I’ve been a Canva subscriber for years. The $120 felt justified considering I could whip up graphics in minutes courtesy of Canva’s library of thousands of templates. For someone who isn’t great at spinning up graphics from scratch, it’s a godsend.

Canva isn’t just for posters anymore either, I’ve built a whole website with it. However, for all its functionality, it doesn’t quite match up to pro-grade tools with constant limitations. But if you’re willing to spend 15 minutes learning a new tool, there’s a free, open-source alternative that’s way better for anyone doing serious design work.

What is Penpot

An open-source design tool that actually feels premium

Credit: Yadullah Abidi / MakeUseOf

Penpot is a web-based design and prototype platform built on open-source principles, meaning no subscription fees, no vendor lock-in, and no hidden paywalls limiting your creativity.—a great alternative to Adobe apps like Photoshop and, of course, Canva.

Unlike Canva, which focuses on making design accessible to complete beginners, Penpot was created from day one to bridge the gap between designers and developers. Even if you’re just a content creator who doesn’t care about CSS standards and developer handoffs, Penpot still delivers everything you need.

The interface is clean, modern, and way less cluttered than Canva’s toolbar. You get drag-and-drop editing, real-time collaborations, component libraries, prototyping tools, templates, and even the ability to self-host the tool without paying a dime.

The tools that make Penpot seriously good

It has everything a designer needs, and then some

During the switch, I expected a slow transition where I’d miss having a specific Canva tool, realize that it’s called something else in Penpot, and fumble my way around the UI until I got the hang of it. Surprisingly, I didn’t.

Penpot includes a rather intuitive canvas with snap-to-grid alignment, layer management, and undo functionality that feels way more responsive. The design system features are leagues ahead of Canva. You get components, variants, and design tokens—think of them as reusable design blocks that keep everything consistent across the board. If you’re creating multiple designs with similar elements, this saves a ridiculous amount of time. Change a component once, and it automatically updates everywhere.

Text editing works exactly like you’d expect from professional tools like Adobe Photoshop. Adding shapes, icons, and graphics is equally straightforward, and you can export designs to PNG, JPG, or PDF formats, among others.

Additionally, since the tool uses web standards like SVG, CSS, and HTML, it forces you to think about design in a more structured way. CSS flexbox and grid layouts work exactly like they do on the web, so when you’re designing for digital, you’re designing in a way that translates directly to code. For someone who creates his own user interface and design elements for projects, this is a major convenience.

This might sound nerdy to anyone not concerned about the CSS code behind their designs, but if you’re designing elements or interfaces for a website or web-app, your developer’s going to be very happy. If you never need to hand off a design or want to understand how it’ll actually be built in code, you’re not dealing with hours of guesswork or proprietary formats. The design already speaks the language of the web.

Credit: Yadullah Abidi / MakeUseOf

And for any functionality you don’t find natively in Penpot, you can turn to its plugin library. You’ve got plugins that add asset packs, free stock image searching capabilities, 3D mockups, pattern and tiling options, more features or more advanced options for existing features, and the list goes on.

Last but not least, real-time collaboration features are incredibly helpful if you’re working in a team. Multiple team members can work on the design simultaneously, leave comments directly on elements, and more. It works exactly like you’ve seen in tools like Google Docs or Figma, and is an excellent way of designing faster.

The trade-offs you’ll want to know about

Canva still has some useful tricks up its sleeves

Of course, Penpot isn’t perfect. The first drawback you’ll feel when switching over from Canva is the size of the template and asset library. It may be a more capable tool, but Penpot’s asset library doesn’t even come close to what Canva has. The only relief is that the templates that do exist are solid, and the tool pushes you to create designs from scratch anyway.

Another major problem is Penpot’s lack of photo editing tools. It’s purely a design software, meaning you miss out on all the AI-powered background removal and other fancy tools that Canva provides. There are some basic editing options, and you can add more thanks to Penpot’s vast plugin ecosystem, but nothing beats having the functionality built in natively.

Credit: Yadullah Abidi / MakeUseOf

Last but not least, the learning curve is also slightly steeper than Canva. One of the reasons why Canva is so popular is that it’s extremely easy to use and is built with total beginners in mind. Penpot, on the other hand, is built for experienced designers who know what they’re doing and feel limited by Canva.

Regardless, you’ll be able to get going within a couple of YouTube tutorials. The interface itself is intuitive enough that even total beginners can figure it out, way faster than they could navigate all of Canva’s endless Pro features and convoluted menus.

Goodbye Canva, hello freedom

After years of paying for Canva, this switch was an easy call

If you’re a more experienced designer who feels limited and bogged down by Canva’s hand-holding approach to design, Penpot is a great, and more capable, alternative that’s going to save you money every month.

Penpot is among the things I wish I knew before paying for Canva Pro. If you’re doing any kind of regular design work—social media graphics, presentations, mockups, or client deliverables—switching costs nothing but gives you powerful tools, zero subscription fees, and complete control over your designs.