Earlier this year, Canva increased the subscription price of Canva Teams by 300%.
If you use Canva Teams, the price will increase to $500 from $199 per year. A huge jump!
The new pricing move does not affect Canva Pro or Canva Enterprise. If you’re a one person office, then Canva’s pricing of $120 per year for Canva Pro is still affordable.
Why the increase? First, Canva has added AI features such as Magic Studio, and it is reported that costs are being passed onto the user. The company is also preparing for an initial public offering, which is the first step of offering its stock to the public.
Once again, another business decision has a significant impact on the everyday consumer.
There have been comments on forums about corporate greed, as well as frustrations expressed that “it appears Canva started off at a low cost to get users to “ditch the industry standard” and then pushed prices up. There’s a general sense in forums that the pains of using the platform do not justify the increased price.
If you work as part of a team of more than 3 people, here’s how to cope with the new pricing:
- Some suggest having multiple users on the same account, especially as you can use CanvaPro on multiple devices. While Canva does not explicitly forbid this, you have to weigh if this sits right with you.
- Some suggest having multiple users on the same account, especially as you can use CanvaPro on multiple devices. While Canva does not explicitly forbid this, you have to weigh if this sits right with you.
- Determine which functions you actually need on Canva. Are Magic Studio or advanced features really worth the subscription fee? For instance, if all you use Canva for is captions or background removal, you could easily get that with other tools.
Canva Alternatives
If you need an alternative to Canva Teams’ high price, look at these options:
Visme: Costs $24.75 for its teams version, and $12.25 for an individual plan. However, Canva has a much broader range of tools and templates. And, Visme is more appropriate for data-based infographics, reports and charts.
Adobe Express: While not as extensive as Canva, Adobe Express has the advantage of integrating with Adobe’s other tools. It allows users to create basic graphics, edit videos, and even design web pages, but without the complexity of Illustrator or Photoshop.
Photopea.com: A Photoshop clone, with surprising value for being free. While there are no pre-made templates or AI features, if you are familiar with Photoshop, Photopea has a similar menu and tools for photo editing, layering and retouching. There’s a $5 monthly fee for removal of ads.
Affinity Designer: The whole Affinity product suite was acquired by Canva in March 26, 2024. While it is an alternative to Canva, there are likely to be changes to its pricing structure in the future. I’ll cover more about this in a future email.
Create 200 Social Media posts in 10 minutes using Canva and GPT
A must watch for the one person business whose time is stretched thin.
This 10 minute video from Modern Millie provides a detailed demonstration of how to use Chat GPT and Canva’s bulk create feature to create graphic quotes and reels.