Digital painting, as the name suggests, means doing a painting digitally with the help of some modern tools. Those tools or softwares, whatever you may call them, can help oneself to easily manage one's work. For the painting, designers used different types of tools for good looking and attractive texturing and elegant design. But what software tools are used in digital printing systems? Adobe Illustrator, Blender, SAI paint tool, and others. So, let’s choose the best painting digital painting tool for your aesthetic design.
Imagine yourself doing a traditional painting where you needed brush, color, oil paints, stands, papers. Moreover you may find it hard to create a masterpiece in one shot. There comes the digital painting softwares. These software are fully packed with all the necessary items you need. And you don't have to fear one-shot perfection.
There are lots of softwares out there. Some are for all the operating systems, some for multiple, some for only one. With the advancement of AI, the tools have integrated AI features, making the user's job much easier than ever. Users now can generate files, edit files or even merge them according to their needs. However, we will be showing you the best, top 11 ones here. Let’s dive in.
Adobe Illustrator is a powerful AI vector based graphics tool. Vectors are images that can be scaled as per need and they will still look the same as before. This tool was first introduced in 1987 and from then it has been gaining popularity every year. With the help of mathematical constructs working in the backend, this tool can easily create vector graphics.
There are two ways to buy this software; one buy this software only for $37.99, two buy it from creative clouds as a package with other Adobe softwares for $89.99 only.
As Illustrator is a part of the Adobe company, Adobe achieved a record $21.51 billion in total revenue in the 2024 fiscal year.
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Procreate is an award-winning, premium quality app, only for the iOS users. As the name suggests, one can easily create pro quality illustrations, animations, sketches using this app. The graphics created with Procreate are made of tiny little pixels.
One of the things that makes this software stand out is the buy once feature. As a result, if someone buys it for only $12.99 USD, he/she doesn't have to pay anymore.
Another good part of it is that anybody can start designing with it because there are tons of beginner friendly tutorials.
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With the tagline “The Freedom to Create”, Blender, a free and Open-source software, claims to be free “forever”. And this status can never be lost as it is under GPL (GNU General Public License). It was first developed in 1994 by Ton Roosendaal for in-house use.
However, it is mostly popular for its intricate modelling system, and they are popular among animators. And the best part of Blender is its huge community. And that’s how they keep on going.
As of January 2025, the monthly users are about 4.9 Million according to similarweb. That’s more than 1.37% from last month.
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A light-weight graphic design tool that primarily focuses on illustrations of anime and cartoons. With amazing anti-aliased painting functionality, it allows users to work without any distractions.
Whereas most of the digital painting tools needs high-end requirements, Painttool SAI is a blessing for the low-end PCs. It has a simple interface and supports a wide range of advanced painting techniques. This software is also responsive and lag-free.
It is developed by a Japanese company named SYSTEMAX Software Development. As of January 2025, their website got over 110,901 visitors according to similarweb.
Likewise Procreate, this also has a one time payment system. For only $50.81 you can basically own the software. If compared to Procreate, this is way extra for a software. Moreover, as there is no free trial option, one may find it hard to invest money.
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A software that can be used freely, meaning it does not have a price tag. A drawing arts tool that can also be used in smartphones. It is mainly designed for the comic and manga artists and this sets the software apart from other softwares.
As it is a cloud based digital media software, any artist can access this from anywhere in the world. Medibang Paint is a Japanese free software, developed by MediBang Inc that uses a clear and uncluttered UI.
This painting software has 2 types of plans, with the free plan you can do almost everything. But if you want to get additional benefits you can upgrade to the premium plan.
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It is a free, as well as open-source vector graphics editor. It is used not only for artistic use but also for technical illustrations. Most beginners use this to start their journey as it does not contain complicated components.
Inkscape is best known for its ability to create SVG format files. As it is an open-source software, it gets updated and developed simultaneously by thousands of users around the world.
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ArtRage, a simple yet better painting software. It is known best for its oil painting simulation. With the simple textured paper-like interface, one can easily get the feel of real life painting. This digital painting software was created by a small company in New Zealand.
What sets it apart is that it is the best software for painters. As there are some premium paint options, users are able to paint easily.
As of today, it has 4 versions. The Desktop version costs $80, Lite version costs $29, Android and the iOS version costs $4.99.
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A digital painting software that is beginner friendly and professional enough for the users of different needs.
With over 250+ ArtSets, TwistedBrush Pro Studio provides a powerful brush customization. This allows the users to go beyond their imagination, giving creative styles in the arts.This sets it apart from other competitors.
It is owned by Pixarra, a software company. Beside this, they have a variety of products too. They have 3 versions. A free trial version, Version 26 license for $109 and Perpetual License for $199.
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This software is known for its Photo manipulation program. GNU Image Manipulation Program, also known as GIMP, is a free, open-source raster graphics editor. Its key muscle is in the ability to make smooth, high-quality photo manipulation.
When there is debate on the best photo editing software, this software is every bit as good as Photoshop. What's more, the best part is it’s totally free.
With the new release of GIMP 3.0, users can now get better graphics table support. Also on Linux, Wayland support is available.
Nonetheless, there is a huge community of dedicated developers who are working continuously for the betterment of this software.
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While most of the softwares gives you all the tools and makes the interface jam-packed, MyPaint focuses on minimalistic UI. As a result, users get to see the canvas more often. Besides being easy, light-weight, it is also an open-source painting software. This software is mainly used for painting and sketching from scratch.
According to AppBrain, this app has over 10k+ downloads and has a rating of 2.23/5. Most of the users want to enjoy a free flowing infinite canvas that can give them a creative environment.
MyPaint was originally created by Martin Renold in 2004, now runs as a community-led project, written in C, C++ and Python, developed for simple uses. As it's a free software, it largely depends on donations.
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With over 20M+ downloads worldwide, this software gained popularity for being a light-weight software. This is another Japanese software that is not only best for beginners but also for experts. Its main focus is “drawing”, rather than “controlling”.
It was developed by PGN Inc, the company that makes light-weight softwares for the light-weight users. Thus, they made it an alternative to the heavy ones.
It can run even on low-end pcs. It has 2 versions. One, the FireAlpaca is totally free but has ads and another FireAlpaca SE version that costs one time payment.
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Above mentioned softwares are solely chosen by us keeping in mind the reviews, availability, support and personal use. We are also not affiliated with any of the apps. So always try the “Trial Version” if available before buying any of the above softwares.
Choosing a digital painting software isn’t easy as there are so many software. You have to bear in mind some key points before choosing your perfect digital painting tools. After that hopefully you will find one according to your need.
You can look for customer reviews on popular websites like Truesuggest, g2, Capterra, and Trustpilot. These reviews can help you understand the reliability, and the feedback can give you a sense of common issues.
Every software has a targeted audience. ; some are good for beginners, and some are good for professional use. Beginners may look for easy-to-use, simple, budget-friendly software, whereas professionals may look for more advanced features.
Not every software can run smoothly on every device. So, try to check the minimum requirements to avoid future crashes or lags.
Try to check if your searched software supports cross platform installation. If you have a different OS, this feature will be very helpful. Cross platform installation makes the users usability easier as users can access their file from any OS.
As there are many digital painting softwares, these can vary mostly on their features and pricings. However, the article discusses different types of softwares, why they are different from other competitors and advantages & disadvantages of them. Remember, tools can never make you a pro, it only helps you and your flow and makes it faster. So in the beginning it’s okay to start with any software as most of those have the same tools and layouts.
The answer depends on many things. If you fear that after one time payment, what will you do if you don't like that software then monthly subscription is best for you. On the other hand, if you believe you can buy with proper research and there will not be any problem, then you can do that.
This is a digital tool that lets you paint on images. It is one of the most basic tools that can be found in graphics design and in every editing softwares.
Digital Brushes are one kind of tool that is used in editing to create digital art. These brushes are mainly there to help you, bring your imagination to life. These brushes include different shapes like Flat, Round, Bright, Fan etc.
Open source means the code is open to the public and closed source means not open to the public. It's hard to say which is best but it can be said that you can check and learn from open sourced ones, see if there is any malicious object. But from the closed source, you don’t have any access to any of those. Some popular open-source software is Mozilla Firefox, and closed-source is Facebook.
