Going beyond GIMP for a free Photoshop alternative

Many people come to thriftmac looking for a free alternative to Photoshop. I fear many of them come away disappointed to discover what they likely already suspected — GIMP is the only 100 per cent free alternative.

But it’s not all bad. After seven years of development, GIMP is finally at version 3. The interface has improved, and the learning curve is not quite so steep. If you’re turned off by memories of the old GIMP, it might be worth giving this iteration a try.

Seashore — a sort-of light version of Photoshop — is also 100 per cent free, although you can make a donation to the developer. The catch is that it has been “deprioritized” in favour of a new project called Seahorse. It doesn’t cost much, but it isn’t free.

Affinity Studio comes close to being totally free, except that you have to pay for AI tools. I would pay not to have AI, so this a good thing from my point of view.

If you’re not fussy, you could try Photoscape X, which has a free version. According to its history page, though, it hasn’t had an update since January 2022. Plus, Firefox complains that the site is not secure.

And if you don’t need all of Photoshop’s functionality, there are two free apps that replace parts of it — Darktable for RAW editing and colour grading, and Krita for digital painting, brushes and layers.

We don’t deal with online apps at thriftmac, but here are few you could try: Photopea, Befunky and Pixlr. Mrs. thriftmac is a big fan of Befunky.

I would be remiss if I didn’t also mention Preview, which comes free with your Mac. It’s no Photoshop, but it does more than you might think.

I use Preview quite a bit. For those cases where it’s not good enough, I turn to Affinity Studio or GIMP.