe Stock, and Photoshop. This integration allows you to generate creative text effects, use fonts, and sync Photoshop edits.
Pricing:
- Free – 2 GB storage
- Premium – $9.99 per month
Pros: Adobe Express offers superior photo editing capabilities. It also has an extensive library of fonts, which is incomparable to that of Canva’s.
Cons: This Canva alternative is not for beginners and non-designers due to its higher learning curve. It also offers limited free features, making it a more costly option.
11. Pixlr
If cost is a concern, Pixlr is a solid alternative to Canva. It offers both a good free plan and super affordable paid plans. While rough around the edges, it’s fast becoming one of my favorite image editing suites.
Pixlr has five apps: Pixlr Editor, Pixlr Express, Pixlr Designer, Remove bg, and Batch Editor. While splitting different features into somewhat separate apps can be annoying, it makes Pixlr very user-friendly. Pixlr Designer is the most Canva-like because of the feature that lets you choose a template and customize it to fit your needs. But you can also open whatever you’re designing in Pixlr Editor or Pixlr Express.
Pricing:
- Free – Basic editing tools
- PIxlr Premium – $4.90 per month
- Pixlr Creative Pack – $14.99 per month
Pros: Pixlr is the alternative you need if you mainly edit photos. Its advanced features make it ideal for those who need in-depth image manipulation capabilities. You can also use many of its advanced tools without restrictions.
Cons: Since Pixlr focuses on photo editing, it lacks the pre-made templates Canva is known for. It also has no collaboration features and offers fewer stock resources.
12. BeFunky
If you’re mostly looking for a Canva alternative so you can edit photos and turn them into collages, whether for sharing to social media or even printing out, then BeFunky is well worth considering
Like Pixlr, BeFunky splits its tools across several apps. In this case, Photo Editor, Collage Maker, and Graphic Designer. Images you edit in the Photo Editor are available in the Collage Maker and Graphic Designer. Similarly, create a collage and save it to BeFunky, and you can use it as part of something in the Graphic Designer.
Pricing:
- Free – Basic editing tools
- Plus – $14.99 per month
Pros: Another photo editing tool that offers better features than Canva’s. It has a wide range of effects, an easy-to-use collage maker, and artistic filters. Its paid plans are more affordable, too.
Cons: It has limited design templates, no collaborative features, and fewer branding tools.
The Bottomline
If you want to DIY your branding and marketing designs, turn to these twelve best Canva alternatives. However, checking graphics licenses and royalties is recommended to prevent copyright issues.
If you want hassle-free graphic design without the time-consuming design process, turn to on-demand design services. These subscription-based graphic design companies cost more than these DIY tools. However, brands will enjoy unique, professional, and fast content and images created by professional graphic designers.
Why Choose Penji
Penji offers unlimited designs and revisions at fixed monthly rates. After submitting your design brief, expect to have the first draft within 24 to 48 hours. Plus, you’ll own all licenses without worrying about copyright issues. Watch this short demo video to learn more about Penji’s services.
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