The 8 Best Alternatives to Adobe Products That Run on Linux

1. GIMP (Adobe Photoshop)

GNU Image Manipulation Program (GIMP) is a free, open-source, cross-platform image editor widely used for editing and manipulating images in GNU/Linux, Windows, and other operating systems. Linux users can perform specific tasks like transcoding image file formats, free-form drawing, file formatting, and much more. This graphic editor is released under the GPL 3 license.

GIMP supports various sophisticated tools that make the creative work for illustrators, scientists, designers, and photographers effortless, effective, and elegant. It provides many customization options along with third-party plugins to provide you with a creative edge.

2. Inkscape (Adobe Illustrator)

Inkscape is one of the best creative alternatives to Adobe Illustrator. It is a free and open-source vector graphics editor, which is not only licensed under GPL but is also helpful for creating vector images in scalable vector graphics formats. Rest assured, even if your vector image is in some other format, you can still comfortably import or export the images in different formats with Inkscape.

To create vector images, you will need some primitive vector shapes. Otherwise, you might have to make a list of shapes likes eclipse, spiral, and rectangle on your own. What truly makes Inkscape stand out is its list of various pre-designed shapes and 3D boxes, which makes the whole process of illustrations seamless and smooth.

Inkscape also allows you to trace raster graphics and embed them so that you can create vector graphics using images and other sources effortlessly. Linux users can benefit from further image manipulation features like rotation, scaling, skewing, and much more.

Related: The Best Adobe Illustrator Alternatives for Linux

3. Scribus (Adobe InDesign)

When you talk about Adobe InDesign alternatives, Scribus will emerge as the clear winner. Scribus is a free and open-source desktop publishing software for Linux, specially designed for layouts.

If you want to create interactive and animated PDFs, you would love this platform. If you are from a media domain, you will find creating posters, brochures, and newsletters an absolute cinch with Scribus.

This software is released under GNU General Public License, which supports its native versions within Unix, macOS, OS/2, BSD, and Linux.

4. OpenShot (Adobe Premiere)

One of the most challenging tasks for Linux users is creating videos. OpenShot is an ideal solution for dealing with your video shooting and editing woes. It is a free and open-source platform that supports features like video effects, audio waveforms, animation & keyframes, slow motion & time effects, all in one single platform.

The core audio on the platform is supported by the JUCE library and the video editing features are implemented through libopenshot, a C++ library. The user interface is simple to understand and supports 70+ languages.

5. Synfig (Adobe Animate)

2D animation has never been better for Linux users, thanks to Synfig. Synfig is another top contender licensed under GNU GPL 3. This platform’s popular features attract Linux users, especially since it offers a ton of features ranging from vector tweening, and bones, to advanced controls, layers, and filters.

These features make it a perfect replacement for Adobe Animate but for the Linux OS. The gradients offer soft-shading features for your images, which will save a lot of time and effort. Designers won’t face the hassles of shading, as Synfig takes care of everything.

These real-time effects bring your objects to life, as it also works on high dynamic range imaging.

Related: A Beginner’s Guide to Adobe Character Animator

6. Darktable (Adobe Lightroom)

Darktable is an open-source photography workflow application that manages the digital negatives in a database. The software manages your digital negatives in a database which further helps enhance your raw images.

Darktable includes a subset of operations that focuses on improving a photographer’s workflow as it handles and facilitates a large number of raw images.

The software is released under GPL 3 license, which supports customized versions on Linux, Solaris, and Windows.

7. Ardour (Adobe Audition)

Ardour is a free audio recording application that runs on Windows, macOS, FreeBSD, and Linux. Adobe Audition is quite a popular software for an audio workstation; however, it is not compatible with Linux. The best alternative, Ardour, was then developed by Paul Davis, which has worked wonders for audio developers running Linux distros.

Released under the GPL 2 license, Ardour is one of the best solutions for audio engineers, soundtrack editors, musicians, and composers who need an audio workstation but do not have a Windows setup.

8. Master PDF (Adobe Acrobat)

Using PDF editors, users can create flawless documents while being able to edit them simultaneously. Even though Adobe Acrobat is an ideal software to perform such functions, Linux users are always cornered out, as Adobe applications aren’t available for the OS.

Linux users have found solace in Master PDF, which is a close replacement for Adobe Acrobat. This software lets you edit PDF text and pages while adding and editing the pre-defined bookmarks of the file in question. Master PDF also helps you convert your XPS files into PDF in a few simple clicks.

Finding the Ideal Replacement for Adobe Products

The aforementioned list of software includes some of the top contenders in the software industry, which makes them ideal replacements for their Adobe counterparts.

There are a variety of features available for Linux users, which makes each of these software perfect for people who are looking to replicate Adobe’s functionalities using open-source applications.