Canva has finally released the new Affinity app for iPad, nearly a year after it brought the redesigned creative suite to Mac and Windows. To go with it, the company has also introduced a bunch of new tools that take advantage of Apple Pencil and the iPad’s touchscreen. And the good news is that the app is free, at least for the core creative tools.
As we reported last week, Affinity already offered separate Photo, Designer, and Publisher apps for iPad. The new version brings all those capabilities into a single app, allowing users to work on illustrations, photos, vectors, and page layouts without switching between different apps.
A few new tricks for Apple Pencil
Starting with Sketch Studio, the app gains a dedicated workspace for drawing with Apple Pencil, with support for pressure and tilt controls. There is also a new Sketch to Shapes feature that can turn rough hand-drawn shapes into editable vectors, without having to redraw everything.
For more advanced drawing, users can take advantage of Apple Pencil Pro features like barrel roll, squeeze, and hover. There is also a new Mask Tool for selecting tricky edges in photos, such as hair and fur. You can also edit RAW photos, create multi-page documents, and keep all the edits in the same .af file.
Canva AI joins the mix
Next in line is Canva AI Studio, which adds some AI-powered editing tricks into the mix. The list includes Generative Expand for extending images, image upscaling, motion blur reduction, and noise reduction. Another tool called Decompose Layer can split a flattened image into separate editable layers.
Notably, Affinity’s core Sketch, Vector, Pixel, and Layout tools are free for individuals. However, the AI features require a premium Canva account. The app is now available on the iPad App Store, with a free Canva account required to get started.
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