Adobe PhotoShop
Based on 2323 reviews and ratings
Canva
Based on 874 reviews and ratings
Highlights
Adobe Photoshop and Canva are both graphic editing software. Adobe Photoshop is the market incumbent, while Canva is a new, more niche offering. Both products are rare among enterprises, but Canva is more concentrated in the small business market due to its robust free package and focus on user-accessibility.
Adobe Photoshop is positioned as the legacy market incumbent, with advanced features for a range of more intensive editing uses. Canva specializes as an online entry-level editing software particularly well suited for social posts and graphics.
Features
Both Adobe Photoshop and Canva offer basic graphic editing features, including graphic creation and editing existing content. However, they each provide features tailored to their specializations.
Adobe Photoshop has invested more heavily in powerful and advanced editing capabilities. This allows Photoshop to provide deeper functionality for most editing and graphic design needs. The range and depth of its capabilities makes Photoshop ideal for frequent or power users. Broadly speaking, Photoshop has set the baseline on which editing software is compared to.
In contrast, Canva differentiates by being more accessible for more casual or inexperienced users. Canva provides a free version that is fairly sufficient for many basic tasks, and includes a range of prebuilt templates for common use cases, such as social media graphics. It is designed to be extremely user friendly and accessible to users, regardless of prior experience or skill level.
Limitations
While both Adobe Photoshop and Canva offer strong features, they also have some limitations worth considering.
Adobe Photoshop’s power also entails greater complexity. The more advanced features and interface often requires a steeper learning curve to become proficient and work efficiently within the tool. Additionally, Photoshop has no free version. This requires more up front investment in the application than freemium products.
In contrast, Canva is more limited in its functionality. Many of the better or larger graphics and images are paywalled, placing a ceiling on what can be done with the free version of Canva. There are also more limited account management features within the software. The lack of these features is most pertinent to freelancers or contractors, who may manage graphics for multiple clients within the software.
Pricing
Adobe Photoshop is sold individually for $20.99/month. It can also be bundled with Adobe Lightroom for $9.99/month.
Canva has 3 pricing tiers. The free version provides 8,000+ templates, 100+ design types, and many free images and graphics. The Pro version additionally offers a Brand Kit for white labeling, more free templates, premium images, and custom templates. The Enterprise version includes multiple Brand Kits, team management, workflows, and additional security features and support.
Provided by the TrustRadius Research Team
Published on May 21, 2020
Attribute Ratings
- Adobe PhotoShop is rated higher in 3 areas: Likelihood to Recommend, Usability, Support Rating
- Canva is rated higher in 5 areas: Likelihood to Renew, Availability, Performance, Implementation Rating, Product Scalability
Likelihood to Recommend
Adobe PhotoShop
Canva
Likelihood to Renew
Adobe PhotoShop
Canva
Usability
Adobe PhotoShop
Canva
Availability
Adobe PhotoShop
Canva
Performance
Adobe PhotoShop
Canva
Support Rating
Adobe PhotoShop
Canva
In-Person Training
Adobe PhotoShop
Canva
Implementation Rating
Adobe PhotoShop
Canva
Product Scalability
Adobe PhotoShop
Canva
Likelihood to Recommend
Adobe PhotoShop
Canva
Pros
Adobe PhotoShop
- Brush customization. There are many available brushes for illustration, and each can be customized to fit the needs of your specific style.
- Integration with other Adobe products. It is essential that the images I create be accessible in Adobe Indesign and Illustrator, and [Adobe] Photoshop can be placed and edited easily within those programs.
- Advanced editing. The possibilities for editing photos [are] endless, with new features being added constantly.
Canva
- Provides readily accessible approved fonts and colors for our university publications.
- A great selection of templates to select from.
- Lots of resources for design, like photos, clip art, backgrounds, and other design elements.
- The ability to share your design with others at the university.
- The ability to download your design as a png, pdf, jpg, svg, even MP4 video or gif.
- Easy to edit and alter the design and not lose what you had by creating clones of previous designs and then make the changes.
Cons
Adobe PhotoShop
- PhotoShop is a specialized tool with a learning curve. The controls are sometimes cryptic to the unimmersed.
- The licensing model for PhotoShop and the Creative Suite can sometimes be cost-prohibitive and hard to justify deploying.
- There are lots of overlaps in the Adobe Creative Suite that make it difficult to know if PhotoShop, Lightroom, PhotoShop Lite, etc. are the right tools for the job.
Canva
- Some pretty basic fonts are missing from the database, which proves to be annoying when trying to stay on brand
- Pre-grouping sections of templates can be a hassle to figure out
- Creating your own template from scratch can have it's hiccups, but that could be my lack of design experience.

Pricing Details
Adobe PhotoShop
General
Free Trial
—Free/Freemium Version
—Premium Consulting/Integration Services
—Entry-level set up fee?
Starting Price
Adobe PhotoShop Editions & Modules
Edition
Single App | $20.001 |
---|
- per month
Additional Pricing Details
—Canva
General
Free Trial
—Free/Freemium Version
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
—Entry-level set up fee?
Starting Price
Canva Editions & Modules
Edition
Pro | $12.951 |
---|---|
Enterprise | $30.002 |
- per month
- Per Month Per User
Additional Pricing Details
—Likelihood to Renew
Adobe PhotoShop
Canva
Usability
Adobe PhotoShop
Canva
Reliability and Availability
Adobe PhotoShop
Canva
Performance
Adobe PhotoShop
Canva
Support Rating
Adobe PhotoShop
Canva

In-Person Training
Adobe PhotoShop
Canva
Implementation Rating
Adobe PhotoShop

Canva
Alternatives Considered
Adobe PhotoShop
Canva

Scalability
Adobe PhotoShop

Canva
Return on Investment
Adobe PhotoShop
- Saved our company thousands of dollars by editing in house.
- Has given us the ability to do things on the fly and get projects done faster.
- Having the original .psd files saved has given us the ability to go back and reuse and update photos and graphics instead of starting all over again.

Canva
- As far as ROI is concerned, Canva has proven itself time and time again as having a positive impact for business.
- Just yesterday, I had to prepare an hour-long presentation on the fly; the great reviews of the presentation and the materials (all made in Canva) only served to advertise for Canva and it proves that Canva is a smart investment.
- I don't think in the time that I have been a Canva pro user that I can say that my ROI has been negatively impacted. Highest recommendation. The software more the casually pays for itself time and time again.