Adobe hikes Creative Cloud prices with a rebrand no one asked for
Adobe's new "Creative Cloud Pro" plan now comes with a new name, a bigger bill, and not much else. Here's how the price tiers compare in May 2025.
Adobe jacks up prices for same tools with a shiny new label
Adobe has just announced that it will jump prices on its Creative Cloud All Apps plan -- and gave it a bit of a rebrand in the process. At a time when everything is becoming more expensive, the move seems, at best, poorly timed.
Starting June 17, Adobe will jack up prices for access to its Creative Cloud subscription, and prices will go into effect upon a user's next renewal date. Here's what you can expect.
The cost of Adobe Creative Cloud Pro
For the average individual, that is someone who doesn't receive a license through their employer or school, the price increases are as follows:
- Monthly: $104.99 per month
- Annual, billed monthly: $69.99 per month
- Annual, prepaid: $779.99 per year
That's a significant increase over the previous pricing -- about 16.7% for the monthly and annual, billed monthly plans, and 18% for the annual prepaid plans.
For students and teachers, the pricing structure is as follows.
- New users, annual, billed monthly: $29.99 per month
- New users, annual, prepaid: $359.88 per year
- Renewing users, annual, billed monthly:$39.99 per month
- Renewing users, annual, prepaid: $479.88 per year
Students and teachers do not appear to have the option to pay month-to-month, so you'll automatically be opted into a 12-month contract.
And yes, all these prices are before taxes.
Image Credit: Adobe
Creative Cloud Pro features
So, what does Adobe Creative Cloud "Pro" get you, besides a more expensive bill? The answer is, unfortunately, "not that much."
It is essentially the same plan you were paying for before, but $10 more expensive per month. So, it's ostensibly just a flat price increase.
If you're unfamiliar with what is included, here's a quick recap:
- Full access to 20+ desktop apps, including Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, Premiere, and more
- Full access to mobile apps, including Photoshop, Lightroom, Illustrator, Acrobat, and Fresco.
- Unlimited access to "standard" generative features, like generative fill
- 4,000 credits per month for "premium" generative features, like generative video and audio
- Firefly Boards (in beta), allowing you to create multiple concept boards
- Choice to use non-Adobe AI models like OpenAI GPT, Google, Imagen and Veo, and Flux
- 100GB of cloud storage, plus options for higher storage plans
Introducing: Creative Cloud "Standard"
Adobe seems to recognize that the jump from $59.99 to $69.99 per month is significant -- after all, it adds on an extra $120 a year, before taxes. To soften the blow, Adobe has decided to give users a choice.
Current subscribers can downgrade their subscriptions -- though Adobe does not call it downgrading -- to "Creative Cloud Standard." This plan is actually a little less than the current cost of the All Apps plan:
- Monthly: $82.49 per month
- Annual, billed monthly: $54.99 per month
- Annual, prepaid: $599.88 per year
It's not without compromise, though. This plan strips out most of the AI features, which might be seen as a plus by many artists.
However, it also removes access to all mobile apps -- something that was included in the All Apps plan before -- except for Acrobat Mobile. So, if you liked Photoshop on iPad or Illustrator on iPad, you won't be able to use them if you downgrade to "Creative Cloud Standard."
Update: Adobe has since revised its policy on who can use Adobe Creative Cloud Standard. All individuals, whether new or existing customers, will have the option of using Creative Cloud Standard plan. Existing individuals are able to swap plans now.
Currently, new customers will need to talk to Adobe customer support via chat, as it is currently not integrated into the system. A self-service option for new customers should be available by May 23.
Teachers and students do not have the option to use Creative Cloud Standard.
Annual vs Annual, billed monthly vs Monthly plans
Before you pull the trigger on purchasing a plan, it's important to understand how each plan works. This is crucial, as Adobe has never made it particularly clear.
Adobe has three tiers of pricing for some of its plans: Monthly; annual, billed monthly; and annual, prepaid. Here's what each of those plans means.
Image Credit: SerenityArt at Pixabay
Monthly:
This is exactly what it sounds like -- the cost you'll pay, each month, to access Adobe's apps. This is the most expensive plan on a monthly basis by far.
The benefit is that you can cancel at any point with no fees -- something that Adobe is well-known for. However, the cost can be so prohibitively expensive that users may feel pushed into purchasing the "Annual, billed monthly" plan.
Annual, billed monthly
This is the plan that typically gets people into trouble, vis-a-vis fees. This plan allows you to split your one-year contract into twelve equal payments.
However, if at some point you decide that you don't want to -- or can't afford to -- pay that much, Adobe will charge you an early termination fee. Currently, the early termination fee is 50% of the remaining contract obligation.
It also kicks in very early -- you have 14 days to decide whether or not you want to continue paying. If you try to cancel on day 15 or later, you'll get slapped with that fee.
This plan is pricey in its own right, but may be the only viable option for creatives who can't pay for a yearly
Annual, prepaid:
If you want to pay a single, lump sum for your Adobe subscription, they make that option available to you as well. While this is the cheapest option in terms of overall cost, many creatives find it hard to drop hundreds of dollars upfront.
Of course, if you cancel your plan after 14 days, you don't get a refund, either.
Not the only price increase
While this marks Adobe's most recent price increase, it's not the only price increase of the year.
In January, Adobe also changed the pricing on its Adobe Creative Cloud Photography (20GB) plan -- sort of. For those who paid monthly for an annual subscription saw the price jump from $9.99 to $14.99.
However, if you pay for a 12-month Adobe Creative Cloud Photography (20GB) plan, you'll still pay $119.88 upfront -- so there's no price increase in that regard.
The Lightroom-only plan also saw an increase from $9.99 to $11.99 per month.
Death of Adobe Mobile bundle
To make matters worse, Adobe has killed off its $15 Mobile-only bundle subscription, which means iPad-only designers will now need to pay more than $70 to use the iPad apps, even if they never plan on using a desktop version of any software. That's a 367% increase.
It appears that you can still pay for individual mobile apps via in-app purchases at anywhere between $8 and $10 per month per app. It is unclear whether those who have the Adobe mobile-only bundle subscriptions will be allowed to stay on after June 17.
It's worth pointing out -- again -- that the Affinity universal license costs $164.99. For those who will miss Adobe Fresco, Procreate is a one-time purchase of $12.99 for the iPad and $5.99 for Procreate Pocket, the iPhone version.
Read on AppleInsider
Comments
Or had, rather, since I just cancelled it. I no longer use it enough to justify the cost, and have been using Pixelmator Pro for the odd work that I needed done.
Switching to a new program isn't easy... but it's getting easier, and I'm getting tired of Adobe's incessant price increases.
I'm currently going through the painful process of trying to delete the apps from my machine.
Apparently Adobe didn't hear about the "one click cancel/delete" law...
Adobe still obfuscates the fee issue. On the pricing pages when you go to purchase a subscription, it simply says "you'll be charged an early termination fee" but does not say that it's 50%. It may disclose it better when you make the actual purchase -- I haven't bought anything from Adobe in several years.
And to anyone who might read this -- I dunno if this trick still works, but it used to. If you're on the All-Apps "annual, paid monthly" plan and want to cancel, you may be able to save money by first downgrading your account to the Photography plan. Then when you cancel, you'll only be charged the 50% termination fee on a plan that is significantly cheaper than All Apps.
Again, haven't had to do this in a while, so I'm not sure if it works. Might be worth a try.
https://affinity.serif.com/en-us/
A few years back when I exited Adobe's subscription trap, I felt like joining this choir and celebrating.
I had the problem recently where I couldn't get Pixelmator to export to .ai format (guessing this disappeared when Apple bought them). So I tried exporting to PDF, but it wouldn't preserve the layers when the print house opened the file in Illustrator. Even though reopening the PDF in Pixelmator showed the layers just fine. Smells like there's Adobe lock-in, and so I'm wondering if Affinity figured out a way around it.
- Photoshop - Apple Pixelmator Pro is fantastic.
- Premiere Pro - Final Cut Pro is the replacement. You can even get a license for a shared computer while Adobe won't do unless EDU.
- Acrobat Pro - Preview does allow for PDF files to be combined and signing can be handled by other tools. pdf24 is OK for online use.
- InDesign is still the industry standard. I don't expect to ever go back to Quark.
- Illustrator was never fantastic. I don't see a switch to CorelDraw. Perhaps Affinity?
- XD... the last UX'er moved to Figma years ago. No wonder Adobe tried to buy it.
- After Effects... motion designers really like this.
- Lightroom... PhotoMechanic is what professionals use - at least if they need to deliver.
Companies could benefit from understanding their license use. Widespread use of Adobe software indicates a lot of non-creatives spending time on stuff they shouldn't spend their time on. We're talking broken workflows, that someone created templates for the SoMe team in Photoshop, manual steps, or "hidden factories" / failed outsourcing.May make sense for business, but as a home user who rarely upgrades those tools, it’s definitely a scam.
Notice: The you will own nothing and be happy side, always wins… next up Apple must share Apple Silicon with all that want it.
I really hope that Apple keeps Pixelmator apps around and doesn't Sherlock them. It would be a real shame as I use them almost everyday, at least Pixelmator Pro.