{"slug": "adobe-photoshop", "name": "Adobe Photoshop", "category": "media", "category_name": "Media and creative", "description": "Adobe's raster image editor for photo retouching, compositing and digital painting.", "recommenders": 5, "commenters": 41, "warners": 14, "score": -2.734, "rising": 1.02, "first": "2025-12-19", "latest": "2026-10-26", "why": "HN commenters see Photoshop as the capable industry standard, citing its smooth brushes, layers and one-click AI subject cutouts.", "why_is_quote": false, "has_verdict": true, "sentiment": {"recommend": 5, "neutral": 22, "compare": 3, "warn": 14}, "spark": [0, 1, 1, 0, 1, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 2], "listed": true, "loved": ["Industry standard", "Familiar workflow"], "caveat": "Subscription cost", "short_quote": "Since they added it a year or so ago it has been game-changing.", "icon": false, "domain": "youtube.com", "github_repo": null, "official_url": "https://www.adobe.com/products/photoshop.html", "pricing": "paid", "aliases": ["Photoshop", "Adobe Photoshop"], "verdict": [{"text": "HN commenters see Photoshop as the capable industry standard,", "cites": [{"id": 801222448, "item_id": 50076403, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50076403", "by": "MrSkelter", "date": "2026-10-13", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I use Adobe products because the dirty secret is they are without equal in many areas", "excerpt": "I use Adobe products because the dirty secret is they are without equal in many areas, as well as being the industry standards. I am not a fan of the subscription model, but remember when the suite came in a box big enough to put shoes in and cost $2K. If you upgraded every couple of years the subscription are cheaper. The truth is that replicating apps like photoshop isn\u2019t enough. The work required means they can\u2019t ", "context": "", "use_case": "image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "Attack of the Vibe Coded Photoshop Clones"}, {"id": 792660865, "item_id": 49541304, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49541304", "by": "pseudosavant", "date": "2026-09-02", "stance": "compare", "quote": "It isn't as capable as Photoshop, but it isn't a rental", "excerpt": "The backlash is so completely unwarranted. This is a piece of free software where the creator is making it easier to use on free software platforms. If you don't want PDN on Linux because you hate AI no matter what, then don't use it. Don't rage attack the creator so that others can't use PDN. Thanks Rick Brewster! I love PDN. It isn't as capable as Photoshop, but it isn't a rental, and it does 99% of what I need it ", "context": "", "use_case": "image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "Paint.net 5.2 alpha now runs on Linux"}, {"id": 789339889, "item_id": 49333743, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49333743", "by": "jockm", "date": "2026-08-17", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "the photoshop I used in the late 90s/early 2000s", "excerpt": "GIMP still lags behind the photoshop I used in the late 90s/early 2000s. Then there is the name thing. I am *NOT* telling anyone else how to feel about it. I have no interest in relitigating it, but I am disabled and had it thrown at me as a term of hate; I just can't support a piece of software that uses it. We each have to stand up for what matters to us.", "context": "", "use_case": "image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "GIMP Development Update"}]}, {"text": " citing its smooth brushes, layers and one-click AI subject cutouts.", "cites": [{"id": 800756849, "item_id": 50047303, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50047303", "by": "jenniferhooley", "date": "2026-10-11", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Trying to type text, takes like 1second per character just to type (photoshop is instant).", "excerpt": "Really? I got the 0.7.0 version today and loaded a couple of my projects and tried using it in my normal day-to-day workflow. 1. Can't use brushes because they are slow and render jaggy polygons instead of the beautiful perfectly smooth brushes of Photoshop - literally can't draw a hand-print looking sketch circle as it looks like a weird digital polygon. 2. I use masks for texturing vector layers, literally cannot c", "context": "professional digital artist", "use_case": "professional image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "ArtCraft Apps \u2013 open-source Adobe compatible suite written in Rust"}, {"id": 742183585, "item_id": 46386474, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46386474", "by": "cben", "date": "2025-12-25", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I want more apps to expose UX like PhotoShop layers, where users are more productive manipulating a recipe", "excerpt": "Computers are not a kitchen. They are clay, they are Lego, they are jungles of imagination. It's true that our current trajectory devolves their universality to a set of discrete isolated applications == multiplexing a set of appliances on one device. That's an economic win sure, but it's tragic if we fail to unlock more of their flexibility for \"end users\"! IMHO that's the biggest unsolved problems of computer scien", "context": "", "use_case": "layer-based editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "Are we stuck with the same Desktop UX forever? [video]"}, {"id": 758737120, "item_id": 47421070, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47421070", "by": "qingcharles", "date": "2026-03-17", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Since they added it a year or so ago it has been game-changing.", "excerpt": "I use the Adobe version of this in Photoshop every day and I assumed that Adobe solved this the same way, but used professionals to cut out the subjects from the backgrounds then fed both versions into their AI. Since they added it a year or so ago it has been game-changing. I'm cutting out portraits every day and having a magical tool that cuts out the subject with perfect hair cut out with a single click is sci-fi.", "context": "Cuts out portraits daily", "use_case": "cutting out portrait subjects", "switched_from": "", "story": "It Took Me 30 Years to Solve This VFX Problem \u2013 Green Screen Problem [video]"}]}, {"text": " The most common complaint is its costly subscription model,", "cites": [{"id": 800842336, "item_id": 50052646, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50052646", "by": "egeozcan", "date": "2026-10-12", "stance": "warn", "quote": "I used to pay for Photoshop and I was very happy until they started with the subscription business.", "excerpt": "That's very superficial. I used to pay for Photoshop and I was very happy until they started with the subscription business.", "context": "", "use_case": "image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "Attack of the Vibe Coded Photoshop Clones"}, {"id": 791760401, "item_id": 49485025, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49485025", "by": "stubbby", "date": "2026-08-28", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Photoshop that costs $275/year in a predatory subscription where you cant cancel without a $200 penalty", "excerpt": "Opus 5 (xhigh): ~8 hours of agentic churn, ~1 hour of my time to test features and direct the agents. As an experiment I provided ZERO technical guidance, I let it pick architecture, programming language, GPU interface, rendering interface, all of it. I only provided feedback from the perspective of a user and only things visible to a user. I.e. \"Adjusting the curves spline is too slow. Make it instantaneous\", I did ", "context": "", "use_case": "image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "My agents made a Photoshop equivalent in 8 hours"}, {"id": 800196384, "item_id": 50012274, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50012274", "by": "rerdavies", "date": "2026-10-08", "stance": "warn", "quote": "A UI that has rotted out over time. No way I'm paying the extortionate rental prices for current-gen Adobe tools.", "excerpt": "People are buzzing about it because it is bold experiment whose outcome may tell us extremely interesting things abut vibe coding with current-generation tools. Most particularly, can you, or can you not build large applications with pure vibe coding? And lots of speculation over whether architectural rot will be better or worse than what humans do. Because human-generated architectures rot out too (Photoshop being a", "context": "professional coder with decades of experience", "use_case": "image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "What ArtCraft's Vibe-Coded Apps Say About Adobe"}]}, {"text": " followed by reports that it has grown slower and buggier over time.", "cites": [{"id": 782280096, "item_id": 48892506, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48892506", "by": "donatj", "date": "2026-07-13", "stance": "warn", "quote": "every time CPUs have gotten faster, it's gotten slower.", "excerpt": "My biggest complaint about Photoshop is that every time CPUs have gotten faster, it's gotten slower. I've used it since the mid 1990s recreationally, early 2000s professionally. Every time I get a major CPU upgrade, it will be fast for a while, but with updates become slow again. This pattern has repeated over and over again. Most recently when I moved to Apple Silicon from an Intel Mac, I was excited how quickly eve", "context": "user since the 1990s", "use_case": "image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "An Infuriating Goodbye to Photoshop"}, {"id": 782292608, "item_id": 48893288, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48893288", "by": "bananaboy", "date": "2026-07-13", "stance": "warn", "quote": "It was getting slower and slower with every release.", "excerpt": "I cancelled mine this year too after having the subscription for maybe 10 years (and using dodgy copies previously for many many years). I used it mostly because it's the only professional tool remaining that can handle palettised formats and can reduce colours with a bunch of dithering options (I do a lot of retro computing projects and sometimes need/want to manage palettes in there). But it was just infuriating. I", "context": "retro computing projects", "use_case": "palettised images and dithering", "switched_from": "", "story": "An Infuriating Goodbye to Photoshop"}, {"id": 782738018, "item_id": 48921126, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48921126", "by": "IAmGraydon", "date": "2026-07-15", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Lots of problems in Adobe Creative Cloud on Win 11 (primarily Photoshop, InDesign, Illustrator)", "excerpt": "iOS is definitely buggier. It used to be a silky smooth experience but it's degraded significantly in the last year or so. Safari on iOS, in particular, is very bad. Lots of problems in Adobe Creative Cloud on Win 11 (primarily Photoshop, InDesign, Illustrator) in recent months too.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: Is it just me, or is software buggier across the board?"}]}], "praise": [{"label": "Industry standard", "summary": "Commenters call it the industry standard and more capable than free alternatives.", "quotes": [{"id": 801222448, "item_id": 50076403, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50076403", "by": "MrSkelter", "date": "2026-10-13", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I use Adobe products because the dirty secret is they are without equal in many areas", "excerpt": "I use Adobe products because the dirty secret is they are without equal in many areas, as well as being the industry standards. I am not a fan of the subscription model, but remember when the suite came in a box big enough to put shoes in and cost $2K. If you upgraded every couple of years the subscription are cheaper. The truth is that replicating apps like photoshop isn\u2019t enough. The work required means they can\u2019t ", "context": "", "use_case": "image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "Attack of the Vibe Coded Photoshop Clones"}, {"id": 792660865, "item_id": 49541304, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49541304", "by": "pseudosavant", "date": "2026-09-02", "stance": "compare", "quote": "It isn't as capable as Photoshop, but it isn't a rental", "excerpt": "The backlash is so completely unwarranted. This is a piece of free software where the creator is making it easier to use on free software platforms. If you don't want PDN on Linux because you hate AI no matter what, then don't use it. Don't rage attack the creator so that others can't use PDN. Thanks Rick Brewster! I love PDN. It isn't as capable as Photoshop, but it isn't a rental, and it does 99% of what I need it ", "context": "", "use_case": "image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "Paint.net 5.2 alpha now runs on Linux"}, {"id": 789339889, "item_id": 49333743, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49333743", "by": "jockm", "date": "2026-08-17", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "the photoshop I used in the late 90s/early 2000s", "excerpt": "GIMP still lags behind the photoshop I used in the late 90s/early 2000s. Then there is the name thing. I am *NOT* telling anyone else how to feel about it. I have no interest in relitigating it, but I am disabled and had it thrown at me as a term of hate; I just can't support a piece of software that uses it. We each have to stand up for what matters to us.", "context": "", "use_case": "image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "GIMP Development Update"}]}, {"label": "Familiar workflow", "summary": "Long-time users rely on its interface and muscle memory, and some say they were more productive in it than in GIMP.", "quotes": [{"id": 801719664, "item_id": 50107479, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50107479", "by": "Aozora7", "date": "2026-10-15", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I pirated photoshop when I was 12 and kept using that for image editing my entire life.", "excerpt": "As far as I can tell, they copied nearly every tool and menu and their behavior one for one. I'm not an illustrator so I can't tell how well they copied brush behavior for painting, but as far as editing goes, this does almost everything. One noticeable omission that I could find is lack of frame by frame animation and gif export. I pirated photoshop when I was 12 and kept using that for image editing my entire life.", "context": "", "use_case": "image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: Are you hesitant to install vibe-coded apps?"}, {"id": 789292113, "item_id": 49330757, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49330757", "by": "Joeboy", "date": "2026-08-17", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "having got quite good at it in the '90s", "excerpt": "> I use it to add text to a family photo. The primary storage medium is jpeg. I don't want or need anything else. So you open your photo, add your text, press Ctrl+E, choose a filename or press Enter to overwrite your old version, and press Enter to accept the default jpeg settings. I guess it could save a couple of keypresses by auto-overwriting your original file without asking, or not asking about jpeg settings. B", "context": "long-time Photoshop user since the 90s", "use_case": "image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "GIMP Development Update"}, {"id": 789266417, "item_id": 49329151, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49329151", "by": "Joeboy", "date": "2026-08-17", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "when I used to use Photoshop twenty-five years ago I was a lot more productive than I'm able to be in GIMP", "excerpt": "I'm a fairly casual / infrequent user, but they've already addressed most of the things I found infuriating in the past. The big remaining thing I can think of is the \"layer boundary\" thing, which (it seems to me) is very confusing for new users and inconvenient for all users. I also have a vibes-based feeling that when I used to use Photoshop twenty-five years ago I was a lot more productive than I'm able to be in G", "context": "", "use_case": "image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "GIMP Development Update"}]}, {"label": "AI selection tools", "summary": "One-click subject cutouts and similar tools are called game-changing for daily portrait work.", "quotes": [{"id": 758737120, "item_id": 47421070, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47421070", "by": "qingcharles", "date": "2026-03-17", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Since they added it a year or so ago it has been game-changing.", "excerpt": "I use the Adobe version of this in Photoshop every day and I assumed that Adobe solved this the same way, but used professionals to cut out the subjects from the backgrounds then fed both versions into their AI. Since they added it a year or so ago it has been game-changing. I'm cutting out portraits every day and having a magical tool that cuts out the subject with perfect hair cut out with a single click is sci-fi.", "context": "Cuts out portraits daily", "use_case": "cutting out portrait subjects", "switched_from": "", "story": "It Took Me 30 Years to Solve This VFX Problem \u2013 Green Screen Problem [video]"}, {"id": 803969040, "item_id": 50248065, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50248065", "by": "pwython", "date": "2026-10-26", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I used to make Photoshop tutorials before YouTube", "excerpt": "I'm sure it will be a great resource for LLMs to read. But seriously, good luck to them. I used to make Photoshop tutorials before YouTube, and it was a lot of fun. When YouTube came around, all the eyeballs went there, rightfully so -- videos made more sense for Photoshop. But I didn't have it in me to pivot. And these days you don't even have to know how to do things like mask objects. There's one-click solutions, ", "context": "former tutorial author", "use_case": "image editing tutorials", "switched_from": "", "story": "CSS-Tricks has a new owner"}]}, {"label": "Brushes and responsiveness", "summary": "A professional artist praises its smooth brushes and instant text input compared with a clone.", "quotes": [{"id": 800756849, "item_id": 50047303, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50047303", "by": "jenniferhooley", "date": "2026-10-11", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Trying to type text, takes like 1second per character just to type (photoshop is instant).", "excerpt": "Really? I got the 0.7.0 version today and loaded a couple of my projects and tried using it in my normal day-to-day workflow. 1. Can't use brushes because they are slow and render jaggy polygons instead of the beautiful perfectly smooth brushes of Photoshop - literally can't draw a hand-print looking sketch circle as it looks like a weird digital polygon. 2. I use masks for texturing vector layers, literally cannot c", "context": "professional digital artist", "use_case": "professional image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "ArtCraft Apps \u2013 open-source Adobe compatible suite written in Rust"}]}, {"label": "Layers model", "summary": "Its layers are held up as a UX model that makes users productive.", "quotes": [{"id": 742183585, "item_id": 46386474, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46386474", "by": "cben", "date": "2025-12-25", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I want more apps to expose UX like PhotoShop layers, where users are more productive manipulating a recipe", "excerpt": "Computers are not a kitchen. They are clay, they are Lego, they are jungles of imagination. It's true that our current trajectory devolves their universality to a set of discrete isolated applications == multiplexing a set of appliances on one device. That's an economic win sure, but it's tragic if we fail to unlock more of their flexibility for \"end users\"! IMHO that's the biggest unsolved problems of computer scien", "context": "", "use_case": "layer-based editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "Are we stuck with the same Desktop UX forever? [video]"}]}], "caveats": [{"label": "Subscription cost", "summary": "Many object to the subscription, calling it extortionate or predatory, with a reported cancellation penalty.", "quotes": [{"id": 800842336, "item_id": 50052646, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50052646", "by": "egeozcan", "date": "2026-10-12", "stance": "warn", "quote": "I used to pay for Photoshop and I was very happy until they started with the subscription business.", "excerpt": "That's very superficial. I used to pay for Photoshop and I was very happy until they started with the subscription business.", "context": "", "use_case": "image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "Attack of the Vibe Coded Photoshop Clones"}, {"id": 791760401, "item_id": 49485025, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49485025", "by": "stubbby", "date": "2026-08-28", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Photoshop that costs $275/year in a predatory subscription where you cant cancel without a $200 penalty", "excerpt": "Opus 5 (xhigh): ~8 hours of agentic churn, ~1 hour of my time to test features and direct the agents. As an experiment I provided ZERO technical guidance, I let it pick architecture, programming language, GPU interface, rendering interface, all of it. I only provided feedback from the perspective of a user and only things visible to a user. I.e. \"Adjusting the curves spline is too slow. Make it instantaneous\", I did ", "context": "", "use_case": "image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "My agents made a Photoshop equivalent in 8 hours"}, {"id": 800196384, "item_id": 50012274, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50012274", "by": "rerdavies", "date": "2026-10-08", "stance": "warn", "quote": "A UI that has rotted out over time. No way I'm paying the extortionate rental prices for current-gen Adobe tools.", "excerpt": "People are buzzing about it because it is bold experiment whose outcome may tell us extremely interesting things abut vibe coding with current-generation tools. Most particularly, can you, or can you not build large applications with pure vibe coding? And lots of speculation over whether architectural rot will be better or worse than what humans do. Because human-generated architectures rot out too (Photoshop being a", "context": "professional coder with decades of experience", "use_case": "image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "What ArtCraft's Vibe-Coded Apps Say About Adobe"}]}, {"label": "Slower over time", "summary": "Long-time users say each release gets slower, with one reporting a 30-second startup.", "quotes": [{"id": 782280096, "item_id": 48892506, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48892506", "by": "donatj", "date": "2026-07-13", "stance": "warn", "quote": "every time CPUs have gotten faster, it's gotten slower.", "excerpt": "My biggest complaint about Photoshop is that every time CPUs have gotten faster, it's gotten slower. I've used it since the mid 1990s recreationally, early 2000s professionally. Every time I get a major CPU upgrade, it will be fast for a while, but with updates become slow again. This pattern has repeated over and over again. Most recently when I moved to Apple Silicon from an Intel Mac, I was excited how quickly eve", "context": "user since the 1990s", "use_case": "image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "An Infuriating Goodbye to Photoshop"}, {"id": 782292608, "item_id": 48893288, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48893288", "by": "bananaboy", "date": "2026-07-13", "stance": "warn", "quote": "It was getting slower and slower with every release.", "excerpt": "I cancelled mine this year too after having the subscription for maybe 10 years (and using dodgy copies previously for many many years). I used it mostly because it's the only professional tool remaining that can handle palettised formats and can reduce colours with a bunch of dithering options (I do a lot of retro computing projects and sometimes need/want to manage palettes in there). But it was just infuriating. I", "context": "retro computing projects", "use_case": "palettised images and dithering", "switched_from": "", "story": "An Infuriating Goodbye to Photoshop"}, {"id": 782281200, "item_id": 48892575, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48892575", "by": "pier25", "date": "2026-07-13", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Photoshop and Illustrator CS6 were the last good versions.", "excerpt": "I've been using Photoshop since CS1 (was a Corel user before that). Photoshop and Illustrator CS6 were the last good versions. Very snappy and with probably 99% of the features I use today. Everything slowly degraded when they moved to the subscription model which I've been paying since 2013. Apple Silicon support was really bad for a couple of years (tons of GPU issues in Illustrator) but I will admit it's better no", "context": "user since CS1", "use_case": "image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "An Infuriating Goodbye to Photoshop"}]}, {"label": "UI decline", "summary": "Users describe the UI as rotted or less responsive than older versions, and one rolled back to a 2020 release over the select-and-mask tool.", "quotes": [{"id": 800196384, "item_id": 50012274, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50012274", "by": "rerdavies", "date": "2026-10-08", "stance": "warn", "quote": "A UI that has rotted out over time. No way I'm paying the extortionate rental prices for current-gen Adobe tools.", "excerpt": "People are buzzing about it because it is bold experiment whose outcome may tell us extremely interesting things abut vibe coding with current-generation tools. Most particularly, can you, or can you not build large applications with pure vibe coding? And lots of speculation over whether architectural rot will be better or worse than what humans do. Because human-generated architectures rot out too (Photoshop being a", "context": "professional coder with decades of experience", "use_case": "image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "What ArtCraft's Vibe-Coded Apps Say About Adobe"}, {"id": 780711264, "item_id": 48794454, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48794454", "by": "cosmic_cheese", "date": "2026-07-05", "stance": "warn", "quote": "before they switched to the branded-UI mess", "excerpt": "That move of Adobe\u2019s drives me nuts even now. It might be my imagination but as I recall, the UI of Photoshop for example felt more responsive (at least on Mac) in 7/CS1/CS2 before they switched to the branded-UI mess (despite the hardware of that era being so much weaker than today\u2019s), and visual contrast and readability was better before too.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Dark Mode with Web Standards"}, {"id": 768749200, "item_id": 48046825, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48046825", "by": "northernsausage", "date": "2026-05-07", "stance": "warn", "quote": "I can't tell you how frustrating the select and mask  tool is to actually use. I've rolled back to 2020 version", "excerpt": "I use PS every single day and I can't tell you how frustrating the select and mask tool is to actually use. I've rolled back to 2020 version that seems to be easier to use but dumber product.", "context": "uses it every day", "use_case": "daily image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "Photoshop's challenges with focus, pt. 2"}]}, {"label": "Creative Cloud bugs", "summary": "Commenters report problems with Creative Cloud apps on Windows 11 and with Creative Cloud sync.", "quotes": [{"id": 782738018, "item_id": 48921126, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48921126", "by": "IAmGraydon", "date": "2026-07-15", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Lots of problems in Adobe Creative Cloud on Win 11 (primarily Photoshop, InDesign, Illustrator)", "excerpt": "iOS is definitely buggier. It used to be a silky smooth experience but it's degraded significantly in the last year or so. Safari on iOS, in particular, is very bad. Lots of problems in Adobe Creative Cloud on Win 11 (primarily Photoshop, InDesign, Illustrator) in recent months too.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: Is it just me, or is software buggier across the board?"}, {"id": 782279728, "item_id": 48892483, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48892483", "by": "yardie", "date": "2026-07-13", "stance": "warn", "quote": "They only supported local copy and Creative Cloud sync.", "excerpt": "> One thing I loved as part of the Creative Cloud subscription was the Creative Cloud Synced Files service. Basically, it was Adobe\u2019s version of DropBox. I used it all the time to share screenshots and samples of in-progress work. Then, in 2023, Adobe announced they\u2019d be discontinuing the service. There was so much pushback that they delayed the service\u2019s retirement for a year. It makes sense, it was a nice feature o", "context": "IT admin supporting a graphic design team", "use_case": "design team asset editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "An Infuriating Goodbye to Photoshop"}, {"id": 782281200, "item_id": 48892575, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48892575", "by": "pier25", "date": "2026-07-13", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Photoshop and Illustrator CS6 were the last good versions.", "excerpt": "I've been using Photoshop since CS1 (was a Corel user before that). Photoshop and Illustrator CS6 were the last good versions. Very snappy and with probably 99% of the features I use today. Everything slowly degraded when they moved to the subscription model which I've been paying since 2013. Apple Silicon support was really bad for a couple of years (tons of GPU issues in Illustrator) but I will admit it's better no", "context": "user since CS1", "use_case": "image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "An Infuriating Goodbye to Photoshop"}]}, {"label": "Unwanted AI features", "summary": "One user says constant updates added AI features they did not want or need.", "quotes": [{"id": 782292608, "item_id": 48893288, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48893288", "by": "bananaboy", "date": "2026-07-13", "stance": "warn", "quote": "It was getting slower and slower with every release.", "excerpt": "I cancelled mine this year too after having the subscription for maybe 10 years (and using dodgy copies previously for many many years). I used it mostly because it's the only professional tool remaining that can handle palettised formats and can reduce colours with a bunch of dithering options (I do a lot of retro computing projects and sometimes need/want to manage palettes in there). But it was just infuriating. I", "context": "retro computing projects", "use_case": "palettised images and dithering", "switched_from": "", "story": "An Infuriating Goodbye to Photoshop"}]}], "who": [{"by": "pwython", "context": "former tutorial author", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50248065", "date": "2026-10-26"}, {"by": "razster", "context": "hobby photographer", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50235604", "date": "2026-10-25"}, {"by": "jenniferhooley", "context": "professional digital artist", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50047303", "date": "2026-10-11"}, {"by": "geerlingguy", "context": "edits 4K ProRes and H.265 footage", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49434312", "date": "2026-08-25"}, {"by": "Joeboy", "context": "long-time Photoshop user since the 90s", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49330757", "date": "2026-08-17"}, {"by": "munificent", "context": "author of hand-lettered books", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49009243", "date": "2026-07-22"}, {"by": "Daub", "context": "art instructor", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48047308", "date": "2026-05-07"}, {"by": "qingcharles", "context": "Cuts out portraits daily", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47421070", "date": "2026-03-17"}, {"by": "PaulHoule", "context": "DSLR photographer", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46326331", "date": "2025-12-19"}], "tags": ["for photo retouching", "for design professionals", "for digital painting", "for palette and retro graphics", "for macOS and Windows"], "use_cases": ["image editing", "photo editing", "image editing tutorials", "photo processing", "professional image editing", "creative work"], "compared": [{"slug": "gimp", "name": "GIMP", "co": 15, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 1}, {"slug": "photopea", "name": "Photopea", "co": 7, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 2}, {"slug": "krita", "name": "Krita", "co": 6, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 2}, {"slug": "pixelmator-pro", "name": "Pixelmator Pro", "co": 3, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 1}, {"slug": "adobe-lightroom", "name": "Adobe Lightroom", "co": 5, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "affinity", "name": "Affinity", "co": 4, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "photocraft", "name": "Photocraft", "co": 2, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 1}, {"slug": "inkscape", "name": "Inkscape", "co": 4, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}], "makers": [], "threads": [{"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48891200", "title": "An Infuriating Goodbye to Photoshop", "mentions": 6}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49326156", "title": "GIMP Development Update", "mentions": 4}, {"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=50052156", "title": "Attack of the Vibe Coded Photoshop Clones", "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=48013750", "title": "Photoshop's challenges with focus, pt. 2", "mentions": 2}], "sentiment_by_month": {"2025-11": {}, "2025-12": {"neutral": 2, "recommend": 1}, "2026-01": {"recommend": 1, "neutral": 2}, "2026-02": {}, "2026-03": {"recommend": 1, "neutral": 1}, "2026-04": {}, "2026-05": {"warn": 2, "neutral": 3, "compare": 1}, "2026-06": {"neutral": 2}, "2026-07": {"warn": 8, "neutral": 3}, "2026-08": {"neutral": 5, "warn": 2}, "2026-09": {"compare": 1}, "2026-10": {"compare": 1, "warn": 2, "recommend": 2, "neutral": 4}}, "quotes": [{"id": 803969040, "item_id": 50248065, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50248065", "by": "pwython", "date": "2026-10-26", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I used to make Photoshop tutorials before YouTube", "excerpt": "I'm sure it will be a great resource for LLMs to read. But seriously, good luck to them. I used to make Photoshop tutorials before YouTube, and it was a lot of fun. When YouTube came around, all the eyeballs went there, rightfully so -- videos made more sense for Photoshop. But I didn't have it in me to pivot. And these days you don't even have to know how to do things like mask objects. There's one-click solutions, ", "context": "former tutorial author", "use_case": "image editing tutorials", "switched_from": "", "story": "CSS-Tricks has a new owner"}, {"id": 803769668, "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": 803767043, "item_id": 50235440, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50235440", "by": "razster", "date": "2026-10-25", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "add some Photoshop magic", "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": "photo editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "Nikon photography contest winner loses title after scientists spot signs of AI"}, {"id": 803746865, "item_id": 50234179, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50234179", "by": "imaginationra", "date": "2026-10-25", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I don't need Photoshop anymore", "excerpt": "I use it everyday- I don't need Photoshop anymore- its faster and does everything I need it to do- the only other \"creative\" artcraft app I've really tried to use is Filmcraft, the Premiere replacement but I'm still using Davinci Resolve Studio as Filmcraft isn't as far along as Photocraft but Davinci Resolve Studio is slow, bloated, can't customize the UI and barely has an API so I can't wait to dump it", "context": "", "use_case": "image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "What Adobe v ArtCraft teaches us"}, {"id": 801719664, "item_id": 50107479, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50107479", "by": "Aozora7", "date": "2026-10-15", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I pirated photoshop when I was 12 and kept using that for image editing my entire life.", "excerpt": "As far as I can tell, they copied nearly every tool and menu and their behavior one for one. I'm not an illustrator so I can't tell how well they copied brush behavior for painting, but as far as editing goes, this does almost everything. One noticeable omission that I could find is lack of frame by frame animation and gif export. I pirated photoshop when I was 12 and kept using that for image editing my entire life.", "context": "", "use_case": "image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: Are you hesitant to install vibe-coded apps?"}, {"id": 801222448, "item_id": 50076403, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50076403", "by": "MrSkelter", "date": "2026-10-13", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I use Adobe products because the dirty secret is they are without equal in many areas", "excerpt": "I use Adobe products because the dirty secret is they are without equal in many areas, as well as being the industry standards. I am not a fan of the subscription model, but remember when the suite came in a box big enough to put shoes in and cost $2K. If you upgraded every couple of years the subscription are cheaper. The truth is that replicating apps like photoshop isn\u2019t enough. The work required means they can\u2019t ", "context": "", "use_case": "image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "Attack of the Vibe Coded Photoshop Clones"}, {"id": 800842336, "item_id": 50052646, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50052646", "by": "egeozcan", "date": "2026-10-12", "stance": "warn", "quote": "I used to pay for Photoshop and I was very happy until they started with the subscription business.", "excerpt": "That's very superficial. I used to pay for Photoshop and I was very happy until they started with the subscription business.", "context": "", "use_case": "image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "Attack of the Vibe Coded Photoshop Clones"}, {"id": 800756849, "item_id": 50047303, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50047303", "by": "jenniferhooley", "date": "2026-10-11", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Trying to type text, takes like 1second per character just to type (photoshop is instant).", "excerpt": "Really? I got the 0.7.0 version today and loaded a couple of my projects and tried using it in my normal day-to-day workflow. 1. Can't use brushes because they are slow and render jaggy polygons instead of the beautiful perfectly smooth brushes of Photoshop - literally can't draw a hand-print looking sketch circle as it looks like a weird digital polygon. 2. I use masks for texturing vector layers, literally cannot c", "context": "professional digital artist", "use_case": "professional image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "ArtCraft Apps \u2013 open-source Adobe compatible suite written in Rust"}, {"id": 800196384, "item_id": 50012274, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50012274", "by": "rerdavies", "date": "2026-10-08", "stance": "warn", "quote": "A UI that has rotted out over time. No way I'm paying the extortionate rental prices for current-gen Adobe tools.", "excerpt": "People are buzzing about it because it is bold experiment whose outcome may tell us extremely interesting things abut vibe coding with current-generation tools. Most particularly, can you, or can you not build large applications with pure vibe coding? And lots of speculation over whether architectural rot will be better or worse than what humans do. Because human-generated architectures rot out too (Photoshop being a", "context": "professional coder with decades of experience", "use_case": "image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "What ArtCraft's Vibe-Coded Apps Say About Adobe"}, {"id": 799675392, "item_id": 49979712, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49979712", "by": "dofm", "date": "2026-10-06", "stance": "compare", "quote": "My own feeling is that there are serious cracks in the way Photoshop works.", "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 editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "ArtCraft Apps \u2013 open-source Adobe compatible suite written in Rust"}, {"id": 792660865, "item_id": 49541304, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49541304", "by": "pseudosavant", "date": "2026-09-02", "stance": "compare", "quote": "It isn't as capable as Photoshop, but it isn't a rental", "excerpt": "The backlash is so completely unwarranted. This is a piece of free software where the creator is making it easier to use on free software platforms. If you don't want PDN on Linux because you hate AI no matter what, then don't use it. Don't rage attack the creator so that others can't use PDN. Thanks Rick Brewster! I love PDN. It isn't as capable as Photoshop, but it isn't a rental, and it does 99% of what I need it ", "context": "", "use_case": "image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "Paint.net 5.2 alpha now runs on Linux"}, {"id": 791760401, "item_id": 49485025, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49485025", "by": "stubbby", "date": "2026-08-28", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Photoshop that costs $275/year in a predatory subscription where you cant cancel without a $200 penalty", "excerpt": "Opus 5 (xhigh): ~8 hours of agentic churn, ~1 hour of my time to test features and direct the agents. As an experiment I provided ZERO technical guidance, I let it pick architecture, programming language, GPU interface, rendering interface, all of it. I only provided feedback from the perspective of a user and only things visible to a user. I.e. \"Adjusting the curves spline is too slow. Make it instantaneous\", I did ", "context": "", "use_case": "image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "My agents made a Photoshop equivalent in 8 hours"}, {"id": 791558515, "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": "image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "Asahi Linux Progress Report: Linux 7.2"}, {"id": 790948993, "item_id": 49434312, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49434312", "by": "geerlingguy", "date": "2026-08-25", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I use both the base M4 Mac mini and an M4 MacBook Air for Final Cut Pro, Photoshop, and Fusion", "excerpt": "I use both the base M4 Mac mini and an M4 MacBook Air for Final Cut Pro, Photoshop, and Fusion, and while they're not as almost-always-perfectly-smooth as my Mac Studio, they're about 100x better than the experience I used to have on my old Intel MacBook Pros in the 2010s. I edit 4K ProRes and H.265 footage, sometimes with multicam (up to 4 streams) and color adjustments, titles, etc. It's only after stacking 3-5 eff", "context": "edits 4K ProRes and H.265 footage", "use_case": "creative work", "switched_from": "", "story": "Apple introduces M6 and M5 Ultra"}, {"id": 790881266, "item_id": 49430079, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49430079", "by": "al_borland", "date": "2026-08-25", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "before that it was Photoshop", "excerpt": "For non-commercial use, I\u2019m betting the alternative to AI isn\u2019t hiring a graphic designer, it\u2019s simply nothing. I was giving someone some concert tickets for their birthday. Concert tickets these days are pretty ugly, or are completely virtual. I wanted to have something in the card, so I had ChatGPT make up some concert tickets based on the promo image, and had them printed on card stock. I\u2019d never hire someone for ", "context": "", "use_case": "making cards", "switched_from": "", "story": "'Don't ask me to print your ChatGPT birthday card': Hitting back at AI 'slop'"}, {"id": 789339889, "item_id": 49333743, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49333743", "by": "jockm", "date": "2026-08-17", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "the photoshop I used in the late 90s/early 2000s", "excerpt": "GIMP still lags behind the photoshop I used in the late 90s/early 2000s. Then there is the name thing. I am *NOT* telling anyone else how to feel about it. I have no interest in relitigating it, but I am disabled and had it thrown at me as a term of hate; I just can't support a piece of software that uses it. We each have to stand up for what matters to us.", "context": "", "use_case": "image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "GIMP Development Update"}, {"id": 789292113, "item_id": 49330757, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49330757", "by": "Joeboy", "date": "2026-08-17", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "having got quite good at it in the '90s", "excerpt": "> I use it to add text to a family photo. The primary storage medium is jpeg. I don't want or need anything else. So you open your photo, add your text, press Ctrl+E, choose a filename or press Enter to overwrite your old version, and press Enter to accept the default jpeg settings. I guess it could save a couple of keypresses by auto-overwriting your original file without asking, or not asking about jpeg settings. B", "context": "long-time Photoshop user since the 90s", "use_case": "image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "GIMP Development Update"}, {"id": 789272721, "item_id": 49329545, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49329545", "by": "squidbeak", "date": "2026-08-17", "stance": "warn", "quote": "I loathe photoshop", "excerpt": "This isn't true. There have been plenty of other applications (Corel, Paint Shop Pro, Fireworks, Krita etc) with their own workflows and keybindings that weren't confusing for users. GIMP's UX is just bad. I loathe photoshop and desperately want to like GIMP, but each time I make the attempt the friction is too much and the workflows nonsensical. I used it a few weeks ago to place two images side by side in a larger ", "context": "", "use_case": "image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "GIMP Development Update"}, {"id": 789266417, "item_id": 49329151, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49329151", "by": "Joeboy", "date": "2026-08-17", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "when I used to use Photoshop twenty-five years ago I was a lot more productive than I'm able to be in GIMP", "excerpt": "I'm a fairly casual / infrequent user, but they've already addressed most of the things I found infuriating in the past. The big remaining thing I can think of is the \"layer boundary\" thing, which (it seems to me) is very confusing for new users and inconvenient for all users. I also have a vibes-based feeling that when I used to use Photoshop twenty-five years ago I was a lot more productive than I'm able to be in G", "context": "", "use_case": "image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "GIMP Development Update"}, {"id": 784670981, "item_id": 49041936, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49041936", "by": "MiddleEndian", "date": "2026-07-24", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Photoshop has gotten worse", "excerpt": "I use KDE on Bazzite. It has a couple killer UI features over Windows. It can label bluetooth devices (so I can have blue dualsense controller, pink dualsense controller, white dualsense controller, etc.). No clue why this doesn't work in Windows lol. Also the super/win + arrow keys are more predictable, super pgdn is minimize and super pgup is maximize, so I never find myself accidentally minimizing windows when try", "context": "", "use_case": "image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "Nothing works and everyone is euphoric"}, {"id": 784147888, "item_id": 49009243, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49009243", "by": "munificent", "date": "2026-07-22", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I scanned those and cleaned them up in Photoshop", "excerpt": "As a user and consumer of objects, sometimes I want a meaningful experience with a thing made lovingly by human hands. I will take a dinner cooked by my friends over take-out any day of the week even if the restaurant makes objectively better food. But sometimes I am happy to use a mass produced utilitarian object because it solves the problem. I don't have an emotional relationship with my stapler. These two perspec", "context": "author of hand-lettered books", "use_case": "cleaning up scanned illustrations", "switched_from": "", "story": "Why I Am Not Going to Buy a Computer"}, {"id": 783245395, "item_id": 48952837, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48952837", "by": "PaulHoule", "date": "2026-07-17", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Photoshop is like that too", "excerpt": "I've got really mixed feelings about Clojure. Like when I read Graham's book I went through a phase of \"he wouldn't be fighting with nconc if he was using Clojure!\" I find some algorithms to be easy and fun to write using persistent data structures and others maddening though if I did it more I'd get better at it. zippers are weirdly unergonomic because of some little bad choices. I badly wanted to do a project with ", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "A Road to Lisp: Which Lisp"}, {"id": 782738018, "item_id": 48921126, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48921126", "by": "IAmGraydon", "date": "2026-07-15", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Lots of problems in Adobe Creative Cloud on Win 11 (primarily Photoshop, InDesign, Illustrator)", "excerpt": "iOS is definitely buggier. It used to be a silky smooth experience but it's degraded significantly in the last year or so. Safari on iOS, in particular, is very bad. Lots of problems in Adobe Creative Cloud on Win 11 (primarily Photoshop, InDesign, Illustrator) in recent months too.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: Is it just me, or is software buggier across the board?"}, {"id": 782323088, "item_id": 48895193, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48895193", "by": "lossyalgo", "date": "2026-07-13", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I use PS weekly and I've never seen it (or anything else) touch my hosts file on Windows.", "excerpt": "OP is using Apple so maybe that's why? I use PS weekly and I've never seen it (or anything else) touch my hosts file on Windows. I just verified - nothing beyond my own entries.", "context": "", "use_case": "image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "An Infuriating Goodbye to Photoshop"}, {"id": 782292608, "item_id": 48893288, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48893288", "by": "bananaboy", "date": "2026-07-13", "stance": "warn", "quote": "It was getting slower and slower with every release.", "excerpt": "I cancelled mine this year too after having the subscription for maybe 10 years (and using dodgy copies previously for many many years). I used it mostly because it's the only professional tool remaining that can handle palettised formats and can reduce colours with a bunch of dithering options (I do a lot of retro computing projects and sometimes need/want to manage palettes in there). But it was just infuriating. I", "context": "retro computing projects", "use_case": "palettised images and dithering", "switched_from": "", "story": "An Infuriating Goodbye to Photoshop"}, {"id": 782285472, "item_id": 48892842, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48892842", "by": "stronglikedan", "date": "2026-07-13", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I use PS daily", "excerpt": "It does require admin rights on Win and will pop up the little admin confirmation message on each edit. I'm dubious of the claim that it was written to unnoticed. I use PS daily and I know it hasn't modified my hosts file, because I have, often, and would have noticed (that, and the obvious admin confirmation dialog).", "context": "", "use_case": "image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "An Infuriating Goodbye to Photoshop"}, {"id": 782281200, "item_id": 48892575, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48892575", "by": "pier25", "date": "2026-07-13", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Photoshop and Illustrator CS6 were the last good versions.", "excerpt": "I've been using Photoshop since CS1 (was a Corel user before that). Photoshop and Illustrator CS6 were the last good versions. Very snappy and with probably 99% of the features I use today. Everything slowly degraded when they moved to the subscription model which I've been paying since 2013. Apple Silicon support was really bad for a couple of years (tons of GPU issues in Illustrator) but I will admit it's better no", "context": "user since CS1", "use_case": "image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "An Infuriating Goodbye to Photoshop"}, {"id": 782280096, "item_id": 48892506, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48892506", "by": "donatj", "date": "2026-07-13", "stance": "warn", "quote": "every time CPUs have gotten faster, it's gotten slower.", "excerpt": "My biggest complaint about Photoshop is that every time CPUs have gotten faster, it's gotten slower. I've used it since the mid 1990s recreationally, early 2000s professionally. Every time I get a major CPU upgrade, it will be fast for a while, but with updates become slow again. This pattern has repeated over and over again. Most recently when I moved to Apple Silicon from an Intel Mac, I was excited how quickly eve", "context": "user since the 1990s", "use_case": "image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "An Infuriating Goodbye to Photoshop"}, {"id": 782279728, "item_id": 48892483, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48892483", "by": "yardie", "date": "2026-07-13", "stance": "warn", "quote": "They only supported local copy and Creative Cloud sync.", "excerpt": "> One thing I loved as part of the Creative Cloud subscription was the Creative Cloud Synced Files service. Basically, it was Adobe\u2019s version of DropBox. I used it all the time to share screenshots and samples of in-progress work. Then, in 2023, Adobe announced they\u2019d be discontinuing the service. There was so much pushback that they delayed the service\u2019s retirement for a year. It makes sense, it was a nice feature o", "context": "IT admin supporting a graphic design team", "use_case": "design team asset editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "An Infuriating Goodbye to Photoshop"}, {"id": 780711264, "item_id": 48794454, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48794454", "by": "cosmic_cheese", "date": "2026-07-05", "stance": "warn", "quote": "before they switched to the branded-UI mess", "excerpt": "That move of Adobe\u2019s drives me nuts even now. It might be my imagination but as I recall, the UI of Photoshop for example felt more responsive (at least on Mac) in 7/CS1/CS2 before they switched to the branded-UI mess (despite the hardware of that era being so much weaker than today\u2019s), and visual contrast and readability was better before too.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Dark Mode with Web Standards"}, {"id": 779261921, "item_id": 48703870, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48703870", "by": "telman17", "date": "2026-06-27", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "exported from art I did in Photoshop", "excerpt": "Thanks, I used Phaser to build it. The nebula textures are exported from art I did in Photoshop using some galaxy brushes from brusheezy. It has a few dozen color palettes that it chooses at random that are used for the connections and the final nebula art.", "context": "", "use_case": "nebula art", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: Starglyphs - A constellation puzzle game based on Euler paths"}, {"id": 778099344, "item_id": 48631209, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48631209", "by": "aleyan", "date": "2026-06-22", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "drew a depth map in Photoshop", "excerpt": "There are many ways of making wigglegrams. The first method is to capture multiple horizontally displaced shots together at once. There were cameras designed for this in the 80s that had 4 lenses, with the widest about eye width apart; the intent was for them to be printed as lenticular 3d images. The second is to have a single shot and then synthetically create additional perspective, such as by using a depth map. I", "context": "", "use_case": "drawing depth maps", "switched_from": "", "story": "Help I Accidentally a Wigglegram"}, {"id": 771943586, "item_id": 48246474, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48246474", "by": "vessenes", "date": "2026-05-23", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Photoshop has a history palette, but it just does not do (easily) what this lets you do", "excerpt": "I can\u2019t tell if I love or hate the idea of this. On the hate side, ComfyUI is just so, so difficult to use on a normal size screen with a trackpad. It\u2019s designed for someone with a 34\u201d gamer monitor and a mouse with like six buttons, and I haven\u2019t seen a good working node based interface that would be comfortable on a Mac or iPad, so I feel frustrated just looking at the images and thinking about zooming in / out and", "context": "", "use_case": "image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "ArcBrush \u2013 Node-based 2D image editor"}, {"id": 771084929, "item_id": 48192808, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48192808", "by": "pessimizer", "date": "2026-05-19", "stance": "compare", "quote": "I deeply disagree that Photoshop has better UI than GIMP", "excerpt": "I really hate [edit: the necessity for something like] this. I deeply disagree that Photoshop has better UI than GIMP, it's just that GIMP is no professional's daily driver, you were paid to learn Photoshop; and whenever you learned any technique, you learned it in Photoshop. Clinging to Photoshop UI (which is completely arbitrary and bizarre) just supports Photoshop - you're taking a vacation instead of making a mov", "context": "", "use_case": "image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "Photo GIMP \u2013 A Patch for GIMP 3 for Photoshop Users"}, {"id": 770850368, "item_id": 48178148, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48178148", "by": "Hard_Space", "date": "2026-05-18", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I need Photoshop for an almost vanishingly small subset of all the things it is capable of", "excerpt": "I need Photoshop for an almost vanishingly small subset of all the things it is capable of, and this holds true for nearly all 'full-fledged' software that I use. So what may not be surfacing, in the absence of vibe-coded Photoshops, is the growing local script collections of many users. Since I have had AI to knock up Python scripts and workflows incorporating local ImageMagick and FFMPEG, I have devolved a lot of t", "context": "", "use_case": "image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "Where Are the Vibecoded Photoshops?"}, {"id": 768758321, "item_id": 48047395, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48047395", "by": "vintagedave", "date": "2026-05-07", "stance": "warn", "quote": "None of it lost functionality like this, which looks like they used an entirely new UI framework under the good.", "excerpt": "> It\u2019s not that hard to picture people spending 8+ hours a day going through these windows for years if not decades to come, and it\u2019s not hard to add and multiply all... This is key to being a product manager, as well as a UX designer. It is the single most important lesson to learn for anyone managing stable, longterm software. I used to be the PM for the Delphi IDE (RAD Studio, C++Builder) and we did a UX refresh. ", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Photoshop's challenges with focus, pt. 2"}, {"id": 768756928, "item_id": 48047308, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48047308", "by": "Daub", "date": "2026-05-07", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "a stepped curve in Photoshop", "excerpt": "> Any suggestion how can I add such color visualization across body of work of a given artist or a style? I think that the best visualization of the colors of a painting is by using the painting itself. In class I demonstrate lightness by first desaturating the work (or copy pasting the L in Lab). I then do a controlled posterize on the image - basically a stepped curve in Photoshop. I try to isolate the dark, middle", "context": "art instructor", "use_case": "posterizing paintings for teaching", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: Explore color palettes inspired by 3000 master painter artworks"}, {"id": 768749200, "item_id": 48046825, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48046825", "by": "northernsausage", "date": "2026-05-07", "stance": "warn", "quote": "I can't tell you how frustrating the select and mask  tool is to actually use. I've rolled back to 2020 version", "excerpt": "I use PS every single day and I can't tell you how frustrating the select and mask tool is to actually use. I've rolled back to 2020 version that seems to be easier to use but dumber product.", "context": "uses it every day", "use_case": "daily image editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "Photoshop's challenges with focus, pt. 2"}, {"id": 759680240, "item_id": 47480015, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47480015", "by": "idopmstuff", "date": "2026-03-22", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "it'll be much more efficient to just do it in Photoshop than to describe the change in English", "excerpt": "I don't know that people are saying code is dead (or at least the ones who have even a vague understanding of AI's role) - more that humans are moving up a level of abstraction in their inputs. Rather than writing code, they can write specs in English and have AI write the code, much in the same way that humans moved from writing assembly to writing higher-level code. But of course writing code directly will always m", "context": "", "use_case": "pixel-perfect photo edits", "switched_from": "", "story": "Reports of code's death are greatly exaggerated"}, {"id": 758737120, "item_id": 47421070, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47421070", "by": "qingcharles", "date": "2026-03-17", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Since they added it a year or so ago it has been game-changing.", "excerpt": "I use the Adobe version of this in Photoshop every day and I assumed that Adobe solved this the same way, but used professionals to cut out the subjects from the backgrounds then fed both versions into their AI. Since they added it a year or so ago it has been game-changing. I'm cutting out portraits every day and having a magical tool that cuts out the subject with perfect hair cut out with a single click is sci-fi.", "context": "Cuts out portraits daily", "use_case": "cutting out portrait subjects", "switched_from": "", "story": "It Took Me 30 Years to Solve This VFX Problem \u2013 Green Screen Problem [video]"}, {"id": 742183585, "item_id": 46386474, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46386474", "by": "cben", "date": "2025-12-25", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I want more apps to expose UX like PhotoShop layers, where users are more productive manipulating a recipe", "excerpt": "Computers are not a kitchen. They are clay, they are Lego, they are jungles of imagination. It's true that our current trajectory devolves their universality to a set of discrete isolated applications == multiplexing a set of appliances on one device. That's an economic win sure, but it's tragic if we fail to unlock more of their flexibility for \"end users\"! IMHO that's the biggest unsolved problems of computer scien", "context": "", "use_case": "layer-based editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "Are we stuck with the same Desktop UX forever? [video]"}]}