Epic Affinity free trial is perfect timing for creatives looking for an Adobe alternative

Photoshop-maker Adobe has had a difficult few weeks, and Serif's Affinity has been quick to offer an alternative to disgruntled creatives. It's launched an unprecedented six-month free trial of its creative apps, giving new users plenty of time to try the software – as well as the chance to get it permanently at half price.

The recent surge in creatives looking for Adobe alternatives has been spurred by a controversial clarification of Adobe's terms of use giving the software giant access to users' work as well as a lawsuit from the US government over its cancellation policies. While nobody else can compete with the sheer range of Adobe Creative Cloud, which has programs for everything from web design to video editing, the Serif Affinity suite is one of the closet viable alternatives, comprising Affinity Photo, Affinity Designer, and Affinity Publisher for Mac, Windows and iPad, and it doesn't require a subscription.

Affinity has three apps: Affinity Photo for image manipulation and digital art, Affinity Designer for vector design and Affinity Publisher for desktop publishing. The current free trial and 50% off deal covers all three for Mac, Windows and iPad, whether bought separately or as a package. Perpetual licences mean that customers pay only once but qualify for free updates.

While it's fairly common for creative software to come with a free trial, it's usually only for a month at the most. Six months makes the new Affinity offer the longest free trial I can recall and genuinely provides enough time for users to fully test out the software to decide if they want to go on to buy it.

For comparison, Adobe's free trial for Creative Cloud lasts a measly seven days – nowhere near long enough for a newcomer to the software to even get a taste of what the vast array of apps can do let alone start to learn how to use them.

Another advantage of Serif's Affinity suite is the one-off purchase price rather than a monthly subscription. Pricing starts at $69.99 for each individual desktop apps or $164.99 for the trinity of Affinity Photo, Designer and Publisher. And it gets even better because there's a deal at the moment that offers 50% off all apps on a perceptual licence.

Affinity was bought by major Adobe rival Canva earlier this year. That's led some users to fear that it might change its pricing model to adopt a subscription policy. These massive deals seem designed to assuage those concerns while taking advantage of Adobe's recent controversies and catching the attention of disgruntled users currently on the hunt for alternatives.

“We’re saying ‘try everything and pay nothing’ because we understand making a change can be a big step, particularly for busy professionals,” said Affinity CEO Ashley Hewson. “Anyone who takes the trial is under absolutely no obligation to buy.”

In our own Affinity Photo review, we gave the program four stars, noting that it's the most viable Photoshop alternative for most users. See full details of the current deals below.

Also see our pick of the best graphic design software, the best photo editing software and the best Photoshop alternatives.