13 Alternatives to Photoshop

Adobe Photoshop is the gold standard for photo editing software. Coupled with its sister program, Lightroom, it's a powerhouse of a program. If you're a serious photographer, you've either used it or you likely want to. But it's not free, nor is it particularly cheap. Adobe has a monthly subscription, which is what I have, which is costing me about $16 Canadian a month, which is almost $200 per year. That adds up. 

There are alternatives and Creative Blog has an article that describes thirteen of them. Some are free (GIMP, Paint.net), others quite expensive (Corel PhotoPaint), and most of the rest are reasonably priced.

As for myself, I'm sticking with Photoshop for now, but if I had to switch to something else it would almost certainly be GIMP, which I have used occasionally in the past and has more features than I am ever likely to need.

A free, open-source alternative to Photoshop that's been around for donkey's years, GIMP stands for GNU Image Manipulation Program. Today it's available in versions for Linux, Windows and Mac.

GIMP offers a wide toolset, similar to Photoshop in many ways, and is a great option if you're looking for a no-cost image editor. The interface differs somewhat from Photoshop, but a version of GIMP is available that mimics Adobe's look and feel, making it easier to migrate over if you're ditching Photoshop.

The full suite of tools is available here – everything you're accustomed to is within easy reach, including painting tools, colour correction, cloning, selection, and enhancement. The team that oversees development has worked hard to ensure compatibility too, so you'll be able to work with all the popular file formats without any trouble at all. You'll also find a very capable file manager built in, along similar lines to Adobe's Bridge.

Overall, this is a great option whether you've either got a limited budget, or want to move away from Photoshop for other reasons.