Illustrator by Adobe is one of the best illustration software in the world. It is used by many of the artists and graphic designers. The main purpose of Illustrator is to create vector images, freehand drawings, logos, 2D and 3D graphic vectors, text typography, and trace works. It is the best software for professionals or peoples who know a thing or two about illustrations. But for beginners, Illustrator is one of the toughest tools to master. Moreover, it is not a free tool, it costs $29.99 per month that is more than three times of Netflix Basic Plan ($8.99 per month). So, if you are a beginner, you have to use some basic illustration tools and then go for the advanced ones. In this article, we picked the best alternatives for Adobe Illustrator.
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List of Best Alternatives for Adobe Illustrator
Below are the best alternatives of Adobe Illustrator:
- CorelDRAW
- Gravit Designer
- Inkscape
- Sketch
- Affinity Designer
- Graphic
- Xara Designer Pro
- BoxySVG
- Canvas X
- Vectr
Check our list of Best Lightroom Alternatives as well.
CorelDRAW
CorelDRAW is one of the best alternatives for Adobe Illustrator. It is considered as a rival for Illustrator.
For Illustration and Design, it has a dedicated tool called CorelDRAW Graphics Suite. It is available for both Windows and Mac. The illustration tool has 7000 cliparts and digital images, 1000+ TrueType and OpenType fonts, 600 vector fill, and 150 built-in templates. In addition to the Graphics Suite, you can get Photo-Paint for photo editing and Coral Website Creator also. The CorelDRAW Graphics Suite 2020 has all the illustration tools you need.
It costs $16.50 per month and $469 for a lifetime. It also has a 15-day free trial and 30-days money-back guarantee.
Gravit Designer
Gravit Designer can be used in two ways. You can access it with your web browser or you can install the software.
Gravit Designer has all the tools from colour adjustments to filters. It is a perfect illustration tool for both beginners and professionals. The application also has Gravit Cloud feature to save all your work. Gravit Designer is one of the easiest tools to master the illustration. It is one of the best alternatives for Adobe Illustrator. It is also available as an extension for the Chrome browser, you can download it on the Chrome Web Store.
Gravit Designer is available for free.
Inkscape
Inkscape is one of the best beginner tools for illustration and it is one of the best alternatives for Adobe Illustrator.
The tool has some basic tools like Pencil, Pen tool, Calligraphy tool, Shape tools, Text tools, Gradient tools, Fill and stroke tools. You can also create embedded bitmaps with ease. Inkscape can be downloaded on Windows, Mac, and Linux platforms. You can find almost all the Adobe Illustrator tools in the Inkscape, there is only a small difference. Still, it is not suited for professionals.
Inkscape is free for all platforms.
Sketch
Sketch is one of the best alternatives for Adobe Illustrator if you are a Mac user.
The illustrator tool is available only for the Mac platform. All the available tools are placed out of the editing screen, leaving you the whole screen to edit. In this, you can work without any congested tools. You can also add extra extensions like Stark, Pexels, Chart, Overflow, Vectary and much more. If you are professional, you can create your own extension and publish it on the Community page.
Sketch costs $99 for a lifetime.
Affinity Designer
Affinity Designer is a professional illustrator tool and it is a perfect Adobe Illustrator alternative.
It is one of the fastest graphic design tools. With the tool, you can zoom and pan at 60fps (Frames per second). All your editings can be previewed in real-time allow you to get the best colour correction. The tool is developed in such a way that it can handle more than 1000 objects without any lag. It is optimized for any complexity. It is available for Windows, Mac, and iPad.
Affinity Designer costs $49.99 for Windows and Mac, for iPad it costs $9.99.
Graphic
A graphic is a feature-rich tool. It is not only the Adobe Illustrator alternative, but it is also a competitor.
The Graphic is specially designed for Apple devices, It can be installed on Mac, iPad and iOS devices. It is best suited for professionals. For beginners, it has thousands of tutorial videos. With those videos, one can learn all the basics and how to create icons and logos. It has separate user guides for Mac, iPad, and iPhone. You can import and edit SVD, PSD, and even PDF files.
It costs $29.99, $8.99, $2.99 for Mac, iPad, and iPhone respetively.
Xara Designer Pro
Xara Designer Pro is one of the best alternatives for Adobe Illustrator with all its advanced features.
The illustrator tool comprises of tools and features for illustration, photo editing, web designing, and DTP (Desktop publishing). It has all the design tools like Page Layout, 3D Extrude, Blends, Live Effects, Text Handling, Feathering, and Shadows. Like Affinity Designer, it is one of the fastest tools. With Xara Designer Pro, you can perform infinite undo and redo. You can finetune your work as minute as possible as it has the capability of zooming up to 25,000%.
It costs $299 and has a free trial for 7 days.
BoxySVG
Like Gravit, BoxySVG can be used as an application and as a Web app.
As mentioned in the name, it uses SVG as a native document format. The rendering engine is the Chromium-based. If you some basic SVG and CSS codes, you can view and edit them using the built-in inspector. BoxySVG is rich in keyboard shortcuts, it has over 100 customizable keyboard shortcuts. It is available for macOS, Linux, Windows, and Chrome OS platforms. You can import and export any type of file like PNG, JPEG, GIF, PDF, WebP.
BoxySVG is available for free.
Canvas X
Canvas X is a powerful illustrator tool and considered one of the Adobe Illustrator alternatives.
With Canvas X, you can import and edit 70+ file formats, export with 40+ formats. It is one of the best tools to create both vector and raster images. Developed by ACD Systems, it is best suited for professionals. For beginners, it may be tough to master. You can share your work with encryption and password protection. Canvas X requires high-end PCs to run smoothly.
It costs $239 per year and $599 for a lifetime. It also has a 30-day free trial.
Vectr
Vectr is one of the simplest illustrator tool. It is best for beginners.
Like Gravit and BoxySVG, it was available as both applications and web. Now, it is available only as a Web app. With the intuitive interface, the platform is easy to learn. If the tool is difficult, you can use the tutorials. For every logo or illustration you create, you will get a unique URL for easy sharing. Since it is a web app, you can use the software on any OS.
Vectr is available for free.
Check our list of best free Photoshop alternatives as well.
These are the best Adobe Illustrator alternatives. Install or buy any of the illustrator tools mentioned above. If you are a beginner, go for any free tools. Once you master those free tools, buy any premium ones. Did we miss any of the best Adobe Illustrator alternatives? Mention that in the comments section.
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