{"slug": "adobe-lightroom", "name": "Adobe Lightroom", "category": "media", "category_name": "Media and creative", "description": "", "recommenders": 3, "commenters": 15, "warners": 1, "score": 4.441, "rising": -0.98, "first": "2025-11-30", "latest": "2026-10-25", "why": "Lightroom isn\u2019t perfect. But it is fast, it is intuitive", "why_is_quote": true, "has_verdict": false, "sentiment": {"recommend": 3, "neutral": 8, "compare": 3, "warn": 2}, "spark": [0, 1, 0, 0, 0, 1, 0, 0, 1, 0, 0, 0], "listed": true, "loved": [], "caveat": "", "short_quote": "Lightroom isn\u2019t perfect. But it is fast, it is intuitive", "icon": false, "domain": null, "github_repo": null, "official_url": "https://www.adobe.com/products/photoshop-lightroom.html", "pricing": "", "aliases": ["Lightroom", "Adobe Lightroom"], "verdict": null, "praise": [{"label": "", "summary": "", "quotes": [{"id": 785663585, "item_id": 49103974, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49103974", "by": "IgorPartola", "date": "2026-07-29", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Lightroom isn\u2019t perfect. But it is fast, it is intuitive", "excerpt": "I guess I am in the minority but I did not have a good time with Darktable. I used it for a few years and then had to hold my nose and transition to Lightroom. On decent hardware (MacBook Pro that was only a few years old) it was dog slow. But the worst part was transitioning from their version 2 to version 3 of the workflow or whatever they called it. None of my old photos would render correctly after that and half ", "context": "", "use_case": "photo editing", "switched_from": "Darktable", "story": "Darktable"}, {"id": 765194208, "item_id": 47824638, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47824638", "by": "bix6", "date": "2026-04-19", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I love Lightroom but it\u2019s too expensive for my hobby use.", "excerpt": "Paywall. I assume everyone is tired of their subscription fee? I love Lightroom but it\u2019s too expensive for my hobby use. I wish all the photo systems had better interoperability. I\u2019m losing quite a bit as I migrate to Darktable.", "context": "hobbyist", "use_case": "hobby photo editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "The creative software industry has declared war on Adobe"}, {"id": 738751344, "item_id": 46171959, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46171959", "by": "camillomiller", "date": "2025-12-06", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "it's worth every cent", "excerpt": "> For every cloud service I use, I want to have a local copy of my data for backup purposes and independence. I know how much Adobe is hated around any creative circle, but tbf I find that Lightroom CC does this pretty well. Adobe has a well done simple helper app that does just that: downloads the entire of your library locally, with all pictures, all edits, everything. For backup purposes is perfect. Lightroom migh", "context": "", "use_case": "photo library with local backup", "switched_from": "", "story": "Self-hosting my photos with Immich"}]}], "caveats": [{"label": "", "summary": "", "quotes": [{"id": 765220208, "item_id": 47826263, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47826263", "by": "shrubble", "date": "2026-04-19", "stance": "warn", "quote": "LR had uploaded it and deleted it from my hard drive!", "excerpt": "Adobe lost me when I got a deal on Lightroom, installed it, and edited an image. Then I went to look at the image on my drive, and it wasn't there. LR had uploaded it and deleted it from my hard drive! They broke faith with me with that action, I deleted LR and have never touched it since. If you use Sony cameras, you should check out Capture One, which (last I tested) has a deft touch with Sony files.", "context": "", "use_case": "photo editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "The creative software industry has declared war on Adobe"}, {"id": 764175569, "item_id": 47760973, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47760973", "by": "buildbot", "date": "2026-04-13", "stance": "warn", "quote": "with Lightroom, edits seem slightly worse", "excerpt": "Wow, this looks incredible- Capture One has really not been innovating, is slow, the library can\u2019t handle 40k raws, and with Lightroom, edits seem slightly worse. The cinematic color grading seems super cool, can\u2019t wait to give this a try.", "context": "has a 40k RAW library", "use_case": "RAW photo editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "DaVinci Resolve releases Photo Editor"}]}], "who": [{"by": "razster", "context": "hobby photographer", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50235604", "date": "2026-10-25"}, {"by": "rahulmax", "context": "photographer", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49708243", "date": "2026-09-15"}, {"by": "tobyhinloopen", "context": "Linux desktop user", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48132519", "date": "2026-05-14"}, {"by": "bix6", "context": "hobbyist", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47824638", "date": "2026-04-19"}, {"by": "wowczarek", "context": "Linux user since 1998, network engineer", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46798635", "date": "2026-01-28"}], "tags": [], "use_cases": ["photo editing", "photo processing", "fine adjustments", "photo management and editing", "photo management", "media management"], "compared": [{"slug": "darktable", "name": "Darktable", "co": 9, "switched_from": 1, "switched_to": 2}, {"slug": "capture-one", "name": "Capture One", "co": 7, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 3}, {"slug": "adobe-photoshop", "name": "Adobe Photoshop", "co": 5, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "photomator", "name": "Photomator", "co": 2, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 1}, {"slug": "davinci-resolve", "name": "DaVinci Resolve", "co": 3, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "qwen-image-2-1", "name": "Qwen Image 2.1", "co": 2, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "rawtherapee", "name": "RawTherapee", "co": 2, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}], "makers": [], "threads": [{"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50229827", "title": "Nikon photography contest winner loses title after scientists spot signs of AI", "mentions": 2}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49958850", "title": "ArtCraft Apps \u2013 open-source Adobe compatible suite written in Rust", "mentions": 2}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49096654", "title": "Darktable", "mentions": 2}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47824403", "title": "The creative software industry has declared war on Adobe", "mentions": 2}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46095087", "title": "Self-hosting my photos with Immich", "mentions": 2}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50059523", "title": "AI coding agents generate more code, but not more software", "mentions": 1}], "sentiment_by_month": {"2025-11": {"neutral": 1}, "2025-12": {"recommend": 1}, "2026-01": {"compare": 1, "neutral": 1}, "2026-02": {}, "2026-03": {}, "2026-04": {"warn": 2, "recommend": 1}, "2026-05": {"neutral": 1}, "2026-06": {}, "2026-07": {"compare": 1, "recommend": 1}, "2026-08": {"neutral": 1}, "2026-09": {"neutral": 1}, "2026-10": {"compare": 1, "neutral": 3}}, "quotes": [{"id": 803769667, "item_id": 50235604, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50235604", "by": "razster", "date": "2026-10-25", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "processing them once again in either Lightroom or Photoshop", "excerpt": "Oh yeah, I'm not going to lie, once I started using ComfyUI with FIBO2 and Qwen Image 2.1 to restore my photographs, I was hook! I have 25+ years of digital and film photos that I've been restoring due to my older camera/lens quality. The addiction of restoring these older photos and then processing them once again in either Lightroom or Photoshop. I caught myself spending countless hours revisiting the past and rest", "context": "hobby photographer", "use_case": "photo processing", "switched_from": "", "story": "Nikon photography contest winner loses title after scientists spot signs of AI"}, {"id": 803767042, "item_id": 50235440, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50235440", "by": "razster", "date": "2026-10-25", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I then pass them through Lightroom for fine adjustments", "excerpt": "Oh man, I love using AI to retouch my photographs. I shoot with a Canon 5D Mark I (OG), which has a faulty sensor. Since I can\u2019t afford an upgrade, I rely on vintage glass: Pentax SMC 50mm and 35mm lenses adapted from M42 to EOS. With FIBO2 and Qwen Image 2.1, I can transform my raw shots so they look as though they were captured with a high-end digital camera. I then pass them through Lightroom for fine adjustments,", "context": "hobby photographer", "use_case": "fine adjustments", "switched_from": "", "story": "Nikon photography contest winner loses title after scientists spot signs of AI"}, {"id": 801426626, "item_id": 50089164, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50089164", "by": "dofm", "date": "2026-10-14", "stance": "compare", "quote": "feel nicer and more gentle to use than Lightroom or even DxO PhotoLab", "excerpt": "> Maybe the agents know this so don't bother putting too much effort in? Perhaps it is much more basic: the words to describe really good user interfaces are inadequate to the task, and they are often emotional/psychological in nature. For example, look at how Mac enthusiasts talk about interfaces, talking about \"delight\", \"surprise\", \"subtlety\" on the positive side, \"janky\", \"crass\", etc. on the negative. Even if an", "context": "", "use_case": "photo editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "AI coding agents generate more code, but not more software"}, {"id": 800904529, "item_id": 50056533, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50056533", "by": "bwnkl", "date": "2026-10-12", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I used to be well versed with Lightroom.", "excerpt": "I never used Photoshop that much, but I used to be well versed with Lightroom. So I tried Lightcraft[1] which is their Lightroom clone, and I was disappointed after all that hype. I couldn't get any of my photos to look nice, using the workflows I was used to from Lightroom. It felt cheap, unfinished, and barely usable, also compared to the open source Lightroom alternatives that have been around for a while (e.g. Ra", "context": "", "use_case": "photo editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "QGIS enacts moratorium on AI contributions"}, {"id": 799675395, "item_id": 49979712, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49979712", "by": "dofm", "date": "2026-10-06", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Lightroom is not without its faults", "excerpt": "FWIW I do hear these complaints from people who live in Adobe apps but they are very pragmatic about how they approach it. For example, Lightroom is not without its faults but photographers will switch to Capture One and delay leaving the suite so they don't have to relearn everything at once. Some of those photographers then use their new baseline familiarity with Capture One to test out Affinity for further edits. ", "context": "", "use_case": "photo management and editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "ArtCraft Apps \u2013 open-source Adobe compatible suite written in Rust"}, {"id": 799381858, "item_id": 49961366, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49961366", "by": "pitchlatte", "date": "2026-10-05", "stance": "compare", "quote": "what i still haven\u2019t found a good replacement for is Lightroom", "excerpt": "i personally like affinity better than the FOSS photoshop alternatives, mostly for UX reasons. what i still haven\u2019t found a good replacement for is Lightroom. i use darktable but the way the interface is laid out is antithetical to getting into an efficient flow state. and i say this despite the fact that i consider the output strictly superior to Lightroom (or in fact anything i\u2019ve ever used).", "context": "", "use_case": "photo management", "switched_from": "", "story": "ArtCraft Apps \u2013 open-source Adobe compatible suite written in Rust"}, {"id": 795331889, "item_id": 49708243, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49708243", "by": "rahulmax", "date": "2026-09-15", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I used Behringer Xtouch Mini mapped to Lightroom.", "excerpt": "Love this! In the photography community, we had MIDI2LR (MIDI to Lightroom) (https://rsjaffe.github.io/MIDI2LR/) I used Behringer Xtouch Mini mapped to Lightroom. This allows tactile controls, and also lets you keep your eyes on the photo being edited, instead of the constant back and forth between the controls and the photo.", "context": "photographer", "use_case": "photo editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: Macros with a Behringer FCB1010 MIDI Pedalboard in macOS"}, {"id": 791558513, "item_id": 49472407, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49472407", "by": "coldtea", "date": "2026-08-27", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "The most expensive apps I use (Lightroom, Resolve, Photoshop), are available for Windows too", "excerpt": ">.. so that I can never switch to anything ever due to vendor lock-in, What exactly prevents you? I use macOS, but have used Windows and still also use Linux, and can jump at a moment's notice if I wish. While keeping iPhone, or ditching that too for Android. I'd lose the App Store bought apps, but I don't use that many of those, and the non-cross-platform apps would be an issue if I jumped away from any other OS too", "context": "", "use_case": "photo editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "Asahi Linux Progress Report: Linux 7.2"}, {"id": 785663585, "item_id": 49103974, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49103974", "by": "IgorPartola", "date": "2026-07-29", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Lightroom isn\u2019t perfect. But it is fast, it is intuitive", "excerpt": "I guess I am in the minority but I did not have a good time with Darktable. I used it for a few years and then had to hold my nose and transition to Lightroom. On decent hardware (MacBook Pro that was only a few years old) it was dog slow. But the worst part was transitioning from their version 2 to version 3 of the workflow or whatever they called it. None of my old photos would render correctly after that and half ", "context": "", "use_case": "photo editing", "switched_from": "Darktable", "story": "Darktable"}, {"id": 785650017, "item_id": 49103126, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49103126", "by": "buildbot", "date": "2026-07-29", "stance": "compare", "quote": "Media management though is IMO much worse than Lightroom?", "excerpt": "Capture One in my opinion has much higher output quality, better defaults, and specifically for supports Phase One backs better than anything else. I have not done a scientific study or anything comparing the outputs (maybe I should!), but it\u2019s just really good at producing gorgeous photos. Media management though is IMO much worse than Lightroom? No keyword search, the catalog gets extremely slow over 10k images, an", "context": "", "use_case": "media management", "switched_from": "", "story": "Darktable"}, {"id": 770120304, "item_id": 48132519, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48132519", "by": "tobyhinloopen", "date": "2026-05-14", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I now run Lightroom in a VM and it's incredibly slow to unusable.", "excerpt": "I'm very happy with my Linux install. After almost 2 decades of trying Linux Desktop and falling back to Windows (and MacOS) I've finally switched to Linux (and MacOS). The only thing missing is my Adobe stuff. I now run Lightroom in a VM and it's incredibly slow to unusable.", "context": "Linux desktop user", "use_case": "photo editing on Linux", "switched_from": "", "story": "Linux gaming is faster because Windows APIs are becoming Linux kernel features"}, {"id": 765220208, "item_id": 47826263, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47826263", "by": "shrubble", "date": "2026-04-19", "stance": "warn", "quote": "LR had uploaded it and deleted it from my hard drive!", "excerpt": "Adobe lost me when I got a deal on Lightroom, installed it, and edited an image. Then I went to look at the image on my drive, and it wasn't there. LR had uploaded it and deleted it from my hard drive! They broke faith with me with that action, I deleted LR and have never touched it since. If you use Sony cameras, you should check out Capture One, which (last I tested) has a deft touch with Sony files.", "context": "", "use_case": "photo editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "The creative software industry has declared war on Adobe"}, {"id": 765194208, "item_id": 47824638, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47824638", "by": "bix6", "date": "2026-04-19", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I love Lightroom but it\u2019s too expensive for my hobby use.", "excerpt": "Paywall. I assume everyone is tired of their subscription fee? I love Lightroom but it\u2019s too expensive for my hobby use. I wish all the photo systems had better interoperability. I\u2019m losing quite a bit as I migrate to Darktable.", "context": "hobbyist", "use_case": "hobby photo editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "The creative software industry has declared war on Adobe"}, {"id": 764175569, "item_id": 47760973, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47760973", "by": "buildbot", "date": "2026-04-13", "stance": "warn", "quote": "with Lightroom, edits seem slightly worse", "excerpt": "Wow, this looks incredible- Capture One has really not been innovating, is slow, the library can\u2019t handle 40k raws, and with Lightroom, edits seem slightly worse. The cinematic color grading seems super cool, can\u2019t wait to give this a try.", "context": "has a 40k RAW library", "use_case": "RAW photo editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "DaVinci Resolve releases Photo Editor"}, {"id": 748778162, "item_id": 46798635, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46798635", "by": "wowczarek", "date": "2026-01-28", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Lightroom user, but flexible.", "excerpt": "Linux user since about 1998, leaning towards BSDs today. Network engineer + R&D + software dev. Daily driver (desktop) about 2002-2010 - work made it too difficult later. Very occasional gamer. Corporate world will give you a Windows VDI or web cloudy things if need be. Win10 on my laptop out of habit, mostly using terminals + WSL and a browser. Lightroom user, but flexible. None of the other gear I own runs Windows,", "context": "Linux user since 1998, network engineer", "use_case": "photo editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "Microsoft forced me to switch to Linux"}, {"id": 743642018, "item_id": 46477626, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46477626", "by": "neogodless", "date": "2026-01-03", "stance": "compare", "quote": "I tried Lightroom, darktable, and a few other pieces of software, but I kept going back to PhotoLab.", "excerpt": "I believe this was Dec. 2023 through Feb. 2024 (I should add dates to my little \"blog\"...): https://www.retorch.com/blog/linux-mint.htm If I remember, Linux Mint was on kernel 5.15 at the time. The TL;DR is that fractional scaling was broken under Cinnamon, and Brightness controls were broken under KDE. Most gaming was good, but a brand new game (Hogwart's Legacy) had major issues, including crashing and vastly worse", "context": "", "use_case": "photo editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "2026 will be my year of the Linux desktop"}, {"id": 738751344, "item_id": 46171959, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46171959", "by": "camillomiller", "date": "2025-12-06", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "it's worth every cent", "excerpt": "> For every cloud service I use, I want to have a local copy of my data for backup purposes and independence. I know how much Adobe is hated around any creative circle, but tbf I find that Lightroom CC does this pretty well. Adobe has a well done simple helper app that does just that: downloads the entire of your library locally, with all pictures, all edits, everything. For backup purposes is perfect. Lightroom migh", "context": "", "use_case": "photo library with local backup", "switched_from": "", "story": "Self-hosting my photos with Immich"}, {"id": 737523651, "item_id": 46095228, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46095228", "by": "cuu508", "date": "2025-11-30", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "but I've moved away from using Lightroom", "excerpt": "I'm running Immich on NanoPi R6C (arm64, even lower idle power usage, still plenty fast for running Immich). I use Cloudflare tunnel to make it available outside the home network. I've set up two DNS names \u2013 one for accessing it directly in the local network, and and a second one that goes through the tunnel. The Immich mobile app supports internal/external connection settings \u2013 it uses the direct connection when con", "context": "", "use_case": "photo editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "Self-hosting my photos with Immich"}]}