Affinity is a creative suite originally developed by Serif Europe and bought by Canva. It was composed of three very well-known tools: Affinity Photo, Affinity Designer, and Affinity Publisher. It allowed users to edit photos and create designs and page layouts from a single suite of tools. But now, starting from October 2025, Affinity is changing. It is not really a suite anymore, but a whole program offering all the tools you need for your creativity.
Originally a paid software, Canva made Affinity totally free, offering users a new way to access a premium product without any costs. You can use Affinity on your Windows computer or your Mac. You can even download iPad apps for Affinity Photo, Affinity Designer, and Affinity Publisher, for free.
The new interface, designed by Canva, allows users to use separate workspaces depending on what they need to work on. Easy to use, it offers menus like any other creative tool does, with the same layout. Tools are grouped on a vertical bar on the side, and when you open one, the configuration settings are displayed on the right side.
This renewed version of Affinity is really a great tool for anyone in design and was developed to compete with even the Adobe suite. As a matter of fact, you can even open PSD files from Adobe Photoshop with Affinity.
Why Should I Download Affinity by Canva?
Affinity by Canva was launched in October 2025 and offers a new competition to the famous Adobe Creative Suite (Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Illustrator, Adobe InDesign). It is composed of three different workspaces: Vector editing (Affinity Designer), Raster editing (Affinity Photo), and Desktop publishing (Affinity Publisher). All three original tools are united into a single interface, but if their functionalities are still there, their names are now sadly out of the equation.
Adding to that, Canva included another feature that Canva users are already familiar with: Canva AI. With it, you can remove background, generate objects in pictures, or generate images. The full usage of the AI tools requires a subscription. But that’s not all. Affinity also allows you to export your file directly into Canva, to use all of its specific features.
On top of the window, you’ll see the workspace menu. It allows you to change the layout depending on your work. Simply click on one of the options: Vector, Pixel, Layout (for page layout), and Canva AI. Changing the workspace also changes the tools that are available for you to use on your project.
But that’s not all! If you like to use different tools from vector, pixel, or layout, but don’t want to change workspace every time, Affinity allows you to create a personalized workspace. You can call it what you want and add any tool you need, regardless of their original workspace! Just click on the three dots at the end of the workspace menu, name your new workspace, select each tool you need, and place them as you like on the sidebar!
The fact that Affinity is now free, added to this profound personalization function, offers users a really great tool for creativity and design.
Is Affinity by Canva Free?
Yes, you can use the program for free, and you’ll be able to access all the design and editing features. The only paid parts are the AI functionalities, which require a subscription to be used. Even if it is free, you will be required to create an account to use the program.
What Operating Systems Are Compatible with Affinity by Canva?
Affinity by Canva is available for Windows and macOS users. You can download it by following our links (direct to the official website).
For the moment, the old iPad apps for Affinity Photo, Affinity Designer, and Affinity Publisher are still available, and they are free to download. However, they will only be able to open old Affinity files (not the new ones). The developers’ team is working on a single Affinity iPad app, but no release date is available yet. You can download the separate iPad apps by following our links to the separate Affinity tools (just above).
What Are the Alternatives to Affinity by Canva?
In the world of creative suites, Adobe is the leader. With its Adobe Creative Cloud subscriptions, you can access well-known software such as Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Illustrator, Adobe InDesign but also Adobe Premiere Pro, and more. Design, photo editing, image creation, AI generation (with Adobe Firefly), page layout, PDF edition, video, all is possible… but for a price. However, some Adobe tools are free (without ads), such as Adobe Photoshop Express, Adobe Acrobat Reader, Adobe Express, and Adobe Firefly (to some extent). You’ll just need a Creative Cloud account to use them (also free).
Smaller than Adobe, but with a free offer, Photopea is first a photo editing software. But with the addition of Vectorpea, design is also available. The small suite is available online only (nothing to download or install on your computer). But that means that it is compatible with any operating system, as it only requires a browser to work. The free version displays ads on the side of the interface, but you can access all features. With Photopea, you can even open PSD, PDF, and RAW files.
PixLR is a direct competitor to Photopea as it is also free an also online, but you can also download the mobile apps for Android and iOS. It offers an advanced photo editor (Pixlr Editor), an AI photo editor (Pixlr Express), a designer for templates and animation (Pixlr Designer), an AI background eraser (Remove Bg), and a bulk photo editor (Batch Editor). You just need to choose which tool you want to use. The free version displays ads. To access all the AI tools that Pixlr now offers, you will need a subscription.
