Although Adobe Illustrator is one of the best tools to make vector graphics, it’s indeed expensive. Fortunately, there are some free alternatives available for designers in the market.
Contrary to raster graphics, vector graphics utilize mathematical expressions to create lines, colors and various shapes. It means that they are highly scalable. Vector graphics are best used in designing website graphics, posters, diagrams, logos and icons. In illustration tasks, the present standard is SVG (Scalable Vector Graphics).
Adobe Illustrator has been the best friend for many graphics designers while creating vector graphics. But as it is an expensive tool, designers usually look for less expensive or free alternatives especially when their needs are simple. Thus, hereby presenting before you the best free Adobe Illustrator alternatives that can prove as brilliant picks especially when you have relatively simple requirements.
Top 6 Free Alternatives to Adobe Illustrator
Look at the 6 free alternatives to Adobe Illustrator you can find online. Read On!
1. Canva
Canva is one of the most popular browser-based designing tool that can any day be used as an Adobe Illustrator alternative. The web-based software offers over 50,000 templates different types of purpose. The software can be used to design ads, posters, ebook covers, logos, icons and many more things.
Even though it’s not possible to design anything from scratch (as Canva does not have any drawing tool), there are many templates that can be used and customized according to your needs.
Canva simplifies the process of designing and helps you create more complex, elegant and professional-looking vector designs without any design capabilities.
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Inkscape is arguably the best alternative to Adobe Illustrator. This feature-rich image editor consists of a comprehensive toolkit, offers excellent support and frequent updates. However, the tool can sometimes perform sluggishly.
Inkscape is a powerful tool that is used by both professional illustrators, web designers, and hobbyists. In addition to the standard drawing toolkit, Inkscape also offers specialized spiral tools and a tool to construct difficult patterns. It also offers advanced object manipulation features, diversified filters and some classy fill settings.
Inkscape is an open-source software. Thus, users with technical know-how can edit Inkscape and customize it as per their needs. Although some users complain about its sluggish behavior, its performance entirely depends upon the device you are using. Click here to download Inkscape.
3. Gravit Designer
Gravit Designer is one of the best vector design tools that is powerful, fast and free. Gravit Designer is compatible to all major browsers and can be also downloaded for Mac, Linux, Windows and Chrome OS. You get complete cloud sync integration with all its versions.
The software contains basics functionalities that you would find in the Illustrator. It also includes a pen tool and a freehand sketching tool. Users find it comparatively easy to design custom shapes with Pathfinder tool. There are many keyboard shortcuts in Gravit Designer, which make work much easier. The best part is that many of the shortcuts do match with ones in Adobe Illustrator. It helps in easier transition to Gravit. Again, there are many libraries that consist of pre-designed shapes, lines, icons and illustrations. The software even supports CMYK. Click here to visit or download Gravit Designer.
4. SVG-Edit
SVG-Edit is a decent alternative to Adobe Illustrator that is used by many web developers. It is a web-based tool that does not have any server-side processing and has comparatively less sophisticated tools than its counterpart. If you want to develop SVG files for your websites, SVG-Edit is the perfect vector graphics designing tool for you. It’s free and allows you to easily create and edit SVG images.
It supports any modern-day browser and provides basic vector editing toolkit features. Some of its features include path tools, text tools, shape tools and hand-drawing tools. SVG-Edit is open source. Hence, users with technical expertise and developers can always add new features to the tool.
SVG-Edit is built on JavaScript, CSS3 and HTML and it has no server-side functionality. Click here to download SVG-Edit.
5. Vectr
Vectr is one of the best Adobe Illustrator alternatives that is available as a web app and a desktop app. It is simple and quickly creates vector designs.
Although Vectr is not as feature-packed as Gravit or other tools in the list, it has got all basic features to make beautiful vector designs. The app is specially designed to develop social media cover images. For simplification of the process, there are pre-adjusted document sizes. Thus, it becomes convenient to import images and include text on top.
It also supports seamless cloud integration. Images developed in Vectr have their unique URL. so, they can be easily shared with anyone. You can even export images in JPEG, PNG and SVG formats.
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Boxy SVG is a web-based vector image editor that is easy to use, is available in the form of a browser extension and supports almost all formats.
Boxy SVG is one of the best browser-based alternatives to Adobe Illustrator. It creates scalable vector graphic files and includes basic tools such as basic shapes, text, bezier curves, pens and the capability to add paths, transforms, and types. The USP of the app is that it has an insanely simple user interface. Thus, it’s a quick tool to learn. You can export files in PNG and JPEG formats.
These are the best free alternatives to Adobe Illustrator that can be easily downloaded or used online. Though none of the above tools can match the entire skill sets of Adobe Illustrator, they can be definitely proved useful when creating logos, illustrations, posters and so on. We hope that the tools help you to create inspiring vector designs.
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