Adobe XD vs. Freehand by InVision

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Adobe XD
Score 6.9 out of 10
N/A
Adobe XD is a prototyping and UX/UI option for website and mobile application design, featuring a range of UI tools and and templates, a versatile artboard and contextual layer panels, and deep integration with Adobe's creative suite of products for fast import of objects from these applications.
$33.99
per month per license
Freehand by InVision
Score 6.8 out of 10
N/A
Freehand, from InVision headquartered in New York, is an online whiteboard that enables teams to plan, brainstorm, and draw together. It aims to give everyone a simple way to visually represent ideas with charts, diagrams, and drawings. Whether for mind mapping, creating a customer journey map, or drafting up an org chart, Freehand can help teams make ideas and plans visual.
$4
per month per user
Pricing
Adobe XDFreehand by InVision
Editions & Modules
Individual
$9.99 ($119.88)
per month (annual, prepaid)
Students & Teachers - All Apps
$19.99 ($239.88)
per month, annual plan (for the year)
Business - Single App
$33.99
per month per license
Business - All Apps
$79.99
per month per license
Schools & Universities - Institution Wide
Contact Sales
Freehand Free
$0
per year per user
Freehand Pro
$4
per month per user
Freehand Enterprise
Custom Quote
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
Adobe XDFreehand by InVision
Free Trial
NoYes
Free/Freemium Version
NoYes
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoNo
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
Additional Details
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
Adobe XDFreehand by InVision
Considered Both Products
Adobe XD

No answer on this topic

Freehand by InVision
Chose Freehand by InVision
Honestly, Zoom and Teams don't compare for their whiteboarding. Mainly because those are glitchy and unreliable. I've tried using them in meetings and especially with Zoom (maybe because they are newer) it loads and freezes up. I like to be "on it" in meetings and can't have …
Chose Freehand by InVision
The two other platforms that people have tried to get us to use are Figma and Miro. Since we have been using InVision Freehand it works much better for our teams and is within the InVision environment that we are familiar with. The InVision Freehand tools and user interface are …
Chose Freehand by InVision
Freehand is one of my preferred tools to use in the early stages of design.
Chose Freehand by InVision
I have used Zeplin in the past, and Freehand is by far faster and has a simpler UI. The fact that Freehand is married to the rest of the InVision suite of services makes it a match made in heaven. I have found Freehand's thoughtful progression toward a holistic design service …
Chose Freehand by InVision
Can't really compare it to anything. As I mentioned above this is a great additional tool that we use with InVision.
Top Pros
Top Cons
Best Alternatives
Adobe XDFreehand by InVision
Small Businesses
UXPin
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Score 7.9 out of 10
Canva
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Score 9.1 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies
UXPin
UXPin
Score 7.9 out of 10
Canva
Canva
Score 9.1 out of 10
Enterprises
Optimal Workshop
Optimal Workshop
Score 9.2 out of 10
Miro
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Score 9.2 out of 10
All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
User Ratings
Adobe XDFreehand by InVision
Likelihood to Recommend
5.6
(34 ratings)
7.9
(102 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
7.7
(3 ratings)
8.0
(9 ratings)
Usability
5.5
(3 ratings)
7.5
(16 ratings)
Availability
-
(0 ratings)
8.7
(3 ratings)
Performance
-
(0 ratings)
8.3
(3 ratings)
Support Rating
8.3
(16 ratings)
9.4
(6 ratings)
Implementation Rating
10.0
(1 ratings)
8.0
(7 ratings)
Configurability
-
(0 ratings)
8.5
(2 ratings)
Contract Terms and Pricing Model
-
(0 ratings)
9.1
(1 ratings)
Ease of integration
-
(0 ratings)
8.2
(2 ratings)
Product Scalability
-
(0 ratings)
7.3
(3 ratings)
Professional Services
-
(0 ratings)
9.1
(1 ratings)
Vendor post-sale
-
(0 ratings)
9.1
(1 ratings)
Vendor pre-sale
-
(0 ratings)
9.1
(1 ratings)
User Testimonials
Adobe XDFreehand by InVision
Likelihood to Recommend
Adobe
If its already part of your organization, and they have a license for Creative Cloud, its worth learning. It doesnt take long to get started, but compared to other software in the same field, its lacking in many ways, from quality of life features to just simply not having the option for Darkmode. Even for website design, UX/UI, and mocking up proof-of-concepts, there are much better tools like Figma.
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InVisionApp Inc.
InVision Freehand has quickly evolved to be a very robust solution for our pre-design process and collaboration with stakeholders and other product teams. It has brought a lot more hands-on workshopping opportunities and created engaging spaces for cross functional teams. Internally to our design org we are able to prototype ideas faster and generate insights or changes BEFORE going into more hi-fidelity design tools or processes.
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Pros
Adobe
  • Easy and simple animations.
  • Good tool for website mock-ups.
  • Easy user interface and tools that are like most Adobe products.
  • You can share a dev link and it displays all assets for developers to download or user like it's very own style guide.
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InVisionApp Inc.
  • Bring in and embed external files and view them on the board without having to move out of freehand. eg. pdf's, power point, youtube etc.
  • Creating wireframes, flow maps, all and any kinds of created art boards to share with team members.
  • Ability to create text and link to external sites
  • Can format and create pages with text and bullet points right in freehand, rather than having to go to another software to do the same.
  • Collaborate with Team members all on the same board and project at the same time and get feedback live in a meeting and/or even later.
  • Love the different templates that have been provided for me to use as a starting point.
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Cons
Adobe
  • Doesn’t have image editing tools, so having to go back to Photoshop or Lightroom just to make a sight edit can be a pain.
  • Could add some text editing functionality. It feels silly that I have to draw a line under text when I should just be able to underline.
  • Would be nice to have some real-time collaboration functionality.
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InVisionApp Inc.
  • The resolution: Our webpage designs always pass the resolution threshold to where freehand starts to work its compression. During presentations, it can be a little embarrassing when we can't read the copy because it looks like potatoes.
  • Embedding videos: GIFs are only good to a certain point, and creating Vimeo embeds is tedious. I wish I could embed MP4s or web assets a lot quicker.
  • Touchpad panning: I can't tell you how many times I've "gone back" in my browser when I'm just trying to pan across the freehand. Has honestly made me wanna force quit on many occasions.
  • Sticky notes and text in shapes: Overall, it's really hard to use the sticky notes and text inside rectangles without the text just getting all over the place. It's different sizes, it gets too tiny, it gets way too big, and overall, it just doesn't look professional, even with a lot of fussing.
  • No ability to crop/mask an image. Nice to have, but sometimes we just need to delete a chunk off a screenshot, and it requires opening PS or taking a screenshot to edit anything.
  • Wish there was a way to have "internal comments" that are not visible to our clients.
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Likelihood to Renew
Adobe
We utilize many of the applications in the Adobe CC suite and our usage of this application came about simply because it was the one that was already paid for. Bearing that in mind we will definitely be renewing the software upon the expiration of the licensing. I am not sure if this is the solution we would go with were it not already included, we would have to evaluate all other options
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InVisionApp Inc.
Honestly as in any organization it's up to budget. I feel like every organization I go to I'm constantly striving to keep InVision as part of the main funded tools used by the team especially in a remote environment. I feel there is a push to move to Figma and Zooms new white boarding tool but I'm still not a fan of Zoom's tool. Microsoft also created a white boarding tool which has been buggy.
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Usability
Adobe
Adobe XD is basically on life-support now, there are much better software out there that do everything XD can do, and a few that you don't even have to pay a monthly subscription fee on. While Adobe XD is great as shortcuts that are used in other CC software works, and its integration with CC is great. But it still lacks compared to its closest competitor.
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InVisionApp Inc.
Color Selection can be tricky when changing colors for shapes and text I've seen other users struggle with creating sticky notes and getting text to fit in the box properly and had to abandon the tool for a workshop for this reason After having a demo, I learned of new features I wasn't using. I don't know it would have been intuitive to find on my own.
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Reliability and Availability
Adobe
No answers on this topic
InVisionApp Inc.
For availability, we never have to even think about whether inVision Freehand is going to be available for us to work with. There has never been a time when we have opened up the application and had any issues of any kind. I can't imagine why anyone would work with a platform that is unreliable. inVision Freehand is realibel, stable, and getting better all the time. Whether it's their built-in tools or the expanding of Templates to work with Freehand has been a reliable go-to platform for us.
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Performance
Adobe
No answers on this topic
InVisionApp Inc.
It is a little slow when bringing artboards from Sketch to Freehand using Craft. I have had some issues loading and redrawing pages when I have a lot of images on my freehand board. It gives me an error message while I am in the file and starts to reload and redraw all the photos again. Not sure if it has a limit on how many images it can handle on a board at a time.
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Support Rating
Adobe
I have not had a need to connect with the Adobe XD support team as of yet, but from past experience when dealing with the other products, the support has been very very good, and I would have no reason to think that this product would be any different. There are a good number of training videos on the Adobe site for this product as well as on other social media sites so a quick search should let you find the answers in several different ways.
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InVisionApp Inc.
I haven't had to use the support team for anything, which is great news because that means the product usually works as expected! In terms of online support, I've been able to find videos that show how new features work. Also, many of the people I work with have experience with the tools so they are a great resource for me.
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Implementation Rating
Adobe
Implementation was a snap
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InVisionApp Inc.
The implementation is pretty much easy-peasy and plug-n-play. We simply download the applications and install, signed in and were good to go. I really cannot imagine that there would be anyone who would have any difficulty whatsoever in getting started in more than just a few minutes. It's really how implementing these officewide improvements should always go.
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Alternatives Considered
Adobe
Before XD came to the company, screens were designed in Illustrator or Photoshop and a PDF presentation was generated, which was extremely time-consuming. XD saved us a lot of time (and money) by generating interactive prototypes, which are much more tangible for the client than a PDF. The "fight" with Figma is frequent. Both have features in which they are better than their competition. And, while I still choose Adobe XD, don't rule out moving to Figma with its multiple updates.
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InVisionApp Inc.
Miro (formerly Realtime Board) is the original product concept for this tool and I used it for 3-4 years for product development. Invision is aesthetically a carbon copy of the tool but lacks in fine usability controls. We actually didn't choose Freehand, it just came as an added tool under our Invision subscription. It's helpful but knowing the previous tool, it's been a hard sell because it's just not as good. Again, it's really fine tuned usability things like navigation, zoom, switching from tool to tool, selecting and deselecting, etc
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Contract Terms and Pricing Model
Adobe
No answers on this topic
InVisionApp Inc.
Getting set up with inVision Freehand was super simple. We figured how many of our team members were going to be using it and we set up our account knowing that. There were no negotiations, contract hassles or anything that would have been a waste of our time, efforts or resources.
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Scalability
Adobe
No answers on this topic
InVisionApp Inc.
Not everyone in the company has access to Invision, and they can't view the links I provide to them. I also wish everyone could view a file without logging in to the enterprise account. It comes in handy when I am doing focus-group studies or other studies with our customers that don't have Freehand. Unfortunately, if that is possible, I don't know how to do that.
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Professional Services
Adobe
No answers on this topic
InVisionApp Inc.
We didn't use an outside vendor - that's why I gave this option a 10.
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Return on Investment
Adobe
  • Ease of use means we are up and running in no time.
  • Integrates and is a part of the Adobe CC platform (which we already subscribe to) so there was no additional cost.
  • Online proofing and developer handoff links are the icing on the cake. Keeps everything in one place.
  • Handles all our assets (mostly created in Illustrator) like a dream. Even imports native Photoshop docs, too, so that saves us so much time round tripping.
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InVisionApp Inc.
  • Positives all around. Everyone is able to see and collaborate.
  • Granting access is sometimes a pain. Sending the link does not always work, and I get emails as people try to access boards.
  • No negatives really, I love learning all of the different ways it can be used.
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ScreenShots