Apps have become an indispensable part of our daily lives. From the moment we wake up till the moment we sleep, we are surrounded by apps. Apps help us navigate, connect with people, and do our jobs.
With the increased usage of apps, it is natural for designers to take a keen interest in them. Designers can draw inspiration from apps and they can also use a variety of apps to design.
In this blog post, I will talk about some of the best apps for designers available on iOS and Android. Note that this list is not exhaustive, but it does cover all the major categories related to app design.
Best Apps For Design
The best design apps for Windows
By Tom May published May 12, 2021
We reveal the best design apps for Windows available today, and explain how to choose between them.
Design apps for Windows
(Image credit: Affinity)
Design apps for Windows might seem like an oxymoron. Once, if you were a professional graphic designer, the Mac was the only game in town. Now, though, Windows machines are worthy options for design projects. And there’s a huge array of design apps for Windows to use.
Yes, there are a few outliers, such as Sketch, that refuse to move away from Apple’s platform. But in the main, everything you can do on a Mac, you can use on a Windows laptop or desktop computer. So what are the best apps for Windows for your money?
In this post, we select – in no particular order – the best design apps for Windows on the market today, and give you the information you need to choose between them.
Want more kit options? See our guide to the best laptops for graphic design. Alternatively, if you’re more interested in drawing and painting digitally, check out our pick of the best digital art software.
Design apps for Windows: Illustration of surreal landscape
01. Adobe Photoshop
Industry standard photo editing and raster design tool.
SPECIFICATIONS
Used for: Image editing and manipulation, photo retouching, graphic design, web and app prototyping, 3D modellingPayment model: SubscriptionFree trial: 30 daysPlatforms: Mac, Windows, iPad
TODAY’S BEST DEALS
RECOMMENDED RETAILER
Creative Cloud All Apps
£49.94/mth
Creative Cloud Photography
£9.98/mth
Creative Cloud Single App
£19.97/mth
VISIT SITE
at Adobe
REASONS TO BUY
+Industry standard
+Creative Cloud integration
+3D capabilities
REASONS TO AVOID
-Expensive
Possibly the best known of all design apps for Windows, Photoshop has dominated the profession for the last three decades, and remains the go-to for studios everywhere. Indeed, you’ll probably struggle get a job without knowing how to use it. If you’re a freelancer, of course, you have more scope for using other software, but it will probably be difficult to avoid it altogether.
But is it a any good? Well, with so many design apps for Windows around, you don’t stay on top in an ever-expanding industry for nothing, and Adobe has made strident efforts to update its tool to keep it relevant over the years, for example adding powerful 3D modelling and 3D printing features, and launching an iPad version. This app is getting more and more sophisticated by the day; in March, for example, Adobe added cloud documents version history, and support for cloud documents in offline mode.
The main reason to consider an alternative is price. Photoshop, like other Adobe tools, is now only available as part of a Creative Cloud subscription, and that doesn’t come cheap.
Having said that, there are discounts to be had (check out the latest Creative Cloud discounts), and if you’re using multiple CC tools, then the interoperability between them, and other services like Adobe Fonts and Adobe Stock, can often make the extra cost a good investment in your career.
02. Adobe Illustrator
Popular and established vector editing tool.
SPECIFICATIONS
Used for: Illustration, designing vector graphicsPayment model: SubscriptionFree trial: 30 daysPlatforms: Mac, Windows, iPad
TODAY’S BEST DEALS
Adobe Illustrator
£19.97/mth
VISIT SITE
at Adobe
REASONS TO BUY
+Industry standard
+Creative Cloud integration
+Smart AI cropping
REASONS TO AVOID
-Expensive
First launched in 1987, Illustrator has been the natural companion to Photoshop for generations of illustrators and designers, and it’s long been considered the standard vector drawing tool for the industry. That dominance is starting to ebb a little, with a rush of new rivals into the space. But it remains one of the most sought-after design apps for Windows.
As with Photoshop, its rivals are largely competing on price, and for those whom money is less important than efficiency, Illustrator remains a hugely powerful and versatile tool, that Adobe is constantly making efforts to improve further.
The biggest addition of recent years have been a Freeform Gradients tool that makes it super-easy to create rich gradients, a Global Editing feature that lets you simultaneously make changes across all instances of a similar object, and a smart cropping tool that automatically suggests crops based on AI. Illustrator has also now launched on the iPad, and the latest updates to this app in March and April make it much easier for you to share your work with colleagues and collaborators.
More broadly, the issues that apply to Photoshop apply to Illustrator too. On the plus side, its ubiquity makes it a good tool to learn for your career, and the integration with the Creative Cloud can help make your workflow smooth and speedy. On the downside, its decades-old codebase and interface are becoming a little bloated and well, there’s that monthly subscription.
(Image credit: Serif)
03. Affinity Designer
Professional-grade rival to Illustrator, at an affordable price.
SPECIFICATIONS
Used for: Illustration, designing vector graphicsPayment model: One-off purchaseFree trial: 90 daysPlatforms: Mac, Windows, iPad
TODAY’S BEST DEALS
VIEW AT MICROSOFT UK IE
View at Serif Europe UK
REASONS TO BUY
+Powerful features
+Affordable price
+Integrates with other Affinity apps
REASONS TO AVOID
-Lacks some advanced tools
Since its release for Windows in 2016, Affinity Designer has offered PC-using professionals a grown-up alternative to Illustrator, including a complete vector and pixel editing toolset, 10 million per cent zoom, non-destructive effects and adjustment layers, and more.
While some capabilities in Illustrator are absent, such as distortion or warp effects, most of what you can do in Adobe’s tool, you can do in Affinity Designer. And the interface is similar enough that it’s easy to pick up and use intuitively.
Coded for the latest computers and tablets, makers Serif claim that Affinity Designer runs faster than Adobe’s products, and anecdotal evidence suggests that’s very much the case, as long as you’re using relatively modern equipment. Affinity Designer is also staggeringly cheap, and you only pay once: there’s no subscription.
That said, Illustrator remains the industry standard of all the design apps for Windows, and so there’s somewhat of a chicken-and-egg problem; many studios don’t want to use it until all studios are using it. Also, while Affinity Designer is interoperable with sister tools Affinity Photo and Affinity Publisher (see below), there’s not yet anything approaching the complexity of the Creative Cloud ecosystem, with its endless number of tools, and integrated Adobe Fonts and Adobe Stock options.
For freelancers who have more freedom to organise how they work, though, this most affordable of design apps for Windows is certainly worth considering. The app is constantly being improved, and an update this February introduced a new tool to add contours and line offsets to any shape or path, plus the ability to place linked images and resources.
04. Affinity Photo
Low-cost rival to Photoshop that’s surprisingly capable.
SPECIFICATIONS
Used for: Image editing and manipulation, photo retouching, graphic design, web and app prototypingPayment model: One-off purchaseFree trial: 90 daysPlatforms: Mac, Windows, iPad
TODAY’S BEST DEALS
VIEW AT MICROSOFT UK IE
View at Serif Europe UK
REASONS TO BUY
+Streamlined interface
+Fast working
+Affordable price
REASONS TO AVOID
-Lacks some advanced features
Just as Affinity Designer rivals Illustrator, Affinity Photo is one of the design apps for Windows that offers an alternative to Photoshop. And it’s a pretty familiar experience. Brushes, layers, masks, for example, are all treated in the same way as in Adobe’s tool.
Affinity Photo is not, however, a carbon copy of Photoshop. Indeed, while some designers will complain that Affinity Photo doesn’t do everything that Photoshop does, that’s kind of missing the point. Essentially, this most budget-conscious of design apps for Windows is not weighed down with hundreds of features that try to please everyone, but is more streamlined for specific tasks.
Rather than a fully fledged graphics suite, Affinity Photo is better described as photo editing software with some good art and design tools, including some distinctive features like a saveable undo history, PSD Import/Export options and a non-destructive workflow. More recent additions in February’s update include the ability to add liquify adjustments as live, maskable layers.
If you’re looking for a full graphic design tool, you’re better off – as the name suggests – with Affinity Designer (above), which has pixel design capabilities alongside its range of vector tools. But if photo editing is your main concern, Affinity Photo offers some excellent tools and capabilities, at a low, one-off price.
Design apps for Windows: Illustration of stylised face
05. CorelDRAW Graphics Suite
Vector-based illustration tool with a broad fanbase.
SPECIFICATIONS
Used for: Vector illustration, page layout, image editing and manipulationPayment model: One-off purchase or subscriptionFree trial: 15 daysPlatforms: Mac, Windows
TODAY’S BEST DEALS
CorelDraw Graphics Suite 2021
£299/year
VISIT SITE
at Corel Corporation
REASONS TO BUY
+Powerful features
+Intuitive interface
+Choice of payment models
REASONS TO AVOID
-Not cheap
First launched in 1987, CorelDRAW is a vector-based illustration tool that’s mainly focused on Windows (although in 2019 it did finally launch on MacOS).
So how does it compare with other design apps for Windows? Well, it’s difficult to recommend it over Adobe Illustrator for features, while Affinity Designer easily beats it on value for money. But CorelDRAW continues to be popular amongst everyone from artists to graphic designers, so its makers are clearly doing something right.
In recent years, its standout improvement has been the LiveSketch tool: an innovative line drawing solution for designers and illustrators who want to bypass producing thumbnails on paper and freely sketch-out vector art at the source; this is particularly useful on a drawing tablet.
Other cool features in CorelDRAW include Colour Harmony, which lets you change the look of an object from one group of complementary colours to another; Pointiliser, which lets you create vector mosaics; and the way that every layer is represented with a thumbnail representation of the shape in question. More recently, the latest version (2020) brings new features powered by AI, cloud-based collaborative review options, and overall improved performance.
Conclusion
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