Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Adobe vs Affinity
- Thread starter sparkie7
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
I switched over to the Affinity Suite years ago, while still working as a designer/developer full-time (so about 2015 - 2016) and never looked back. I didn't even inform my team that I was using Affinity instead of Adobe, and no one noticed any difference.
Of course as with all things, mileage may vary, but I've been happily Adobe free for years, without issue.
Of course as with all things, mileage may vary, but I've been happily Adobe free for years, without issue.
OP is referring to Photomator, not Affinity. Canva bought Affinity, Apple bought Photomator and Pixelmator.
Once a software becomes an industry standard, the devs rest on their laurels and jack up the cost. If you're in such industries, it's cost of doing business unfortunately. Not that Adobe was "cheap" prior to CC.
Sure, you can create a file in Affinity Designer and export it as an Illustrator file, but there are still some nuances the recipient may have trouble with.
Autodesk is similar to me, everyone insists on AutoCAD, which (as a non-engineer) is some of the worst software I've had the displeasure of using. At least Fusion360 is alright.
I tried to switch. But, to my dismay, it was too hard to change my workflow after 20+ years of using Photoshop 😤. Affinity is great! Alas... not for me.
I've been using Affinity since they released it (Designer/Photo). Had more than a decade of Photoshop under my belt at that point. I'd say it's the closest in terms of functionality to make the switch viable (unless you depend on actions/scripting) but it has its share of usability issues.
I think you may stumble across these when you work on a document and have to pick and group and manage a whole bunch of different layers frequently. Very finicky selection, click/drag- and focus issues that still drive me up the wall sometimes.
Macro recorder is not a patch on Photoshop's actions. No animation capabilities (and none planned, I believe), come to think of.
I prefer it overall for painting, especially in high bit depths/large canvases. Feels good, is fast and there's no "this tool needs conversion of color space or flattening the canvas" stuff to consider. I've also gotten very used to the menu system of AP so it's Photoshop which feels off to use now.
Having a capable vector drawing app as a sidekick and being able to toss a document back and forth between these two has also come in handy quite a bit and changed my working habits.
I think you may stumble across these when you work on a document and have to pick and group and manage a whole bunch of different layers frequently. Very finicky selection, click/drag- and focus issues that still drive me up the wall sometimes.
Macro recorder is not a patch on Photoshop's actions. No animation capabilities (and none planned, I believe), come to think of.
I prefer it overall for painting, especially in high bit depths/large canvases. Feels good, is fast and there's no "this tool needs conversion of color space or flattening the canvas" stuff to consider. I've also gotten very used to the menu system of AP so it's Photoshop which feels off to use now.
Having a capable vector drawing app as a sidekick and being able to toss a document back and forth between these two has also come in handy quite a bit and changed my working habits.
GIMP or Seashore are good enough for 95% of the population. No need to pay money and no need for subscription taxes.
Yes, Apple acquired Pixelmator.
while I do have affinity Photo, the one I use the most is DXO Photo Lab 8 with the NIK software bundle (V. 7).
Yes GIMP is very good and used to be free. I found it hard to understand coming from a decade+ of PS. Never heard of Seashore until just now.
I use the Adobe photography 20GB plan with LrClassic, Lr and Photoshop. LrClassic is my main photo app that I use 99% of the time, only use Ps when I need layers which is almost never.
I believe LrC will provide access to your photo library (including edits) once you cancel your subscription. You just cannot continue making new edits.
Obviously I could switch to an app such as affinity for Ps work, but LrClassic is in my veins after using it from day one so I will pay whatever they ask to continue using it. I used to be pro, but not anymore. I have a 200000+ LrC personal library.
There has been talk about Adobe price increase lately. If you switch to annual payment it can be worked around for now. I now still pay €9,99 per month and soon 119 per year. For what that brings me, I’d say it’s still fair as long as they iron out the bugs.
I believe LrC will provide access to your photo library (including edits) once you cancel your subscription. You just cannot continue making new edits.
Obviously I could switch to an app such as affinity for Ps work, but LrClassic is in my veins after using it from day one so I will pay whatever they ask to continue using it. I used to be pro, but not anymore. I have a 200000+ LrC personal library.
There has been talk about Adobe price increase lately. If you switch to annual payment it can be worked around for now. I now still pay €9,99 per month and soon 119 per year. For what that brings me, I’d say it’s still fair as long as they iron out the bugs.
What do you mean GIMP "used to be free"? It is free and always will be. Don't buy it from third-party parasites.
Used to subscribed Adobe CC (all apps plan) from 2018 to late 2022.
Trying to Adobe free, but due the clients demand for compatibilty and well known format, I need to going back, especially AE/PS/AI.
I have Affinity Suite tho, but only V1 so far and rarely used. I'm not to fond of Adobe software, they bloated AF, consume so much temporary scratch disk but here my current situation.
Trying to Adobe free, but due the clients demand for compatibilty and well known format, I need to going back, especially AE/PS/AI.
I have Affinity Suite tho, but only V1 so far and rarely used. I'm not to fond of Adobe software, they bloated AF, consume so much temporary scratch disk but here my current situation.
We made the incredible decision to ditch Adobe about 5 years ago and embrace Affinity Publisher/Designer/Photo! It was the absolute best move we could have made. You’ll experience a massive boost in performance on the same hardware. Sure, the learning curve can be a bit daunting, but the rewards are totally worth it! And the money we saved 
Preface: I've never used Adobe in a Prof setting.
Affinity Designer is totally-fantastic.
I haven't really tapped Affinity Publisher like I should; but it seems quite nice.
As with all software, it really doesn't matter what you use, but how you "talk" with the people who actually make the hard-copy.
I come from a CorelDRAW background, and the greatest hurdle was just getting the data to a format that the Printer's software understood.
Good communication is key.
From a non-professional standpoint. I recently purchased Affinity V2 Universal License for $88.49 which includes Photo, Designer and Publisher. I caught a black Friday deal over the holidays.
My last experience with Adobe Creative Suite was version 6 before they started the subscription crap. I had it on a Windows machine before I switched to MacOS. So it's really not a fair comparison but I like Affinity better. I was able to jump right back in where I left off with Adobe years ago because it's so intuitive. So far I've done some logos, some designs for my local environmental commission and I even started making a live action comic book just for fun. The three programs work seamlessly together. I can create a raster image in Photo and recreate it effortlessly in vector in Design. I'm just now learning Publisher which I will use for the comic book.
My rendering times are very fast but that has a lot to do with the GPU. I also love that I'm able to utilize my dual GPU setup with Affinity.
My last experience with Adobe Creative Suite was version 6 before they started the subscription crap. I had it on a Windows machine before I switched to MacOS. So it's really not a fair comparison but I like Affinity better. I was able to jump right back in where I left off with Adobe years ago because it's so intuitive. So far I've done some logos, some designs for my local environmental commission and I even started making a live action comic book just for fun. The three programs work seamlessly together. I can create a raster image in Photo and recreate it effortlessly in vector in Design. I'm just now learning Publisher which I will use for the comic book.
My rendering times are very fast but that has a lot to do with the GPU. I also love that I'm able to utilize my dual GPU setup with Affinity.
For working with Apple's Photos try looking into RAW Power and their newer app as well! They are the ones that worked on Aperture at Apple and is the closest thing to Aperture, for obvious reasons.
I moved lock, stock and barrel over the Affinity as soon as I knew about Designer. Photos came out shortly after and I have never looked back. V2 solves some of the issues V1 had but I mainly use V1 for everything since I need backward compatibility for Mojave (cMP) which can only run V1. I love all their apps!
If you need any professional tooling, I would say that Affinity is the only other option compared to Adobe. But it all depends on your workflow and what you are doing etc. Other options people have already mentioned.
The full power of Adobe Acrobat is Adobe Acrobat. The option that I prefer to use in place of Acrobat is PDF Expert, you can find in the Mac App Store. I like it better then the other app I was using for that functionality and it is a one time purchase, which is the only option to me.
I also still use Aperture for photos using Retroactive! Nothing like it but working on moving the whole workflow to RAW Power soon for modern camera RAW files etc.
Hope that helps.
I moved lock, stock and barrel over the Affinity as soon as I knew about Designer. Photos came out shortly after and I have never looked back. V2 solves some of the issues V1 had but I mainly use V1 for everything since I need backward compatibility for Mojave (cMP) which can only run V1. I love all their apps!
If you need any professional tooling, I would say that Affinity is the only other option compared to Adobe. But it all depends on your workflow and what you are doing etc. Other options people have already mentioned.
The full power of Adobe Acrobat is Adobe Acrobat. The option that I prefer to use in place of Acrobat is PDF Expert, you can find in the Mac App Store. I like it better then the other app I was using for that functionality and it is a one time purchase, which is the only option to me.
I also still use Aperture for photos using Retroactive! Nothing like it but working on moving the whole workflow to RAW Power soon for modern camera RAW files etc.
Hope that helps.
Does PDF Expert have an equivalent to Acrobat's output preview - an ability to check ink densities and overprints (and other print production tools)?
With having Affinity Publisher I would have full preflight before making the PDF in the first place. No real need for a separate preflight app.
For print production, Adobe Acrobat is considered the bare minimum if you have no other apps that do that kind of work.
Everything else that has prepress abilities are made for businesses and only have subscriptions. Many that are doing prepress go for Foxit, PACKZ or ArtPro+ (ArtPro+ makes Adobe look cheap and lacking LOL). I just needed good solid PDF editing abilities and a pay once option, not prepress features.
I found it an upgrade from the older version of PDFpenPro that was taken over by Nitro and I wasn't impressed with the new owners or the app compared to PDF Expert.
There are over 100 PDF apps from cheap nothings to ArtPro+ which is considered the gold standard with a price to match it and there may be some options that I missed that might have print production tools in a cheaper package. Just too many to sort through for my limited needs for just editing PDFs.
There is also other Mac apps that do just the print production part but I have lost the links to those. They are out there somewhere I just don't remember exactly where at the moment. Also, some companies have you install a preflight app they made just for that purpose, before you send them the files from that app: https://accuformprint.com/online-tools/pdf-preflight/index.html.
Thank you for the detailed reply (and yours too gilby101), most useful.