Skip to content

Photoshop for iPad – Adobe’s classic editor is finally here

Adobe has been promising a full-fat iPad version of its beloved Photoshop software for a long time, and at long last, it’s arrived on the App Store.

Photoshop is the most popular image editing program in the world, used by professionals the world over to create and manipulate imagery. Artists, designers, photographers, and many kinds of other users rely on Photoshop daily, but until now it’s only been available as desktop computing software.

That’s not entirely true – Adobe has released many Photoshop-branded apps over the years, each dedicated to a certain specialization. But even this suite of interconnected apps couldn’t ever compete with “proper” Photoshop on the computer.

So it’s great to hear this ambitious new app uses the same code base as the desktop version. That means, finally, that this is real Photoshop on the iPad. Not a watered-down mobile version, but the real deal. As such, images can be created on one platform and continued on another with no loss of nuance or fidelity, and you’ll get the same powerful framework behind the scenes no matter whether you’re sat at home or halfway around the world.

Of course, there are a few caveats – although this is a true form of Photoshop, it doesn’t yet have every single feature from the desktop release. Not even close, in fact. At launch, all the functional basics are present but a lot of the more complex tools are missing. But this is a fantastic foundation, and Adobe has already outlined a roadmap for adding the rest.

Already, this is one of the most powerful editing suits available on iPad, and should help creatives carry out much more work on the go. The interface is familiar to Photoshop users, but makes some smart changes to better tailor itself to tablet use. Apple Pencil works a treat here, and feels much more natural than keyboard and mouse. Adobe says its working on an iPad port of its popular vector drawing app Illustrator, too. Plenty to look forward to!

You can download Adobe Photoshop free on the App Store, but you’ll need an Adobe license to use it. However, there’s a trial available, and if you already pay for Photoshop on desktop you won’t have to shell out again to use this version.

Adobe Photoshop