Free software this advanced, owned by Canva, is too good to be true. This is step one in Affinity's enshittification.
Here is how platforms die: first, they are good to their users; then they abuse their users to make things better for their business customers; finally, they abuse those business customers to claw back all the value for themselves. Then, they die.
Free software this advanced, owned by Canva, is too good to be true. This is step one in Affinity's enshittification.
Agreed. There’s a lot about how free and great it is, but for a major version change all it seems to have is paid AI features. I do notice that they don’t talk about designer, photo, and...
Agreed. There’s a lot about how free and great it is, but for a major version change all it seems to have is paid AI features.
I do notice that they don’t talk about designer, photo, and publisher, though, so maybe they are merging them all into one product?
As bad as Gimp may be, open source software is one tool that cannot be taken away from me. It’s a feature I wish more people would value.
I don't know how they're going to make money on AI subscriptions. Making it free just sounds like they're desperate to take market share from Adobe (and we absolutely need that) by any means...
I don't know how they're going to make money on AI subscriptions. Making it free just sounds like they're desperate to take market share from Adobe (and we absolutely need that) by any means necessary and they'll try make it profitable later.
I do notice that they don’t talk about designer, photo, and publisher, though, so maybe they are merging them all into one product?
This was the big thing for me. Even in Affinity 1 (which is all I paid for) Designer and Photo already felt like two sides of the same coin, so it doesn't surprise me they've gone the route of making it one thing.
Counterpoint : Davinci Resolve is both a good color grading tool (and was use in actual blockbuster movie) and a competent video editor with non trivial feature features (like multicam), and it's...
Free software this advanced [...] is too good to be true.
Counterpoint : Davinci Resolve is both a good color grading tool (and was use in actual blockbuster movie) and a competent video editor with non trivial feature features (like multicam), and it's offered for free.
But I still agree with you in that it's clearer how Blackmagic Design makes money: there's a "studio" version of Davinci with feature that is realistically out of reach and/or useless for regular consumer (120fps at 32K, multiple GPU, remote scripting,...). There's also a wide range of hardware that Blackmagic sells.
I own Davinci Resolve (DR) Studio and it has some features which are useful for non professional users, mainly extra codec support. I think the free version only supports h264, and not HEVC. That...
I own Davinci Resolve (DR) Studio and it has some features which are useful for non professional users, mainly extra codec support. I think the free version only supports h264, and not HEVC.
That being said, DR is not a typical enshittifaction story. They have a very clear, very open business goal: The software is free, because they sell you the hardware to use it properly with. Even for professional software, DR Studio has a one time 300 USD ish price that gives you an actual lifetime license, and you get it with even the cheapest hardware editing keyboard they sell, which is like 400 USD.
The company behind it makes money by selling hardware to edit on, cameras, and instructional material like courses on how to use both with Davinci Resolve. This is different from Affinity V3, which, aside of the AI subscription, has no monetization.
Either Canva is banking on enough people subscribing for AI tools, or they're banking on this offer being so good it gets people off competitors. But even then, getting people off competitors and onto Affinity is only step 1 of the enshittification process, because there is no way to make it profitable in the current state.
I'm pretty pessimistic about this. I bought a Universal V2 license because I want to own my software, and I was happy to support one of the few companies that hadn't moved to software...
I'm pretty pessimistic about this. I bought a Universal V2 license because I want to own my software, and I was happy to support one of the few companies that hadn't moved to software subscriptions. Sure it's only for AI features now, but how long until they start locking more major features behind the sub? How long until the nag screens become more aggressive, or "sponsored content" starts making its way in?
I've made a backup of the final V2 installers, and I may just end up using them indefinitely. I've seen how this goes far too many times before to believe it'll be any different here.
I share your pessimism. Unfortunately for me I made the mistake of buying them through the Mac App store, so I've only got installers until they pull them down or Apple stops allowing downloads...
I share your pessimism. Unfortunately for me I made the mistake of buying them through the Mac App store, so I've only got installers until they pull them down or Apple stops allowing downloads due to incompatibility with later operating systems. I'm just going to uninstall them and return to using GIMP and Inkscape, myself. I really appreciated some of the stuff that Designer was doing, but not enough to swap to V3.
I use Affinity every day, it's been my go to as a professional graphic designer. Downloaded V3 (or, "Studio") yesterday and, well, I have some thoughts. I really don't like the new logo. It's easy...
Exemplary
I use Affinity every day, it's been my go to as a professional graphic designer. Downloaded V3 (or, "Studio") yesterday and, well, I have some thoughts.
I really don't like the new logo. It's easy to be smarmy and say it's very "canva-esque", and I generally don't hate Canva, but that's what comes to mind. Replaced the app icon in my dock because the green was just too garish. The Muse rebrand (MuseScore, Audacity) comes to mind.
The UI is both a step forward and a step back. Custom Personas (sorta like modes, except in Publisher where the other apps were also Personas, it's complicated) is hoewever massively appreciated and something I've been asking for for years.
The coloured icons and tools from V1 and V2 are gone. This is a huge usability problem for me, I used colour to glance at the tools and find them quickly.
The Export dialogue has been massively improved and is - as far as I can tell - also much faster. As someone who does a lot of print and preflight, this is nice to see. Canva has never been a good steward when it comes to print handoff, so I'm hoping this is indicative of a larger trend.
Some much needed features are finally here. Namely, Image Trace and Macros (Actions in Photoshop). Live Filters are also no longer constrained to Affinity Photo, which is nice to see. The new Glitch filter is also very strong, and Blend as well as full scripting is coming in a free update. That's good to hear, and I have no doubts that they can deliver.
All three apps are now in one. This is fine to me, anyone with eyes knew this was coming since Studio Link added the other two apps into Publisher, and all file formats were always feature complete. "Multi-page" being just a checkbox feels... weird though.
Many QOL things like quick hiding of guides and grids are also nice to finally see.
The Canva AI workspace is not intrusive and while I'd rather shit in my hands and clap than use it, the first thing they show you in the "A look at the new Affinity" video is how to turn it off. Good on you.
The New Document dialogue is unquestionably worse and doesn't open to the paper size picker by default, with no way to change this. I'll be filing a feature request.
No light mode is a basic UX failing, especially since V2 and V1 had that since day one.
Transfer of my settings from V2 didn't work properly, and I had to recreate my beloved workspace from scratch. I also wish I could remove the big A from the title bar, which serves no purpose except to take up space.
I didn't test the AI features, but object segmentation from V2 is still available for free if you download the free model in settings. It's not any better, though.
The elephant in the room is of course the pricing model. But... I'll be honest, I don't mind it. Affinity (and Serif, their original company) have always been very upstanding and trustworthy. Hell, they even still support their Pre-Affinity-1 apps if you have them. This to me reads more like the Davinci Resolve pricing model - basic version for everyone, full version for professionals if you need it - and while I wish I could pay once and be done with it, the only features gated behind payment are the AI ones, and that's okay. I really think the animosity here comes from Canva being behind this - and I get that, but, come on. Aside from the amount of garbage they've empowered overconfident high schoolers to make and the pain they've inflicted upon print shops the world over, their intentions read pure to me. They want to compete with Adobe. This is the most compelling Adobe alternative ever, and it's god dam free. Plus, you can turn off telemetry, and it doesn't phone home on startup, I checked.
All in all, 7/10 update, give me back my coloured icons.
I think that’s part of the reason I’m worried. Going free is a tactic that means they’re going to have to make up that cash somewhere else (or some other time), rather than just providing a...
their intentions read pure to me. They want to compete with Adobe.
I think that’s part of the reason I’m worried. Going free is a tactic that means they’re going to have to make up that cash somewhere else (or some other time), rather than just providing a product that is genuinely better than adobe and charging for major updates. I’ve seen too much enshittification of freemium software to be optimistic about this.
Plus, you can turn off telemetry, and it doesn't phone home on startup, I checked.
That’s pretty awesome, certainly a selling point for me compared to the adobe suite.
I really think people are too hung up on the "free" thing. Affinity isn't and won't be their primary money maker, even if they did monetise it monthly, and to Canva - a VC backed private company...
I really think people are too hung up on the "free" thing. Affinity isn't and won't be their primary money maker, even if they did monetise it monthly, and to Canva - a VC backed private company that's very successful in the B2B space - 50 bucks once per user versus 0 bucks once per user probably doesn't much matter in the grand scheme of things (let alone that after-sales support is expensive and since it's free they can essentially cut that now). Serif as far as I know didn't have any major backers or sponsors, they did need the money, but Canva probably doesn't considering it sells volume licenses to very fragmented and huge businesses like ReMax who just throw it to their employees who use it to make their more or less style guide compliant graphics.
This is true, but that is less relevant considering they build that trust before Canva bought them. The change to this freemium/subscription model is the first big thing that has happened under...
Affinity (and Serif, their original company) have always been very upstanding and trustworthy.
This is true, but that is less relevant considering they build that trust before Canva bought them. The change to this freemium/subscription model is the first big thing that has happened under Canva. To me that signals very clearly a change in focus and direction, in turn that means that past behavior shouldn't weigh that heavily.
So far, it looks like they haven't done anything outrageous and this version under the new model is fairly solid. Which I'd actually expect it to be if they want to retain any customers. The question now is how that will develop in the future as it can go in different ways including what a lot of people fear, slow and steady enshitifaction.
It seems sketchy: https://merveilles.town/@lrhodes/115465594958403533 https://www.reddit.com/r/Affinity/comments/1ol1qtw/downloaded_the_affinity_app_opted_out_of_all_ai/ And I see comments that...
Plus, you can turn off telemetry, and it doesn't phone home on startup, I checked.
I can confirm the opposite. If you go into App Settings > Miscellaneous > Send usage data to Affinity and turn that off, as far as I can tell it won't phone home. Yes, you need to log in when you...
I can confirm the opposite. If you go into App Settings > Miscellaneous > Send usage data to Affinity and turn that off, as far as I can tell it won't phone home. Yes, you need to log in when you first set up the app, but after that it works fine even if you're offline, or block Canva with your firewall.
Here's a screenshot from my firewall blocking all connections that Affinity tries to make, and an open file to show that it works just fine. (I don't recommend you do this though, it'll break auto-updates)
Today I've seen people on Reddit say they got the activation screen again after using V3 for just one day. And more people are saying that activation doesn't last more than a year. If you're a...
Today I've seen people on Reddit say they got the activation screen again after using V3 for just one day. And more people are saying that activation doesn't last more than a year.
If you're a professional designer and have permanently migrated to V3, I would at least make .tiff backups regularly and don't allow the software to update automatically. When an update is offered, wait for a good while and let others be the guinea pig until it seems safe.
There's a lot of eye rolling wrt how seriously some people take this stuff, but people my age who've been fucked over by Adobe time and time again know how ugly it can get. It's good to stay a little paranoid when your livelihood is at stake.
How about the claim that activation only lasts for one year at a time? I couldn't find a proper source for it but it's another thing that feels sketchy. I haven't installed V3 yet but if I do, I'm...
How about the claim that activation only lasts for one year at a time? I couldn't find a proper source for it but it's another thing that feels sketchy. I haven't installed V3 yet but if I do, I'm definitely going to disable auto-updates to prevent the type of extortion behaviour we recently saw from Adobe ("Here's our new utterly shitty TOS. Accept the terms or you'll lose access to your unfinished work").
Having to periodically renew activation means they have already built that in, unfortunately. If that is the case, I probably won't install V3 at all. I'm completely done with corporations that are planning to make me suffer at some obscure future time.
This has been a massive bummer. New product contains an AI chatbot that cannot be disabled (or so I have been told, maybe at least it requires a subscription for it to bother you), I specifically...
This has been a massive bummer. New product contains an AI chatbot that cannot be disabled (or so I have been told, maybe at least it requires a subscription for it to bother you), I specifically bought V2 to support a company with one-time purchase costs, no subscriptions, and reasonable licensing, all for them to throw all that goodwill away by enshittifying through acquisition, and now, AI and subscription infiltration.
It was a good run. I am sticking with my v2 as long as possible and just dread the day they no longer activate or run after some future OS update.
I don't even care about the "promises" they're making to v2 users- because I've seen too many companies eventually break those promises. There is NO WAY it will be this way permanently going forward. They're starting to boil the frog and it's only a matter of time. Canva's wishes will eventually take priority over any of ex-Serif's voices, even if it takes five years to get there. They'll smile and welcome you in now and stab you in the back later.
It's the beginning of the end for Affinity and I will have no part in it, nor will I recommend them to anyone ever again, at least not freely, only rarely and begrudgingly. They are the lesser of two evils now I suppose because F Adobe til kingdom come, but still, the only way I would mention them is if someone wanted to avoid Adobe.
Edit: Also, lack of backward compatibility with v2, which to me is a clear (negative) way of trying to incentivize upgrades leaves a really bad taste
I installed it. The account making process used email address for the one-time-code to login, no password. The main three apps (vector, pixels, and layout) are all rolled into one program. There...
I installed it. The account making process used email address for the one-time-code to login, no password.
The main three apps (vector, pixels, and layout) are all rolled into one program. There is a fourth item for some canvAI thing but you can actually hide it by clicking the three dots and unselecting that item. Leaving the UI clean of any upsells for the time being.
I would expect it to be, for now anyway. They do want to offer something, at least initially, that will entice people to actually use it and then hopefully switch to the subscription for more....
Seems okay so far!
I would expect it to be, for now anyway. They do want to offer something, at least initially, that will entice people to actually use it and then hopefully switch to the subscription for more.
What most people fear, based on experience with many freemium models like this, is that over time more and more gets locked behind a subscription.
While subscription models are great for companies, for most consumers they are less great considering they end up paying more compared to a single time purchase.
Moving on from my original stated skepticism, Brad Colbow did a video about this and I think he’s got the best take I’ve seen so far: This? This was the Big Affinity and Canva Announcement?
From that video: I guess so... then hopefully they make a lightroom alternative and do (even half assed) Linux support. The comment section mentioned PixiEditor and Graphite as alternatives and...
From that video:
"my theory is that anything that is bad for adobe is good for canva"
I guess so... then hopefully they make a lightroom alternative and do (even half assed) Linux support.
The comment section mentioned PixiEditor and Graphite as alternatives and I'll check those out now because I thought I was stuck with Inkscape and GIMP or pulling out my macbook.
I still haven't tested it, but I've seen recommendations for RapidRaw as a good free alternative to Lightroom. It's new and it looks really good. Also Photopea, it runs in browser, which I hate...
I still haven't tested it, but I've seen recommendations for RapidRaw as a good free alternative to Lightroom. It's new and it looks really good.
Also Photopea, it runs in browser, which I hate (but so does Graphite iirc), but I have to admit that feature-wise it's the best free Photoshop alternative there is, better than Affinity Photo in some ways. It's ad supported and needs internet connection to start it, but there are some forks on Github that add an electron wrapper to it and let you use it offline supposedly. Not sure how well it works or how kosher it is - I thought Photopea was merely freeware, not open source.
At a super quick glance that looks like exactly what I want. I'll probably download that when I get home. I haven't really touched a camera in a while though so it's not pressing but I'll be happy...
I've seen recommendations for RapidRaw as a good free alternative to Lightroom. It's new and it looks really good.
At a super quick glance that looks like exactly what I want. I'll probably download that when I get home. I haven't really touched a camera in a while though so it's not pressing but I'll be happy to have it my back pocket so I don't have to pay Adobe for Lr again.
Also Photopea, it runs in browser, which I hate (but so does Graphite iirc),
Yuck
It's ad supported and needs internet connection to start it,
Double yuck
but there are some forks on Github that add an electron wrapper to it and let you use it offline supposedly. Not sure how well it works or how kosher it is - I thought Photopea was merely freeware, not open source.
I found one called Amadine that’s paid but looks promising that I plan to check into at some point. I like that even though they’ve got a subscription they’ve also got a reasonably priced...
I found one called Amadine that’s paid but looks promising that I plan to check into at some point. I like that even though they’ve got a subscription they’ve also got a reasonably priced permanent upgrade. All that remains to be seen is if it has truly useful functionality. The Mac version seems to allow you to save in a proprietary format. They paywall exporting and printing, but it otherwise appears to be free to use. Which seems fair enough.
I saw that mentioned in /r/Linux but then someone mentioned it uses a bunch of windows files to make it work. The previous workaround to get V1 and V2 to work also required some windows files...
I saw that mentioned in /r/Linux but then someone mentioned it uses a bunch of windows files to make it work. The previous workaround to get V1 and V2 to work also required some windows files (probably the same ones). The documented workaround for V3 apparently posted those files on github... the suggestion was that this is effectively pirating MS's software.
While I don't feel bad "pirating" some MS stuff, I'd kind of like Affinity to build stuff in a way that doesn't require that, and also don't want to be dependant on files that MS will probably have taken down from GitHub. I could install windows just to harvest the files but then Im really screwing around.
Edit: to be clear, I'm probably still going to try to get it running on Linux when I get home, I just mean that the "half ass" Linux support I'd like is just not having to do the proprietary windows files.
I haven’t tried this but here is where I read it… First from this Tedium post (which was linked from HackerNews): https://tedium.co/2025/10/30/canva-affinity-free-loss-leader-strategy/ Which then...
This Tedium article makes a lot of sense, thanks for the link! I was hoping that Affinity would keep going into a more serious direction now that Adobe chose the other path. There would have been...
This Tedium article makes a lot of sense, thanks for the link!
I was hoping that Affinity would keep going into a more serious direction now that Adobe chose the other path. There would have been many important but extremely boring improvements to make if they wanted to reach professional quality/functionality, but those would have gotten them zero hype. On the forums, I saw a few users mention them but very, very little engagement. I guess that means most serious pros weren't part of the user base, so the decision to not go that route is understandable but disappointing.
Luckily I have V2 installed on two different computers, as well as Adobe CS6 on an older one, and backup installers for the software and compatible OS (and even some spare parts in case the hardware malfunctions!). I'll probably be able to sit still and wait for the AI bubble to burst. Maybe afterwards some company will become interested in making serious, high quality design tools again, even though the user base is much smaller.
The market is definitely too concentrated when everyone who has a viable product feels compelled to go after the single largest consumer group out there. Is it really not profitable to serve someone who just wants a good set of tools without gimmicks, with a reasonably priced perpetual license?
Free software this advanced, owned by Canva, is too good to be true. This is step one in Affinity's enshittification.
Agreed. There’s a lot about how free and great it is, but for a major version change all it seems to have is paid AI features.
I do notice that they don’t talk about designer, photo, and publisher, though, so maybe they are merging them all into one product?
As bad as Gimp may be, open source software is one tool that cannot be taken away from me. It’s a feature I wish more people would value.
I don't know how they're going to make money on AI subscriptions. Making it free just sounds like they're desperate to take market share from Adobe (and we absolutely need that) by any means necessary and they'll try make it profitable later.
This was the big thing for me. Even in Affinity 1 (which is all I paid for) Designer and Photo already felt like two sides of the same coin, so it doesn't surprise me they've gone the route of making it one thing.
Counterpoint : Davinci Resolve is both a good color grading tool (and was use in actual blockbuster movie) and a competent video editor with non trivial feature features (like multicam), and it's offered for free.
But I still agree with you in that it's clearer how Blackmagic Design makes money: there's a "studio" version of Davinci with feature that is realistically out of reach and/or useless for regular consumer (120fps at 32K, multiple GPU, remote scripting,...). There's also a wide range of hardware that Blackmagic sells.
I own Davinci Resolve (DR) Studio and it has some features which are useful for non professional users, mainly extra codec support. I think the free version only supports h264, and not HEVC.
That being said, DR is not a typical enshittifaction story. They have a very clear, very open business goal: The software is free, because they sell you the hardware to use it properly with. Even for professional software, DR Studio has a one time 300 USD ish price that gives you an actual lifetime license, and you get it with even the cheapest hardware editing keyboard they sell, which is like 400 USD.
The company behind it makes money by selling hardware to edit on, cameras, and instructional material like courses on how to use both with Davinci Resolve. This is different from Affinity V3, which, aside of the AI subscription, has no monetization.
Either Canva is banking on enough people subscribing for AI tools, or they're banking on this offer being so good it gets people off competitors. But even then, getting people off competitors and onto Affinity is only step 1 of the enshittification process, because there is no way to make it profitable in the current state.
Calling a "competent" is a huge understatement. I personally find it much better than Premiere Pro + After Effects.
I'm pretty pessimistic about this. I bought a Universal V2 license because I want to own my software, and I was happy to support one of the few companies that hadn't moved to software subscriptions. Sure it's only for AI features now, but how long until they start locking more major features behind the sub? How long until the nag screens become more aggressive, or "sponsored content" starts making its way in?
I've made a backup of the final V2 installers, and I may just end up using them indefinitely. I've seen how this goes far too many times before to believe it'll be any different here.
I share your pessimism. Unfortunately for me I made the mistake of buying them through the Mac App store, so I've only got installers until they pull them down or Apple stops allowing downloads due to incompatibility with later operating systems. I'm just going to uninstall them and return to using GIMP and Inkscape, myself. I really appreciated some of the stuff that Designer was doing, but not enough to swap to V3.
I use Affinity every day, it's been my go to as a professional graphic designer. Downloaded V3 (or, "Studio") yesterday and, well, I have some thoughts.
The elephant in the room is of course the pricing model. But... I'll be honest, I don't mind it. Affinity (and Serif, their original company) have always been very upstanding and trustworthy. Hell, they even still support their Pre-Affinity-1 apps if you have them. This to me reads more like the Davinci Resolve pricing model - basic version for everyone, full version for professionals if you need it - and while I wish I could pay once and be done with it, the only features gated behind payment are the AI ones, and that's okay. I really think the animosity here comes from Canva being behind this - and I get that, but, come on. Aside from the amount of garbage they've empowered overconfident high schoolers to make and the pain they've inflicted upon print shops the world over, their intentions read pure to me. They want to compete with Adobe. This is the most compelling Adobe alternative ever, and it's god dam free. Plus, you can turn off telemetry, and it doesn't phone home on startup, I checked.
All in all, 7/10 update, give me back my coloured icons.
I think that’s part of the reason I’m worried. Going free is a tactic that means they’re going to have to make up that cash somewhere else (or some other time), rather than just providing a product that is genuinely better than adobe and charging for major updates. I’ve seen too much enshittification of freemium software to be optimistic about this.
That’s pretty awesome, certainly a selling point for me compared to the adobe suite.
I really think people are too hung up on the "free" thing. Affinity isn't and won't be their primary money maker, even if they did monetise it monthly, and to Canva - a VC backed private company that's very successful in the B2B space - 50 bucks once per user versus 0 bucks once per user probably doesn't much matter in the grand scheme of things (let alone that after-sales support is expensive and since it's free they can essentially cut that now). Serif as far as I know didn't have any major backers or sponsors, they did need the money, but Canva probably doesn't considering it sells volume licenses to very fragmented and huge businesses like ReMax who just throw it to their employees who use it to make their more or less style guide compliant graphics.
This is true, but that is less relevant considering they build that trust before Canva bought them. The change to this freemium/subscription model is the first big thing that has happened under Canva. To me that signals very clearly a change in focus and direction, in turn that means that past behavior shouldn't weigh that heavily.
So far, it looks like they haven't done anything outrageous and this version under the new model is fairly solid. Which I'd actually expect it to be if they want to retain any customers. The question now is how that will develop in the future as it can go in different ways including what a lot of people fear, slow and steady enshitifaction.
Today they seem to have disabled the activation servers for V2.
It seems sketchy:
https://merveilles.town/@lrhodes/115465594958403533
https://www.reddit.com/r/Affinity/comments/1ol1qtw/downloaded_the_affinity_app_opted_out_of_all_ai/
And I see comments that say you can't turn off some AI features even if you don't want them. Can you confirm?
I can confirm the opposite. If you go into App Settings > Miscellaneous > Send usage data to Affinity and turn that off, as far as I can tell it won't phone home. Yes, you need to log in when you first set up the app, but after that it works fine even if you're offline, or block Canva with your firewall.
https://ibb.co/Qj6GSNF2
Here's a screenshot from my firewall blocking all connections that Affinity tries to make, and an open file to show that it works just fine. (I don't recommend you do this though, it'll break auto-updates)
Today I've seen people on Reddit say they got the activation screen again after using V3 for just one day. And more people are saying that activation doesn't last more than a year.
If you're a professional designer and have permanently migrated to V3, I would at least make .tiff backups regularly and don't allow the software to update automatically. When an update is offered, wait for a good while and let others be the guinea pig until it seems safe.
There's a lot of eye rolling wrt how seriously some people take this stuff, but people my age who've been fucked over by Adobe time and time again know how ugly it can get. It's good to stay a little paranoid when your livelihood is at stake.
How about the claim that activation only lasts for one year at a time? I couldn't find a proper source for it but it's another thing that feels sketchy. I haven't installed V3 yet but if I do, I'm definitely going to disable auto-updates to prevent the type of extortion behaviour we recently saw from Adobe ("Here's our new utterly shitty TOS. Accept the terms or you'll lose access to your unfinished work").
Having to periodically renew activation means they have already built that in, unfortunately. If that is the case, I probably won't install V3 at all. I'm completely done with corporations that are planning to make me suffer at some obscure future time.
If something is free, you are the product. I will hold onto my Affinity v2 for as long as I can
This has been a massive bummer. New product contains an AI chatbot that cannot be disabled (or so I have been told, maybe at least it requires a subscription for it to bother you), I specifically bought V2 to support a company with one-time purchase costs, no subscriptions, and reasonable licensing, all for them to throw all that goodwill away by enshittifying through acquisition, and now, AI and subscription infiltration.
It was a good run. I am sticking with my v2 as long as possible and just dread the day they no longer activate or run after some future OS update.
I don't even care about the "promises" they're making to v2 users- because I've seen too many companies eventually break those promises. There is NO WAY it will be this way permanently going forward. They're starting to boil the frog and it's only a matter of time. Canva's wishes will eventually take priority over any of ex-Serif's voices, even if it takes five years to get there. They'll smile and welcome you in now and stab you in the back later.
It's the beginning of the end for Affinity and I will have no part in it, nor will I recommend them to anyone ever again, at least not freely, only rarely and begrudgingly. They are the lesser of two evils now I suppose because F Adobe til kingdom come, but still, the only way I would mention them is if someone wanted to avoid Adobe.
Edit: Also, lack of backward compatibility with v2, which to me is a clear (negative) way of trying to incentivize upgrades leaves a really bad taste
The difficulty is, I already went to Affinity as an alternative to Adobe. Are the alternatives to Affinity any good?
I haven't touched the newest version so far, and like many others, I'm simply planning to stick to Affinity V2 for as long as possible.
I installed it. The account making process used email address for the one-time-code to login, no password.
The main three apps (vector, pixels, and layout) are all rolled into one program. There is a fourth item for some canvAI thing but you can actually hide it by clicking the three dots and unselecting that item. Leaving the UI clean of any upsells for the time being.
Seems okay so far!
I would expect it to be, for now anyway. They do want to offer something, at least initially, that will entice people to actually use it and then hopefully switch to the subscription for more.
What most people fear, based on experience with many freemium models like this, is that over time more and more gets locked behind a subscription.
While subscription models are great for companies, for most consumers they are less great considering they end up paying more compared to a single time purchase.
Moving on from my original stated skepticism, Brad Colbow did a video about this and I think he’s got the best take I’ve seen so far: This? This was the Big Affinity and Canva Announcement?
From that video:
I guess so... then hopefully they make a lightroom alternative and do (even half assed) Linux support.
The comment section mentioned PixiEditor and Graphite as alternatives and I'll check those out now because I thought I was stuck with Inkscape and GIMP or pulling out my macbook.
I still haven't tested it, but I've seen recommendations for RapidRaw as a good free alternative to Lightroom. It's new and it looks really good.
Also Photopea, it runs in browser, which I hate (but so does Graphite iirc), but I have to admit that feature-wise it's the best free Photoshop alternative there is, better than Affinity Photo in some ways. It's ad supported and needs internet connection to start it, but there are some forks on Github that add an electron wrapper to it and let you use it offline supposedly. Not sure how well it works or how kosher it is - I thought Photopea was merely freeware, not open source.
At a super quick glance that looks like exactly what I want. I'll probably download that when I get home. I haven't really touched a camera in a while though so it's not pressing but I'll be happy to have it my back pocket so I don't have to pay Adobe for Lr again.
Yuck
Double yuck
Hmmm maybe.
I found one called Amadine that’s paid but looks promising that I plan to check into at some point. I like that even though they’ve got a subscription they’ve also got a reasonably priced permanent upgrade. All that remains to be seen is if it has truly useful functionality. The Mac version seems to allow you to save in a proprietary format. They paywall exporting and printing, but it otherwise appears to be free to use. Which seems fair enough.
I’ve seen people running the new Affinity in WINE with no issues at all. On Linux platforms.
I saw that mentioned in /r/Linux but then someone mentioned it uses a bunch of windows files to make it work. The previous workaround to get V1 and V2 to work also required some windows files (probably the same ones). The documented workaround for V3 apparently posted those files on github... the suggestion was that this is effectively pirating MS's software.
While I don't feel bad "pirating" some MS stuff, I'd kind of like Affinity to build stuff in a way that doesn't require that, and also don't want to be dependant on files that MS will probably have taken down from GitHub. I could install windows just to harvest the files but then Im really screwing around.
Edit: to be clear, I'm probably still going to try to get it running on Linux when I get home, I just mean that the "half ass" Linux support I'd like is just not having to do the proprietary windows files.
I haven’t tried this but here is where I read it…
First from this Tedium post (which was linked from HackerNews): https://tedium.co/2025/10/30/canva-affinity-free-loss-leader-strategy/
Which then links this guide: https://affinity.liz.pet/
Hope it helps
This Tedium article makes a lot of sense, thanks for the link!
I was hoping that Affinity would keep going into a more serious direction now that Adobe chose the other path. There would have been many important but extremely boring improvements to make if they wanted to reach professional quality/functionality, but those would have gotten them zero hype. On the forums, I saw a few users mention them but very, very little engagement. I guess that means most serious pros weren't part of the user base, so the decision to not go that route is understandable but disappointing.
Luckily I have V2 installed on two different computers, as well as Adobe CS6 on an older one, and backup installers for the software and compatible OS (and even some spare parts in case the hardware malfunctions!). I'll probably be able to sit still and wait for the AI bubble to burst. Maybe afterwards some company will become interested in making serious, high quality design tools again, even though the user base is much smaller.
The market is definitely too concentrated when everyone who has a viable product feels compelled to go after the single largest consumer group out there. Is it really not profitable to serve someone who just wants a good set of tools without gimmicks, with a reasonably priced perpetual license?