Using a photo editor app can help you edit your photos with ease and allow you to create high-quality small size images to share on the web.

Here we will consider the list of the top 16 best free photo editing apps in 2021 to get a perfect job done:

Photo retouching apk link pictures QR code download link https://drive.google.com. Photolab is a great Android and iPhone app. It’s one of the best choices if you want to turn your photos into a sketch, painting, or even a watercolour image. Apart from the filters, you can also add borders, frames, and montages to turn your photos into realistic works of art. Photo Lab has some of the most realistic photo to drawing app filters available. It includes classic sketch effects such as pencil, pen and ink, charcoal, pastel, and crayon. There are also many other artistic effects to choose from. And you can even create photo collages and scrapbook pages. Best Android sketch photo editing app to create ART with the Pen tool to Make Your Face Logo PHOTOS into pretty Pencil DRAWINGS. Sketch Photo maker is best p.

Read on for the detailed analysis of each app.

Top 16 Best Free Photo Editor Apps

You're convinced that you want to get a photo editor software, but not sure where to start. There are many free online photo editor programs to choose from. We've narrowed down the best free photo editor that you can use without paying a hefty price.

1. Adobe Photoshop Express Editor

Best Photo Editing Software Overall

Although Photoshop can be a bit intimidating, its sister product Adobe Photoshop Express Editor is an altogether different animal. All the tools are readily accessible and easy to use.

Adobe Photoshop Express Editor is a free photo editor. It is jam-packed with features that will allow you to make your images pop. You will be able to remove red-eye, resize images, make color corrections, and more.

It works right from your browser or mobile app. Editing photos is a snap with tools to balance color, resize, crop, change lighting, rotate, and more. The interface is appealing yet user-friendly. Our only gripes are that it was designed in Flash and not HTML5, and image formats can be somewhat limited.

👆 Special Features:

• Crop
• Rotate
• Remove Red and pet-eye
• Auto-Fix
• Text Tool
• Blemish Removal
• Corrections
• Customization
• Perspective Correction
• Pop-Color Tool
• Image Resize
• Watermark Images
• JPEG Quality Output
• Looks
• Borders

✅ PROS:

• Simple and complex customization
• Easy to use
• Compatible with other Adobe Products
• Gives you the edits you need to improve photos significantly

⛔️ CONS:

• Some features require creative cloud membership that has a fee
• The photo organizer tool is a separate app

2. Canva

Best Photo Editing App for Social Media

Canva is an easy to use photo editor app that allows users to create graphics and edit photos by merely dragging and dropping. It takes no time at all to build a design from scratch, and you don't have to be a pro to learn how to use this free photo editing software. It has tons of features that will help you create the ultimate design or touch up your pre-existing photos.

One of the best features of Canva is its extensive library of templates. Within minutes you can drop your photos into a preset layout and then style it using dozens of fonts, illustrations, graphics, colors, and design elements.

With Canva, you can create stunning pieces quickly that you can share, print, or export. This online photo editor also comes complete with built-in support using search, tabs, and articles to find help with any issue.

👆 Special Features:

• Photo Straightener
• Image Cropper
• The Ability to Add Text
• Speech Bubble Maker
• Transparency Tool
• Photo Enhancer
• Photo Blur
• Photo Vignette
• Design Grids
• Free Icons
• Photo Frames
• Web Wireframe
• Stickers
• Badges
• Add Texture

✅ PROS:

• Great for marketing photos on social media
• Make and design ebooks
• Excellent for web presentations
• Tons of great features for free
• Saves project history

⛔️ CONS:

• Unable to remove an image’s background
• Needs to increase font size

3. Resizing.app

Best Photo Resizer

One of our favorites is an online image resizer, called Resizing.app. The company has a straightforward website and process to resize images online within seconds. One of the coolest features is the ability to export your newly sized image into a different format.

Resizing.app couldn’t be easier to use. You simply drag and drop your images into the box on the home page. Then you select how you want to resize your image (by width, by height, custom size, by percentage, or by the largest side of the image). You can choose to compress your image for quality assurance and then just pick your new file format (jpg, png or webp). Once you hit the save button, your new image is saved to your computer. Voila’ all done. No frills but also no hassles.

Unfortunately, this online service does not have any additional photo editing capabilities to go along with resizing. But hey! It’s free, and we like free and simple.

If you resize your images and photos regularly, we highly recommend you to add the Resizing extension to your Google Chrome; it is also entirely free.

👆 Special Features:

• Resizing by width, by height, custom size, by percentage, and by the largest side of the image.
• Compress a photo
• Crop an image
• Convert an image to JPEG, PNG, WEBP
• Optimize a picture

✅ PROS:

• Free
• Easy to use
• Online
• Convert TIFF and HEIC files into JPEG, PNG or WEBP
• Has extention for Google Chrome

⛔️ CONS:

• Doesn't have any additional photo editing capabilities

4. inPixio

Another app we tested looking for the best free photo editor was inPixio. In reviews, inPixio earns high marks for usability, features, support, speed, and pricing. It has some fantastic tools to fix perspective (straighten buildings), image correction, dehaze, and you can even edit metadata right within the app to add headlines, captions, and copyright details.

inPixio also offers a free tool to remove the background from an image. It works pretty well if the photo has a clear color distinction between what you want to remove and what you want to keep. inPixio is fun to use, although it may not rank as the best free photo editor on the block, it is worth checking out.

To purchase the full program, you will need to select either the inPixio Photo Studio 10 for $49.99 or inPixio Photo Studio Professional version for $59.99. The price is for the full software you can install and use on your Mac or Windows PC.

Looking for one for your Mac? Read our review of the best mac photo editor.

👆 Special Features:

• Eraser
• Correction Patch
• Cloning stamp
• Cutter
• Retouching and Correction
• Perspective correction
• Film grain module

✅ PROS:

• Tools for retouching photos, resizing, removing backgrounds, cropping, fixing sharpness, trimming, and adding filters.
• Share images within the app.
• Erase objects easily from photos.
• No ads.
• It doesn’t “push” you to upgrade.
• Special effects to enhance your images.

⛔️ CONS:

• The background removal tool doesn’t always yield perfect results.
• Some users complain that it does not work as advertised.
• Puts watermarks on images with the free version.
• Cannot batch edit.
• Works by installing multiple modules.

5. Instasize

If you are in the market for the best free photo editing app, you will want to check out Instasize. The app was designed for social media and influencers who want to create eye-catching, creative photos, and videos for their social feeds. The software includes dozens of visually stunning filters, color editing tools, and you can even edit your videos with it.

Instasize has a broad fan base of more than 500,000 users. The plethora of editing tools also include photo retouching features, fonts, and text editing. The free version is limited, but if you are willing to pay $4.99/month, the Premium version is loaded with goodies.

👆 Special Features:

• Collage maker
• Naturally enhancing filters
• Advanced editing adjustments
• Borders
• Beauty tools: edit blemishes, whiten teeth, remove redness, etc.
• Social media formats
• Pro fonts and text editor
• Video editing

✅ PROS:

• Geared toward creating engaging content for social media.
• Dozens of useful features, including backgrounds, beauty enhancements, borders, and filters, to make content creation easy.
• Create collages in a snap.
• Automatic resizing for social media formats.
• Fast and easy to use.

⛔️ CONS:

• The free version is stripped down and includes ads.
• Some users complain about the ads and some glitches.
• Only works on mobile devices, no app for PC or Mac.

6. Adobe Photoshop Lightroom

A well-known name in the photo game is Adobe, which makes dozens of photo enhancement and editing products. One such app is the Adobe Photoshop Lightroom app.

This product is a cloud-based product where you can upload batches of images and edit them together. It wouldn’t be from Adobe without excellent photo editing tools built-in, and if you run into trouble, they have online tutorials to walk you through it all.

You can edit photos easily with all the expected features, share photos, take pictures from inside the app and sync them across all your devices. The Premium version cost is $9.99/month, which may be more than most users want to pay. If you want access to all the creative cloud apps, that figure balloons to $52.99/month.

👆 Special Features:

• Preset creation
• Split Toning
• Tone Curve
• Batch editing on desktop
• Camera
• Healing Brushes
• RAW Editing
• Cloud Storage
• Sync Presets & Profiles

✅ PROS:

• Runs on Mac, Windows, Android, and iOS.
• Easy to use, clean interface.
• Create albums to organize all your photos.
• Built-in presets to make editing easy.

⛔️ CONS:

• Costly to use cloud storage.
• May be too much for some users.

7. Fotor

Best Free Photo Editing App Online

Fotor is a photo editor software that allows you to utilize its photo editing suite to create top-notch photos. In just a few clicks you can adjust the color, size, lighting and more. It also has an HDR effect for your advanced editing needs.

The magic of Fotor is its extensive library of one-click filters to enhance and liven up any photo. Although Fotor is not as powerful as Photoshop and not as feature-rich as GIMP, it holds its own with a solid set of skills such as RAW file processing, borders, frames, color enhancement, and lighting adjustments.

If you like Fotor, there is also a Pro version you can purchase. However, it only works on the Windows platform. Read our review of the best windows photo editor.

👆 Special Features:

• Image Shape
• Fonts
• Stickers
• Align
• Drop Shadow
• Transparency
• CLone
• Color Picker
• Photo Collage
• Filters
• HDR
• Beauty Retouching

✅ PROS:

• Has web, mobile and desktop version
• Smart filters and effects
• Collage maker
• Raw file converter
• Has a social network

⛔️ CONS:

• Lots of ads
• Inability to edit photos at a deeper level
• Incompatible with creating images from scratch

8. VSCO

VSCO is another contender in our line-up of the best free picture editing apps. VSCO is a minimalistic app with a simple interface and powerful features. Its best feature is the vast library of filters to enhance your images and make them share-worthy.

You can do so within the VSCO social media channel. Yes, they have their own social network but you aren’t limited to just that one. VSCO also offers some other photo editing tools such as adjusting color, balance, highlights, cropping, and spot healing. The free version is limited to only ten filters, which isn’t very many compared to the 200+ you get with the paid version. A VSCO premium membership costs $19.99/year.

👆 Special Features:

• Filters
• Clarity
• Tint
• Fade
• X-Skew
• Y-Skew
• Skin Tone
• Highlights Tint
• Shadows Tint

✅ PROS:

• Includes its own social network to share images.
• Easy to use interface.
• Excellent editing tools with the paid version.
• Powerful camera features like ISO, exposure, white balance, and focus.
• Save images in RAW format.
• Video editing.
• Create montages easily.
• The ability to share from within the app.

⛔️ CONS:

• Requires a paid subscription for the best features.
• Only works on mobile devices, no app for PC or Mac.
• Not as good for social media image creation.
• Pushes upgrading.
• No option to take selfies with the app.
• No zoom features.

9. BeFunky

BeFunky is much more than just a free photo editor. With easy to use features, this photo editor app provides high-quality results whenever you use it to edit photos or make collages. You’ll have fun using this software for years to come.

Using the myriad of free collage layouts and design elements, you can quickly create a new Facebook banner or other social media image. The program is an online photo editor but also supports a handy mobile app. Integrations allow you to save your masterpiece to Dropbox or Google Drive and share it on Facebook, Pinterest, or Twitter. BeFunky’s drag-and-drop functionality makes it a breeze to use.

👆 Special Features:

• Collage
• Crop
• Resize
• Digital Art
• Cartoonizer
• Enhance DLX
• Font Pairing
• Create Wallpapers for Your Device
• Edit and Replace Colors
• Batch Processing

✅ PROS:

• Complete control of your work
• Easier than most programs to use
• Privacy
• Editing tools have variety

⛔️ CONS:

• No eraser tool
• Additional content has a cost

10. Pixlr

You can’t beat the convenience factor of a powerful photo editor that runs in your browser, and Pixlr delivers. Pixlr is a great way to have a convenient photo editor at your fingertips that is user-friendly and can provide the professional-looking images you imagined.

Pixlr is a Photoshop clone that offers a generous treasure trove of image-editing features along with the ability to import photos from Facebook. Pixlr has also been compared to GIMP in terms of functionality and user interface. Although it may be overkill for some, it’s just the right balance of form and functionality for others.

👆 Special Features:

• Edit Photos Using Dropbox
• Layers
• Filters
• Adjustments
• Texts
• Fonts
• Magic Wand
• Lasso
• Brushes
• Eraser
• Object Transform
• Color Replace
• Digital Painting
• Image Retouching
• Digital Inking
• Photo Collage
• Effects

✅ PROS:

• Available on desktop and mobile
• Supports layers and masks
• Customize the interface

⛔️ CONS:

• Some ads

11. Snapseed for Android and iOS

Best Photo Editing App for Professional Photographers

Snapseed is a free online photo editor designed for the serious photographer who wants to enhance their photos professionally. Its primary focus is on providing filters that will change the effects. You can also share your creations with its export tool.

The software uses stacks/layers of edits so you can remove, arrange, or apply them at will. These stacks can be saved as a “look,” meaning a style which you can then use to apply to other photos. Compared to other apps, Snapseed shines with an impressive array of filters, brushes, and nondestructive editing tools that will delight any serious photo editing buff.

👆 Special Features:

• Pre-Made Filters
• Looks
• Tools
• Export

✅ PROS:

• Nondestructive editing
• Selective edit brushes
• Photographic filters

⛔️ CONS:

• More suitable for experienced users
• No auto-save

12. PhotoScape

PhotoScape was designed for the beginner, but don’t let that fool you; it is a powerhouse of features and functionality. Although the layout of PhotoScape is a bit clunky, the tools are solid, and along with retouching features, you can easily add filters to your images, create animated GIFs, batch edit photos, create slideshows and more using dozens of free templates.

The list of accolades is impressive for a free photo editor app.

PhotoScape gives you the ability to create stunning images with access to multiple tools. Enhancing your photos becomes more convenient, and you aren't disappointed by a system that doesn't deliver. It has your basic features and more advanced ones such as Batch Processing, Font pairing, and Digital Art.

👆 Special Features:

• Viewer
• Editor
• Batch Editor
• Page
• Combine
• Animated GIF
• Print
• Splitter
• Screen Capture
• Color Picker
• Rename
• Raw Converter
• Paper Print
• Face Search

✅ PROS:

• Plenty of Features
• Effects Preview

⛔️ CONS:

• Redundant Interface

13. Paint.NET

Paint.Net started as a built-in program on the Windows platform and evolved into its own standalone photo editing software with an innovative user interface that supports many features. This photo editor can be extended through plug-ins to give a wide variety to what the photo editor app can do.

While it provides a clean layout and powerful tools, this program is not for beginners. It boasts of a main working window with the tools corralled into their own movable windows. The program uses layers to keep everything organized. A design aficionado will be disappointed with the lack of some features, but for most users, it’s a great solution.

👆 Special Features:

• Layers
• Unlimited Undo
• Special Effects
• Powerful Tools
• Unlimited History

✅ PROS:

• Innovative Interface
• Keyboard Shortcuts for Tools and Menu Items
• Font Previews

⛔️ CONS:

• Little Control Over Text
• Minimal Layer Effects
• Few Brush Options

14. GIMP

Best Open-source Photo Editor

GIMP is open-source software and a favorite among many graphic designers. GIMP has often been compared to Photoshop. While it shares many of the same features and functionality of the popular photo editing software, GIMP is free.

Some of the highlights are a plethora of brushes to choose from, filters, and even plugins to make the software more desirable. GIMP also supports animation. Because of all this, GIMP is by far our pick for the best free photo editor.

👆 Special Features:

• Color Correction
• Skin Retouching
• Eyes Brightening
• Customizable Interface
• Graphic Design Elements
• Original Artwork
• Photo Enhancement
• Inkscape
• Swatch booker

✅ PROS:

Best Photo Sketch Editor App

• Compatible With Many File Types
• Developer Support
• User-Friendly Interface
• Open Source Code

⛔️ CONS:

• Functionality

15. Photo Pos Pro

Photo Pos Pro is excellent for creating computer graphic designs and text that will pop. It is a powerful software that can be mastered by advanced and beginner photo editors. The system has a program that offers assistance for beginners who need step by step instructions.

With Photo Pos Pro, you get the best of both worlds, the choice of a beginner or expert interface. Photographers will love the support for RAW files, the many filters, and retouching tools. Both the novice and pro interfaces are a bit confusing and cluttered. It’s a very personal preference when picking the best free photo editor for you.

👆 Special Features:

• Filters
• Layers
• Masks
• Curves
• Scripts
• Effects
• Brushes
• Frames and Collages
• Text Effects
• RAW Files Support
• Remove, Erase, and Replace Backgrounds

✅ PROS:

• Great For Any Level of Experience
• Superb Help and Tutorials
• Manual Editing and Automatic One-Click Editing Balance

⛔️ CONS:

• Large Learning Curve
• Software Glitches

16. Colorcinch

Colorcinch is another great free photo editor with some advanced features that rival PhotoShop. The one-click photo cartoonizer is a fun feature to turn a photo into a cartoon and a work of art all in one. Check out this complete how-to guide to turn your photo into a cartoon.

This free photo editor app is easy to use and full featured, with the ability to use layers, overlays, artistic masks, blur, blend, frames, or eliminate blemishes. The free version works very well, but you can also pay for an enhanced version for $4-$6/month, depending on the plan you choose.

Some features are not available in the free plan, like premium filters and enhancements.The interface is super simple. Just drag and drop a photo and begin editing. People seem to love the cartoon feature; however, some users have experienced bugs. The company recently rebranded; let’s hope they upgraded the app to go with the new name.

✅ PROS:

• One-click cartoon feature.
• Layers.
• Easy to use.
• Full-featured photo editor and text editor.
• Advanced features.
• Inexpensive

⛔️ CONS:

• No batch edit feature (yet).
• Premium features not included with the free version.

How to Choose The Best Free Photo Editor?

When it comes to choosing the best photo editor software, there are many things to take into account. The top features to look at are the file formats, organizing tools, photo sharing, and standard editing tools. These items are significant for those who're interested in doing photo editing whether it is for pleasure or career.

File Formats

File formats like jpg, gif, and png are essential to have if you're uploading your photos to the Internet. These formats allow you to compress the file size of the images to publish them on the web.

Organizing Tools

Having a free online photo editor should come with tools to help keep you organized. It is essential to have features that will keep track of your photos by using thumbnail previews, search, and naming schemes.

Standard Editing Tools

Having the basics is vital to being successful at photo editing and utilizing the photo editor software of your choice. Some of the typical tools you'll need are adjusting brightness and contrast in your photos, crop, resize, and rotating the images. They should be easy to catch onto and fast to use.

Searching for how to resize images without losing quality? Follow our step-by-step guide on how to do it at no time.

Photo Sharing

We all know how eager we get to post our work and personal photos online. With the right program, it will reduce the time it'll take to upload the image online. That will decrease the need to have a photo editor software that has blogging tools to get your photos posted.

If you want to edit your photos like a PRO, check out the following presets of ours. Alternatively, you can leave it to professionals; FixThePhoto is one of the best photo editing companies to assign your photo retouching tasks.

Finding the best free photo editor is what will set you apart with your photography whether it's a hobby or your career. Choose from these free online photo editor apps to enhance your photos with a few simple clicks. The best part about photo editor online software is that you don't have to break the bank with these free, high-quality programs and can do it from any device, because they are web-based.

Related Articles:

5 Free Image Resizer Apps for You in 2020
5 Tips on How to Optimize Images for Web

Launchberg editors pick and review products independently. We may earn affiliate commissions when you purchase an item via our links—it helps support our testing.

Artists and illustrators have a new super-tool in their arsenal - Drawing Apps. Tech-savvy creatives are making the switch from paper to digital and reaping the benefits that drawing apps and art apps offer - powerful drawing tools, special effects, the ability to create vectors or raster images, and even 3D models.

There are a ton of drawing apps, art apps, painting apps, and sketch apps available now to creatives, each with their own USP. Some excel in vector drawings, others in graphic illustrations. There are dedicated apps for image manipulation, mimicking hand drawing, and 3d modeling. While several apps come only in paid versions, there are plenty of free drawing apps available as well.

What are the best drawing apps?

Here is a list of the best drawing apps and art apps in 2021 to express your ideas as digital art.

Adobe Photoshop

No list of creative apps would be complete without listing offerings from Adobe. Adobe has led the pack for decades, and Adobe Photoshop is still the professional's choice for raster art creation. Photoshop is one of the best drawing apps for Mac and PC; they also provide accessory apps for mobile devices and tablets.

The biggest drawback of Adobe’s offerings, especially for beginners, is that you now must purchase a subscription to use these apps. For established pros with stable cash flow, this presents a little problem, but for aspiring amateurs and beginners, there are plenty of apps that offer good functionality at a fraction of the cost.

Adobe Photoshop Sketch

If you’re looking for an app that combines the ease and simplicity of drawing on your mobile device with the power of Adobe Photoshop, check out Photoshop Sketch. When combined with your Adobe Creative Cloud subscription, Photoshop Sketch allows you to fine-tune images created on your tablet later on your computer.

Adobe Illustrator

Just as Photoshop is the industry standard for raster pictures, Illustrator is the go-to for vector art. Illustrator is used to creating everything from basic graphic design tasks like logos to elaborate and beautiful landscapes and portrait photos. With a little practice, you can make nearly anything into a vector in Illustrator.

Adobe Illustrator Draw

Similar to Photoshop Sketch, but for vector drawing, Illustrator Draw allows you to create vector drawings on the go easily. You can then save them to your creative cloud account and fine-tune them in the full program later. Both Photoshop Sketch and Illustrator Draw are free downloads, but if you want to export the images for later editing, you’ll need a Creative Cloud subscription.

Autodesk Sketchbook

Sketchbook from Autodesk is one of the most robust raster drawing programs you will find. Compared to Photoshop, Sketch is a purpose-built platform for artists on the go. It’s not meant for photo editing or other tasks, so the program focuses on just what you need to draw on your tablet easily. The program is available for Macs, PCs, iOS, and Android devices. Unlike many apps that stick to proprietary or generic formats, Sketchbook conveniently has the option to export to Photoshop PSD format with layers intact. The best part? Autodesk has now released the full-featured drawing program for free.

Astropad Studio

The Astropad Studio is a different sort of app that can be a great help to folks looking to create digital drawings. For Mac and iPad users, Studio allows you to connect your iPad wirelessly to your desktop and use it as if it were a drawing tablet. The interface is pretty smooth, but make sure you have a clean system with plenty of free memory to avoid lag. You’ll also want a great stylus like the Apple Pencil.

Affinity Designer

The Affinity set of art apps is poised to take a significant bite out of Adobe’s market share. These programs are full-featured to the point of having things you have to buy aftermarket in Adobe. Designer is Affinity’s answer to Illustrator. It is a desktop vector art program with every feature you could ever want. Designer is available for Mac desktop or iPad.

Affinity Photo for iPad

Affinity is also ready to answer your raster art needs. Photo by Affinity is analogous to Photoshop. Its user interface is a bit smoother, however, with cleaver skin changes based on the type of task you’re looking to complete.

Both Affinity apps are inexpensive when compared to Photoshop and Illustrator. If you’re looking for a great program to learn photo editing or raster drawing with, look no further than Photo and Photo for iPad.

Inspire Pro

For all the painters out there, Inspire Pro turns your iPad into the ultimate painting canvas. This is one of those simple raster drawing apps that can produce some really fantastic artwork thanks to super realistic brushes and massive canvas sizes. You can download Inspire Pro from the Apple App Store.

MediBang Paint

A few key features make Medibang’s apps the best drawing app for some artists. The app is available on any platform you can think of, from Windows and Mac desktops to Apple and Android tablets. They all have a cloud feature, which allows you to easily store, share, and open your work from any device. This is one of the free drawing apps you really should check out if you want to start drawing today easily and cheaply.

Procreate

Procreate is an iOS-only app designed to fully harness the power of Apple’s popular iPad Pro and Apple Pencil combination. More than just a drawing app, Procreate combines many of the powerful tools you’d expect to find in a much more robust program like Photoshop. Layers, custom brushes, and all sorts of special effects are available on your tablet. You can export images, with intact layers, straight to PSD format to open in Photoshop. For on-the-go art, check out their iPhone version as well.

Zen Brush 2

Zen Brush is a simple ink brush app for mobile devices. Of the drawing apps for free, it’s super inexpensive and fun to use, but it is pretty limited. But then, ink and paper are pretty limited too, but that hasn’t stopped artists from making amazing artworks with them for the last thousand years.

Pixelmator Pro

Pixelmator Pro is a Mac OS app that combines many features and functions of other apps all into one tidy app. Pixelmator features many of the best features for drawing and the standard photo editing functions of other editors. It also features a 'layouting' mode for publishing and graphic design work. Their iOS app for mobile is really more of a photo editor rather than an art app.

Assembly

Those in the graphic design world know that there’s a lot more to digital art creation beyond hand sketching. Illustrator and other vector programs use shapes to “assemble” designs, and this is the idea beyond the Assembly app. By simplifying this process, the app allows users to create logos and design elements with ease quickly. Assembly is made for iOS devices.

Graphic

Formerly iDraw, Graphic is a full-featured vector design program for Mac, iPhone, or iPad. The program has all of the features of its more popular competitors, and it allows for the creation of anything from portraits to technical layout and CAD style drawings.

Inkist

Inkist is a super basic drawing app that is available for Mac computers and iOS devices. The mobile app is currently free. It’s not flashy, but it has all the right features to make your artwork pop.

ArtStudio

Luckyclan’s ArtStudio is a full-featured raster art app for iPad or iPhone. It features multiple canvas sizes, layers with masks, over 400 brushes, unlimited undo/redo, and even over 40 filters.

Pixaki

Rizer’s Pixaki has a bit of a limited audience, but if you’re into pixel art, you’re going to love it. Export your creations to GIFs and other simple animation formations. The program can open and save to all the popular formats, including Photoshop, PNGs, and ZIP archives. Start with a sketch or photo, and soon you are rocking it retro style like it’s 1990.

Infinite Painter

Available on Google Play for Android tablets, Painter is a user-friendly drawing app that you’ll love. Organized workflows make navigating the screen easy and keep the workspace less cluttered. Powerful tools like 3D rendering and over 80 brushes make this one of the best full-featured art apps for Android devices.

ArtRage

If you’re looking for great drawing apps that can work on nearly any computer or tablet, you’ve got to check out ArtRage. ArtRage is available in multiple versions, including their free drawing apps called ArtRage Lite for Windows and Mac computers. This program and a loyal following of users, with many fantastic tutorials and inspiration available from other artists.

Concepts

The Concepts App is an interesting program aimed at professional designers that work on Apple, Windows, and Google devices. It uses vector drawings to store ideas; it is very much like a pocket notebook that has gone entirely digital. From brainstorm to “exploring happy accidents,” as the company puts it, to rendering captivating color illustrations and sharing them with the built-in presentation mode, Concepts has your creative brain covered.

Comic Draw

If drawing comics is your beat, Comic Draw is worth checking out. The app is tailor-made for creating single-panel cartoons on your mobile device. You can pair it with the company’s Comic Life app for desktop on either Windows or Mac. Put your frames together into a full-featured comic spread with these art apps.

Paper by Wetransfer

If you’re looking for a doodle and sketchbook app to collate your ideas and let your creativity go on a walkabout, you’ll love this app. One of the best free drawing apps we know of, it's super simple and yet powerful. With a simple toolset and a blank page, let your mind go creative on Paper.

Tayasui Sketches

Available for Mac desktop, iOS mobile devices, and Android, Tayasui’s Sketches app is an artist favorite for many reasons. The user interface and app functions are some of the smoothest on the list. The clean look of the sketch space can’t be beaten. Color blending and gradient tools, along with patterns and the most realistic brushes you can find, round out this fantastic app. Not many free drawing apps offer so many great features. If you really like what you see inside of Sketches, there is an upgraded Pro version available with even more brushes and tools. The community is an excellent source of both advice and examples.

Sketch Club

As the name suggests, one of the best parts of Sketch Club is the club. The first rule of sketch club: everyone talks about Sketch Club. Combining social media inside the app, you can share your creations and comment on others. Who doesn’t love browsing an art gallery on your tablet? The community features daily themed challenges and lots of featured artists whose works you can browse for inspiration. The Sketch Club app is available for Apple iOS in the App Store.

Artflow

If your Android tablet isn't feeling the love with all of these iPad apps in the running, don't lose heart. Artflow is a beautiful drawing app for Android that features a clean user interface and lots of pro features like layers and custom brushes. It is the perfect drawing and painting app to create paint your dream.

Art Set 4

Art Set app for Ipad features tools that look very similar to ones in real life. Art Set 4 is the redesigned and upgraded version of Art Set with more advanced tools for digital painting. This paint program now also has a 3D paint feature along with a workspace that adjusts according to your needs. Although it is a free drawing app for iPad, the pro version gives a ton of features that are essential like setting canvas size of any resolution, auto backup, layers, and 150 more brushes than the free version.

iPastels

This app also features pastel tools which give the feel of real pastels. You can also blend colors on the app using your fingers. iPastels is a free drawing app which is especially useful when you want something to improve your skills when you are in the early stages of your learning. This iPad Pro drawing app has features like layers, apple pencil support, high accuracy which is done by 'floating point accuracy.' The blending of pastels also can be done without much effort in this art drawing app. One unique feature of this easy drawing app is that you can show the pictures as tiles alongside each other; this feature is called the seamless pattern editing mode. Don't have an iPad? Don't worry, iPastels is also a drawing app for the iPhone.

Brushes Redux

Brushes Redux is a free open source painting app which is used both on iPad and iPhone and the work syncs between the two. Other features of this iOS app are the ability to autosave, unlimited undo and redo, adding layers among others. This digital drawing app is quick and easy to use with OpenGL based painting engine and offers 64-bit paint. On their 3.2 version of the app, they are now providing experimental apple pencil support and started the iTunes file sharing option.

Clip Studio Paint EX

If you are looking for an iPad drawing app that has dedicated tools to create manga and comics, this might be the perfect app for you. Not only this, but you can also do illustration, drawing, and painting on this art app. To get six months free subscription a user has to sign up for the EX version of the app. This online drawing app is specially designed for professionals as it has a different exporting option like a movie or animated GIF's, it supports apple pencil, and Wacom bamboo sketch. One can draw moving illustrations as well in this drawing app for iPad.

uMake

An award-winning app, uMake is an iPad Pro drawing app for 3D design. Its website claims that uMake is the first 3D design app created for iPad. This 3D modeling and design app gives the features of desktop CAD software on the iPad. An excellent tool for those who are learning 3D modeling and the ability to do so on iPad opens the door for more creative work on the go. They also provide video tutorials on different topics so that it gets easier to learn how to use the app and to create desired results. Some of their best features are 3D tools to pull and push, augmented reality features, and complex surface creation making it one of the best drawing apps for iPad pro. They offer a 14-day trial and then you can subscribe monthly, quarterly, or yearly based on your requirement.

Paper Colour (Paint Draw Sketchbook, Paint Draw)

This android drawing app is suitable for those who want to learn drawing or painting. It has a feature called basemap which helps a user to set a photo as translucent and draw over it. This Android painting app is very similar to someone tracing on a paper and drawing over the original. This free app is suitable is more amateurs and has additional features on the pro version which can is through in-app purchases.

ibisPaint X

ibis Paint is the of the best drawing apps for Android out there. It has some unique features like recording your drawing as video, and SNS features where you can see and learn from videos other users have made. Other features like fast open GL technology, 142 brushes, 37 filters, and 700 fonts makes it an obvious choice for people looking for an android drawing app with lots of plus points. Apart from this, there are separate features for those artists who are interested in creating manga. To get more features like lesser ads, additional fonts, and materials, gradation map filter, etc. one has to purchase through in-app purchases.

Dotpict

Dotpict drawing free app is available on Android, iPhone, and iPad. This drawing app is only designed to create pixel art. Some features of the dotpict app are different sharing and exporting options, zoom of canvas to see fine details, and display of grids among others.

RoughAnimator

As the name says, RoughAnimator is used to create animations. RoughAnimator drawing app lets you create hand-drawn frame by frame animations on multiple kinds of devices like Android, iOS, and desktop as well. This animation app offers essential features like unlimited layers, onion skinning, audio, and video import, apple pencil and Wacom stylus support, and more but at a price. What better way to start learning animation on your mobile?

Sketch by Sony

Sketch by Sony is a simple Android and iOS sketching app in which brushes and other tools are used to create digital art. The drawing can be done using a finger or a stylus, and the user can create layers in this application. Sony has provided a big community in this app where people can explore other works and showcase their work as well. One can also personalize their feed and collaborate with other artists to create new work. The in-app purchases can access some additional features.

Pigment

Pigment describes itself as adult coloring app, but it looks like kids will also have a lot of fun with it. It is an app to color already drawn pages by professionals and many exclusively by Disney. There are more than 4000 pages to choose from and its drawing tools like pencils, markers, and paintbrushes give you the feeling like you are using natural colors and tools. There are unlimited colors to choose from the color wheel, sounds fun right? To get features like premium brushes and the entire library you have to subscribe to the premium version.

Hexagon

Hexagon is a software for creating 3D models. It has all the tools a graphic artist would need. Some of the outstanding features are DAZ Studio Bridge, freehand modeling brushes, micro displacement modeling tools, comprehensive UV mapping modules, and more. In Hexagon, you can see real-time shadows and instant ambient occlusion. With this modeling software, you can create 3D models for game development in high quality.

Sculptris

An excellent platform for someone who wants to make a foray into the world of 3D drawing. With Sculptris, you can create base models which can then be refined in other software like ZBrush. The 3D software can locally redefine the internal structure of the model you are working with. Sculptris has tools that will make you feel like you are working with real clay. You can also paint a wrapped texture on the mesh surface with this software. (Please note that sculptris was last updated in 2011 and may not function in newer systems)

Blender

Blender is an open-source, free 3D software, which supports modeling, rigging, animation, simulation, rendering, composition, and motion tracking, editing video, and 2D animation pipeline. Developed by experts from multiple fields around the world, Blender has a built-in powerful path-trace engine that offers real results. It has advanced sculpting and other tools through which you can create and transform the models with ease. Blender has a flexible interface in which you can adjust the layout, colors, fonts, etc. There are a lot of add-ons created by users that can be used by anyone using the software.

ZBrush

ZBrush is one of the best software for digital sculpting. With the customizable brushes, you can create shapes, textures, and paint virtual clay. The advanced tools offered by ZBrush is the same as the tools used by designers and artists worldwide. The software has a Non-Photorealistic Rendering (NPR), which enables you to see the artwork in a whole new way. You can convert the 3D artwork into 2D drawing and transfer the sculpted artwork into a comic book. Through ZBrush, you can add overlaying textures, draw outlines, and apply various effects from built-in presets.

Krita

Krita is an open-source painting program, made by artists to provide affordable art tools. This free painting app can be used to create conceptual art, texture and matte, illustration, and comics. Krita, designed for both amateurs and professionals, provides an intuitive interface. This interface can be customized according to your workflow. The dynamic brush tool in Krita can be used to create drag and mass and you can smoothen and stabilize your brush strokes. There are more than nine different brush engines like color smudge engine, shape engine and more through which you can customize your brushes, to suit specific requirements.

Aseprite

Best Photo To Sketch App For Android

Aseprite is a program through which you can create 2D animations. Through this program, you can also create sprites, pixel art, retro-style graphics, and everything related to the 8-bit and 16-bit era. Aseptrite can work on Windows, Mac, and Ubuntu. The program can organize layers, create animations, and custom brushes. The work can be saved in GIF, PNG, and JSON format.

Marmoset Hexels 3

Hexels is a grid-based painting, animation, and design program. With Hexels, you can create complex designs and stunning drawings. With the combination of digital art tools and geometric grid, through which you can paint in free form with the precision of vector art. Powerful software for a pixel artist who can keep track of the colors and gradients with the palette. The canvas can be turned into animation, and a sprite sheet can also be exported easily. This program can be used on Windows as well as Mac devices.

My Paint

Started in 2014, My Paint is an easy-to-use tool for digital artists. My Paint supports graphic tablets by Wacom and similar devices. Due to its versatile and easily configurable brush engine and productive tools, you can create great artwork.

Painter Mobile

Corel Painter Mobile is a powerful tool for creators that allows them to paint when a moment of artistic inspiration strikes. It allows artists to paint, trace from scratch and easily color in images.

Things to consider when choosing a drawing app:

Platform Matters

If you're serious about taking up digital drawing, consider your hardware choices carefully. Ideally, you'll want to sample the exact tablet and computer setup with the stylus of your choice. In short, some are glitchier than others, and creating art requires more finesse than some can deliver.

If possible, consider a tablet with a stylus made by the same manufacturer, for example, the Apple iPad Pro with the Apple Pencil. This ensures the two pair perfectly for the smoothest possible drawing experience. Do check out our list of the best Drawing tablets for Graphics, Art, and Illustration.

Also, look for pressure sensitivity. Different styluses handle the task differently. The feedback provided with pressure sensitivity adds an extra realism that makes drawing on your tablet as close to analog pencil and paper as you can imagine.

As with all apps, be sure to check the operating system used by the app of your choice. The most popular platforms are Windows, macOS, Apple iOS, and Android, and unfortunately, very few apps work on all of them.

Raster vs. Vector Drawing Apps

In the digital world, there are two sorts of images you can draw. Raster images, like JPG or PNG photographs, are drawn pixel by pixel. If you zoom in or enlarge the picture, it will get blurrier and blurrier if it exceeds the pixel size of the image. Think of this as drawing on paper, and you are limited by how large your paper is. You cannot expand the paper size like you cannot expand the pixels. Drawing a raster image is as simple and reasonably intuitive, depending on the app.

Vector drawings solve this problem but unfortunately, add much more complexity. Vector images, like AI or EPS formats, are the world standard in the printing industry. These pictures are made more like computer programs than photographs. In vector drawing applications, you make many paths (lines or shapes) that make up your image. It takes a bit more practice. Some vector apps make the process super simple, but the professional programs with all the bells and whistles take a bit of getting used to.

3D Programs

No discussion of online drawing apps would be complete without a word about three-dimensional drawing apps. If you're looking to create 3D modeling or going for that other-worldly feel that is everywhere, you'll want to make sure to pick the best drawing app that is capable of producing 3D images too. And don't feel left out if you got your drawing apps for free, some of these include 3D rendering also!

Conclusion

Now that you have an idea of how many free drawing apps are out there to choose from, you may feel a bit taken back. But remember, the most fun part of finding the best canvas for your project of choice is the adventure of trying them all out! So which do you think is the best drawing app?

Disclaimer: The images shown are for illustration purposes only and may not be an exact representation of the final product. All images are copyright to their respective owners.

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