Free photo editing software will always have clients. Today, the demand for photo editing and retouching products is very high and software has recorded significant development in the area. Everyone can edit photos using a laptop or mobile devices. Photo editing software has to be multifunctional and provide tools for beginners and professional users.
The following are some of the Best Free Photo Editing Programs that both professional and beginner photographers should check out. Photo editing software is a great way to improve the quality of your pictures and create wonderful masterpieces.
Adobe Photoshop may be the best choice among the photo editing programs but it’s expensive and needs a lot of learning time. It’s designed more for advanced users and many of its features aren’t useful for an average user. So instead of buying a complicated program that you don’t entirely use, is better to look for a free photo editor that provides all that you need.
The best free photo editors offer useful features such as removing red-eyes, resizing, black and white conversion, effects, presets and styles, textures, tools for creating collages, and tools for image retouching. The following list includes some of the best free photo editing software available for Windows.
Microsoft Photos couldn’t miss from the list of best free photo editing software for Windows. It’s an excellent free picture editing software, built-in with Windows 10. Microsoft Photos provides basic adjustments like exposure and color corrections, highlights and shadows adjustments, and clarity control. But what makes Photos stand out is its wide range of attractive presets that allow you to change the look of your images in seconds.
Microsoft Photos goes beyond being a free photo editing software by including video editing tools. You can make clips, trim videos, add titles and effects, and even add background music to your video.
Although it has a good price, Luminar isn’t a free photo editing software. But it has a trial version you can use for free and fall in love with the features of Luminar.
Designed for photographers, Luminar provides all the tools you need for photo enhancement and retouching. It has over 70 filters, grouped in intuitive categories, which allow you fix any type of photo, create atmosphere, or add special effects. Luminar also provides endless Looks, presets that completely transform a picture. You can find Looks for landscapes, portraits, aerial shots, black and white photos, and many more. And if you don’t find what you need, you can always download more free Looks from Luminar Marketplace.
Luminar works with layers and masks, provides geometric transformations, and allows you to save your settings as a custom Look. It also offers outstanding digital assets management, batch processing, and a customizable interface. And all its features are available in the trial version.
Luminar is powered by Artificial Intelligence and provides automatic image enhancement tools like AI Sky Enhancer and Accent AI Filter. It detects objects and faces in your image and decides what adjustments are best for them. And you can fine-tune everything using just a slider. Its free trial is a great opportunity to see what a professional photo editor can do.
GIMP is one of the best photo editing software for Windows because is a complete photo editor that rivals Photoshop in terms of capabilities and features. It provides everything you need, from basic image corrections like exposure control and white balance to advanced editing tools like Transform and Heal. It also provides RAW support, which not many free editors can do.
Convert pdf file to word on mac. Before the 2.10 update, many considered GIMP a complicated program because of its interface. But now GIMP has finally changed its look and workflow and became an attractive and modern photo editor.
GIMP also provides a wide range of filters that help you edit photos in seconds. Overall, it’s one of the best photo editing software for Windows, it’s free, it’s easy to download and install, and can face Photoshop anytime.
Adobe Lightroom has only a free 7-day trial but it’s cloud-based and offers a professional online editor. You can use it with mobile devices and work remotely, quickly fix your images, and share them with your client. Otherwise, Lightroom is an expensive solution, which costs $9.99 per month for a year.
In terms of photo editing, Lightroom gives you control over each aspect of an image, amazing presets, geometry tools, and a neat, fluid workspace. It has a wide community of photographers and trainers around it, which makes it easy to learn and comfortable to use. Among other features, it’s worth mention shift focus, selective edits, noise reduction, healing brushes, and a wide range of special effects. Lightroom was designed for professional photographers, with complex image organizing capabilities and professional photo editing tools.
Photolemur has a free version that only allows you to export images with watermark. But it’s a small price paid for the amazing automatic features of this photo editing software. It analyzes your photos and automatically adjusts it using powerful Artificial Intelligence algorithms.
Photolemur provides features such as color recovery, sky enhancement, foliage enhancement, noise reduction, exposure compensation, tint perfection, lens correction, dehaze, and natural light correction. It’s capable of enhancing any type of photo but has dedicated tools for face enhancing and skin retouching. It’s a great editor for beginners and professionals with little time to spare. Instead of spending hours editing photos, use a smart editor and take more time for creative activities.
Photolemur isn’t expensive software and has a traditional license. The full version offers batch processing, RAW support, and many other filters and features. It’s available as a standalone software, Photoshop and Lightroom pugins, and Apple Photos extension.
Zoner Photo Studio Free is the 18th version of Zoner Photo Studio and was released in 2016 as free software. It’s still available for download. However, the newer version, Zoner Photo Studio X provides much more features but is no longer free. Choose to download the older version and you’ll get the newer one for a 30-days trial and then the older free version.
Zoner Photo Studio 18 provides many modern features such as organizing tools, masks, filters, gradients, tools for highlighting, removing noise, adding frames, and correcting perspective, support for HDR, and tools for capturing the screen, batch processing, and creating video slideshows.
You can choose to compression your images and save the originals in the cloud. You receive unlimited server space and an address with an easy to remember name (for example, myphotos.zonerama.com)
Despite the fact that editing capabilities are limited compared with the professional version of Zoner Photo Studio, the free version is quite impressive. It allows you to change image resolution and canvas size, add text, overlay images, add effects, make color correction, sharpen images, and work with shutter speed and white balance. Zoner Photo Studio is one of the best free photo editing software you can try.
If you’re looking for the best photo editor for Windows that is free and can handle RAW files, then LightZone may be the perfect solution for you. This photography editing software was recently made open source, which means you can start using it right away and edit your RAW files without having to buy a premium photo editor for Windows.
LightZone allows you to start editing your photos by choosing one of its many ‘Styles’. These are presets that combine different settings and give your photos a starting look you can then transform. Among Styles you’ll find Soft Skin Tones, Bright Scene, Midtones Sharpening, Crisp, and Soft Toning. Each style has a distinct look and works best on a specific type of photos. There are also styles that improve your image such as Sharpen, Hue/Saturation, Noise Reductions, and Black and White. You can fine-tune each style to create your artistic vision.
All these features make LightZone a very compelling free picture editing software.
For those looking for a simple and free image editing software, Paint.Net is a good solution. Over the years, the software has turned into a very capable image editor that rivals the best photo editing software for Windows.
It provides a very good user interface and doesn’t try to mimic Photoshop like many other free programs do. It rather keeps things simpler and logical. Paint.NET offers many image enhancement tools like Curves and Levels, layers, blending modes, and creative tools. It also provides more advanced tools like Clone Stamp, which makes Paint.Net a force to be reckoned in the space of free photography editing software.
What puts Paint.Net in the list of best free photo editing software is the fact that its capabilities can be enhanced by using a wide selection of plugins. It has an active community of users that supports the constant growing of plugins list and the editor’s improving.
Photo Pos Pro is a free image editing software that has a lot to offer. It has a customizable interface that appeals to both beginners and advanced users. It has an online community where new users learn how to use the program and ask for help. It has a number of image editing tools that let you enhance your photos. And it also has graphic design capabilities that allow the creation of collages, business cards, and more.
Photo Pos Pro provides basic image editing tools such as exposure adjustments, white balance settings, color correction, and saturation control. Photo Pos Pro also offers filters like Sharpness and Blur, layers, and creative effects.
So, if you’re looking for a picture editing software that provides basic editing and some neat advanced tools, then Photo Pos Pro is definitely worth a look.
PhotoScape X may not be the best free photo editing software you’ll ever use. But it provides easy ways to add filters and make basic image adjustments. For example, the Magic Color filter is really good for enhancing colors without making them look artificial or exaggerated. Another good example are the Light Leak effects that add a vintage look to your pictures.
Among the tools of PhotoScape X are Cut Out for removing the background of an object, Combine for overlaying multiple photos, GIF Creator for making animations, Split for dividing a photo into smaller pieces, Photo Merge for basic HDR creation, and Frames for adding fun borders.
PhotoScape X is a basic photo editing software and can’t overtake editors like Photoshop. Still, it’s a fun editor that can help you do basic adjustments and add creative effects to your photos.
Pixlr definitely deserves a place on the best photo editing software for Windows list. It’s an online editor that can be used with a wide range of browsers and devices. You only need internet connection to load the page. After that Pixlr works on your device and doesn’t need connection anymore.
Pixlr has a Photoshop-like interface that you can customize and many image editing tools. Among its features are exposure controls, white balance adjustments, sharpness, blur tools, color corrections, contrast adjusting, and shadows and highlights settings. You can work with layers and masks as well, which really takes Pixlr’s capabilities to the next level. It also provides curves and levels adjustments, keyboard shortcuts, and plenty of fun filters.
Overall, Pixlr is a very capable and easy to use free image editing software. You can use it anywhere and anytime and it’s particularly useful for editing pictures on location and sending them quickly to your clients.
Another free editor for Windows is RawTherapee. It provides non-destructive RAW editing and many other features that make it similar to Adobe Lightroom. How to cut video on imovie macbook. Free photo editing software doesn’t usually have all the features that RawTherapee offer and that’s why it’s on our best photo editing software for Windows list.
RawTherapee offer exposure, white balance, and color adjustments, shadows and highlights settings, and other image enhancement tools. The only thing that’s missing is digital assets management.
You can use RawTherapee with GIMP by default and make more creative changes to your exported RAW files. We’ve really appreciated the possibility to export files directly into a free complex photo editor.
The list of free photo editing software wouldn’t be complete without DarkTable. It’s one of the best free photo editors for Windows that supports RAW files. DarkTable provides plenty of RAW editing tools that somehow clutter the interface. Still, after you get used to working with them you’ll see only the benefits of having a wide range of tools.
If you compare Darktable with Lightroom, which many say is the best photo editor for Windows that provides RAW editing, you’ll see that DarkTable offers many of Lightroom’s features. It also produces similar results when you use the same settings, which is the proof of its amazing capabilities. The only Darktable’s drawback is a less streamlined design that requires more time for making the same edits. But if you consider that DarkTable is a free picture editing software and Lightroom is quite expensive, you can make this little compromise.
InPixio is a free photo editor for Windows that aims to be the best photo editing software for those looking for a complete solution. It has three distinct parts: The Photo Eraser, The Photo Cutter, and The Photo Editor. The Photo Eraser allows you to remove different objects from your photos to make them look cleaner or bring more focus to the main subject. The Cutter allows you to remove the background from your photos, which can be great for design work or for commercial photographs.
The Photo Editor is where you edit your photos. From simple adjustments to brightness, contrast, and saturation to applying vintage effects, there’s a lot happening in the Editor part of the suite. However, to gain access to the Editor, you have to get the Pro Version of InPixio, which isn’t free. Regardless, the free version of the program offers useful features you can use for object or background removal – things that many of us need from time to time.
Inkscape is an open-source picture editing software that is more useful for graphic design than for photography. It provides a variety of tools that allow users to edit vector images, similar to Adobe Illustrator. Tools like Shapes, Paths, Clines, Transformation, and Text make Inkscape a very capable vector graphics editor but you can use it as a photo editor as well.
It may not be the free professional photo editing software you were hoping for, but it’s still a very good software that deserves to be on the list of the best free photo editing software available today. If you’re a graphic designer and want an alternative to the expensive Illustrator, then try Inkscape.
For now, we end here our list of the best photo free photo editing software available for Windows. Free photo editors are usually considered mediocre in comparison with the paid options but that’s not always the case. Yes, paid editors have more features and often better support from the manufacturers, but that doesn’t mean that free photo editors don’t offer enough. As you can see from the above list, there are many free professional photo editing software that can be used to apply filters and effects, to enhance images, and even to edit RAW files.
Before you can upload your images to your personal blog, social media page or website, it is key that you first edit your images. Nowadays this is a step that you cannot afford to skip if you want your photos to be taken seriously. In fact, as there is such a wide range of software solutions on the market, there is no reason why you should skip this important step.
Though, seeing that users are spoilt for choice, to find the best photo editing tools that will boost your current set of skills can be quite a challenge. If you thought that Adobe Photoshop is the only photo editing software, you would be mistaken. Nowadays there are many much simpler software solutions too! The following are some of the best photo editing software that both professional and beginner photographers should check out.
1. Luminar (7-day Trial)
If you need a photo editing tool to get the job done in a flash, Skylum Luminar can help you to take your photos to new heights. It boasts a really useful AI slider that lets you play around with clarity, brightness and much more. There are also exclusive filters such as the Orton and Sunrays filters that you will absolutely love.
In fact, this software can give Adobe Lightroom and Photoshop a run for their money. Speaking of which, as you only have to pay a fixed fee once (eliminating those annoying monthly subscription payments), it makes sense why Skylum Luminar has become so popular amongst professional photographers. That being said, if you prefer to use Photoshop or Lightroom, it also boasts a plug-in that you will find quite handy.
2. Adobe Lightroom(7-day Trial)
When Adobe Photoshop is too advanced for those straightforward touch-ups, Adobe Lightroom will be more suited for the task at hand. Convert pdf file to word on mac. As a matter of fact, the fact that it is not as complicated as Photoshop is the whole beauty of Adobe Lightroom.
Some of its excellent features include: customizable sliders, gradient and brush adjustments, presets, blurring tools and other professional filters. Plus, you can use it with multiple devices and to help you keep your photos organized it uses face detection. All things considered, with this wide range of functional features and its easy-to-use interface, you can create just as remarkable photos with Lightroom.
3. PicMonkey
If you are searching for a more comprehensive graphic design solution as opposed to just photo editing features, PicMonkey is the perfect pick. With this package, you can create collages, edit your photos, crop and add touch-ups to mention only a couple of its features.
It is the ideal software solution to help you take your design skills to a more advanced level and unleash your creativity. Some of its other main features are basic filters, blank canvas design, and templates. Plus, if you regularly have to work with the different social media platforms, you will love its automatic sizing feature.
4. Aurora HDR(7-day Trial)
Aurora HDR can either be used as a stand-alone app or Adobe Photoshop or Lightroom plug-in. Boasting more than 80 looks, you can transform your photos instantly to deliver first-class final results. Some of its more sophisticated features that professional photographers will welcome include masking and layers, blending modes, powerful batch processing and support for RAW files.
On top of that, it also offers exclusive tools like HDR Denoise and HDR Smart Structure. The Denoise feature will automatically identify any noise and remove it while still retaining all the details, while the latter tool is a slider that uses AI to create astonishing depth.
5. Pixlr Editor
If you have grown accustomed to Adobe Photoshop, but are exploring alternatives, be sure to try out Pixlr Editor. With this online photo editing software, you can add an image to a blank canvas and come up with one-of-a-kind effects. Some of its other main features include overlays, filters and more than two million effects free of charge. If you prefer to use an app, rest assured you can download it to your mobile device or desktop as an app. At the end of the day, if you are not entirely impressed with the features and options offered by Pixlr Editor, you can upgrade to another version (there are various to choose from) that offers more sophisticated options.
6. Fotor
Fotor is another photo editing software solution that boasts an intuitive interface. Some of its main features include: design templates, filters, HDR effects, and portrait retouching. Alternatively, if you are looking to create a bit more informal design, there are countless shapes, fonts and stickers that you can play around with. And, when you feel as if your creative juices are running low, you can save your design and continue editing from where you last stopped.
This well-known cloud-based software boasts more than 300 million users already. Surely millions of users cannot be wrong? You simply need to upload your pics to their site and you are all set to begin the editing process.
7. Adobe Photoshop(7-day Trial)
You are most likely already very familiar with Adobe Photoshop. It is arguably the best known photo editing tool that countless photographers and designers rely on and is aimed at professionals that require all the extra features.
Its layering, masking and retouching features are still arguably the best and ideal for those advanced touch-up jobs. It also offers a wide range of brushes and filters, three-dimensional design functionality and multilayer editing. If you are searching for photo editing software, you can rest assured that Adobe’s products are really superior.
8. ACDSee Photo Studio Ultimate (Free or Full version with 30-day moneyback option)
Do not let the oversimplified interface of ACDSee Photo Studio Ultimate fool you as it can still get any job done. This comprehensive photography software is still relatively new on the market and boasts a couple of useful features. Two of its best features are that it uses facial recognition to organize and index your photos and there is no need to import. This means that you can edit your source file directly from your drive.
9. Serif Affinity Photo
This vector graphic design app has very similar features to the popular Adobe Photoshop and shares identical interfaces. For an affordable once-off fee, you can access professional tools similar to the likes of Adobe Lightroom and Photoshop for editing your photos.
10. PortraitPro
If your niche is portrait photography, PortraitPro is the tool you should give a go. This professional image editor app boasts all the features you require to remove wrinkles, sagging cheeks and other skin imperfections, enhance skin tone and add eyeshadows. Some of its other features include make-up tools, sliders, skin smoothing and sophisticated layering.
11. Corel PaintShop Pro
Photographers who value simplicity will really like Corel PaintShop Pro (and if you still get stuck, you can rest assured as there are learning tutorials available as well). That being said, do not let its simple approach to photo editing fool you as it does not make its editing capability any less effective.
This software boasts everything you require to enhance your pics from AI enhanced presets to graphic design templates to options such as blur and fix. Plus, if the wide range of brushes, textures and backgrounds do not float your boat, do not dismiss the software just yet as brand new features are being added continuously. Overall, it really offers some of the best user experiences.
12. DxO Optics Pro 10
It does not matter if Windows or Mac is your preferred operating system, DxO Optics Pro 10 works equally well with both. It boasts a suite of tools and features such as automatic and manual mode, customized profiles, optical corrections and U-point local adjustment technology. All things considered, it is a reliable tool that professional photographers can use to edit their photos and convert their RAW files to JPG format without any issues.
13. Inkscape
Just like DxO Optics Pro 10, Inkscape is also compatible with both Mac as well as Windows operating systems. What is more, you can use its source code if you would prefer to use it in your very own application.
It is ideal for aspiring photographers and boast a great number of features such as copy-paste object cloning, decorative handwriting tools, and a colour picker. It also supports multiple text formats and offers available extensions and add-ons. With the help of these tools, it is real easy to clone an object, overlay text or add a specific colour to your pics.
14. Capture One
This RAW image editor boasts some features that set it apart from the other software solutions available. For starters, if you need to work with big volumes of photos that are more than 20 megapixel RAW files, you will be impressed with its speed. Itubedownloader 6 3 3 – video downloader mp3. What is more, to help you work more efficiently, the interface boasts some great customizability which means that you can change the keyboard shortcuts and layout to suit your preferences better.
If you often work with layers, you will also love the fact that it does not become slower when you have too many layers. Plus, it lets you make several adjustments per layer.
Some of its other fabulous features that will help you to work more efficiently are its sophisticated color editing and annotations. Its sliders make it much easier to tweak the granularity, while the annotations feature lets you jot down ideas to ensure that you can collaborate smoothly with other photographers and designers.
15. Gimp
This free professional software for editing photos is another excellent Photoshop alternative for beginners. It boasts a variety of features that can assist novices with digital photo retouching and composition. With the help of features like vignette and corrective mode, you can also take your photos of any file format to the next level.
If this sounds like the photo editing software solution for your needs, all you have to do is download it and install it on your device (it is compatible with Linux, Windows and Mac operating systems). Plus, thanks to its built-in file manager, file management will be one less thing on your to-do list.
16. AirMagic(7-day Trial)
No photo editing software list will be complete without including a solution for drone photography. Similar to Photolemur, AirMagic uses sophisticated algorithms and artificial intelligence to enhance your aerial photography automatically. This drag-and-drop photo editing app boasts many unique features that help you to get rid of haze, improve the colours, enhance the sky and bring detail to the fore. As haze is unfortunately a common issue with drone photography, getting rid of haze is a must-have feature. After you have applied these unique features, you can also play around with different creative styles eliminating the need to purchase extra filters.
AirMagic can be used either as an Adobe Photoshop or Lightroom plug-in or stand-alone app. Plus, it can identify the type of camera that you have attached to your drone and adjust its lense corrections and enhancements to that particular camera.
17. Snappa
Snappa is a great solution for photographers who work with social media platforms on a regular basis. It lets you convert pics into Facebook banners and share images on different social media sites.
In short, it is a graphics and design software that enables you to add new effects (such as texts or graphics) to your photos in a flash or change the dimensions easily with the help of image dimension templates. Alternatively, if you are searching for some inspiration or running out of time, you will be glad to know that there are also stock photos available and a useful drag-and-drop photo editing feature. As the software is available online, users do not first have to download something in order to start designing.
18. Canva
Canva is another easy-to-use graphics and design software that you have most likely heard about before. Trusted my millions, it boasts various tools and features to help you edit your photos. Whether you simply want to crop or straighten a photo or want to get creative with textures, fonts, badges and stickers, Canva can help. Some of its other features include vignette, photo blur, a speech bubble maker, an image transparency tool, photo frames and design grids.
Though, if you do not know where to start, be sure to visit the Canva Marketplace where you can find more than 8000 templates. Its basic features are available free of charge, but the more advanced features must be paid for. If you need to edit on the go, you will be happy to know that you can download it to your smartphone. All things considered, it is one of the best resources if you need to come up with visual content that you can use on your website or personal blog. Thanks to its user-friendly drag-and-drop editor, you do not need to be a professional photographer to take advantage of all its features.
19. Photolemur (Free version with watermark)
Photolemur is another photo editing software solution that realizes no photographer or designer has any time to waste behind a screen. With the help of AI and very sophisticated algorithms, this photo enhancer app will analyze all the necessary details and complete intricate adjustments on the spot.
All you have to do is just import your images to Photolemur and leave the rest to the app. The beauty of this tool is that you do not need any prior photo editing experience to complete basic things like getting rid of skin blemishes, whitening teeth or creating perfectly smooth skin as the app will automatically improve your images. Some of its other impressive features include sky enhancement, exposure compensation, color recovery and foliage enhancement. It is really easy to use (you can even enhance multiple photos at the same time) and compatible with both Windows and Mac operating systems.
With the right photo editing software, you can turn any photo into a masterpiece. Whether you want to highlight an important object, bring more focus to your pic or just want to reduce the size of your photo files to improve the loading speed of a website, there is the right photo editing tool for the job and your skills.
0 
Star