Developer(s) | Adobe |
---|---|
Initial release | July 17, 2013 |
Stable release | CC 2024 / October 10, 2023 [1] |
Operating system | Windows, macOS, Android, and iOS |
Predecessor | Adobe Creative Suite 6 |
Available in | English |
Type | Software suite |
License | Software as a service |
Website | adobe |
Adobe Creative Cloud is a set of applications and services from Adobe that gives subscribers access to a collection of software used for graphic design, video editing, web development, photography, along with a set of mobile applications and also some optional cloud services. In Creative Cloud, a monthly or annual subscription service is delivered over the Internet. [2] [3] Software from Creative Cloud is downloaded from the Internet, installed directly on a local computer and used as long as the subscription remains valid. Online updates and multiple languages are included in the CC subscription. Creative Cloud was initially hosted on Amazon Web Services, but a new agreement with Microsoft has the software, beginning with the 2017 version, hosted on Microsoft Azure. [4]
Previously, Adobe offered individual products as well as software suites containing several products (such as Adobe Creative Suite or Adobe eLearning Suite) with a perpetual software license. [5]
Adobe first announced the Creative Cloud in October 2011. Another version of Adobe Creative Suite was released the following year. [6] On May 6, 2013, Adobe announced that they would not release new versions of the Creative Suite and that future versions of its software would be available only through the Creative Cloud. [7] [8] [9] The first new versions made only for the Creative Cloud were released on June 17, 2013.
The Adobe Creative Cloud retains many of the features of Adobe Creative Suite and introduces new features; [10] foremost is the instant availability of upgrades, saving to the cloud, and easier sharing. In June 2014, the company announced 14 new versions of the Creative Cloud essential desktop tools, four new mobile apps, and the availability of creative hardware for enterprise, education and photography customers. [11] [12] [13]
The video disc authoring program Adobe Encore and the web-focused bitmap editor Adobe Fireworks were both discontinued by Adobe in 2013, but were still available as downloads via Creative Cloud until May 2019.
Adobe offers four tiers of the Creative Cloud subscription service for individuals (there are other types for Business and Schools): [14]
The following contains the services found on Creative Cloud.
Product name | Latest major version | Available in | Supported OS |
---|---|---|---|
Acrobat | DC 23.0 | Standalone package Creative Suite Creative Cloud Technical Communication Suite | Windows, macOS, Android, iOS, web |
Aero | Beta (0.23.4) | Standalone product | Windows, macOS, Android, iOS |
After Effects | CC 2024 (24.2.1) | Standalone package Creative Suite Creative Cloud | Windows, macOS |
Animate (formerly Flash Professional) | CC 2024 (24.0.2) | Standalone package Creative Suite eLearning Suite Creative Cloud | |
Audition | CC 2024 (24.0.3) | ||
Behance | N/A | Standalone product Creative Cloud | Android, iOS, web |
Bridge | CC 2024 (14.0.1) | Creative Suite eLearning Suite Photoshop Creative Cloud | Windows, macOS |
Capture | Standalone product Creative Cloud | Android, iOS | |
Character Animator | CC 2024 (24.2) | Windows, macOS | |
Color (formerly Kuler) | N/A | Web (formerly iOS and Android) | |
Comp | Android, iOS | ||
Creative Cloud Desktop app | 6.0.0 | Windows, macOS, Android, iOS, web | |
Dimension | CC 2024 (3.4.11) | Windows, macOS | |
Dreamweaver | CC 2024 (21.3) | Standalone package Creative Suite eLearning Suite Creative Cloud | |
Dynamic Link | N/A | Standalone package Creative Cloud Creative Suite | |
Express | N/A | Standalone package Creative Cloud | Web, Android, iOS |
ExtendScript Toolkit | CC | Standalone package Creative Cloud | |
Fonts (formerly Typekit) | N/A | Web | |
Fresco | 2.0.3 | Windows, macOS, iOS | |
Illustrator | CC 2024 (28.4.1) | Standalone package Creative Cloud Creative Suite | |
Illustrator Draw | Android, iOS | ||
InCopy | CC 2024 (19.0.1) | Standalone package Creative Cloud Creative Suite | Windows, macOS |
InDesign | CC 2024 (19.0.1) | ||
Lightroom | CC 2024 (7.1.2) | Windows, macOS, Android, iOS, web | |
Lightroom Classic | CC 2024 (13.1) | Standalone package [16] Creative Cloud | Windows, macOS |
Media Encoder | CC 2024 (24.2.1) | Creative Cloud Creative Suite | |
Photoshop | CC 2024 (25.6) | Standalone package Creative Suite Creative Cloud eLearning Suite | Windows, macOS, web |
Photoshop Camera | Standalone package Creative Cloud | Android, iOS | |
Photoshop Fix | 1.3 | ||
Photoshop Mix | |||
Photoshop Sketch | 3.4 | ||
Portfolio | N/A | Web | |
Prelude | CC 2024 (22.6.1) | Standalone package Creative Suite Creative Cloud | Windows, macOS |
Premiere Pro | CC 2024 (24.2.1) | ||
Premiere Rush | CC 2024 (2.10) | Standalone Creative Cloud | Windows, macOS, Android, iOS |
Spark Page | 3.1.0 | iOS | |
Creative Cloud Express | 1.0 | Web, Android, iOS | |
Spark Video | 2.1.4 | iOS | |
Stock | N/A | Web | |
XD | CC 2024 (57.1.12) | Windows, macOS |
The change from perpetual licenses to a subscription model was met with significant criticism. [19] [20] Although Adobe's cloud-based model caused disagreement and uncertainty, [19] and incited annoyance [21] and conflict, [22] a survey by CNET and Jefferies revealed that despite complaints most of its 1.4 million subscribers [22] [23] plan to renew. [24] [25]
Shifting to a software as a service model, Adobe announced more frequent feature updates to its products and the eschewing of their traditional release cycles. [26] Customers must pay a monthly subscription fee. Consequently, if subscribers cancel or stop paying, they will lose access to the software as well as the ability to open work saved in proprietary file formats. [27]
Although investors applauded the move, many customers reacted negatively. [28] This shift has been met with mixed reviews by both corporations and independent designers, with many people expressing their displeasure on the web [29] [30] [31] and through multiple Internet petitions. [32] Among these was a Change.org petition which reached over 30,000 signatures within a few weeks of the announcement. [33]
Creative Cloud has been criticized for broken file syncing, one of its core features. [34] [35] In May 2013 Adobe announced that it was suspending the file-sync desktop preview "for the next couple of weeks". [34] Reviewers of Creative Cloud were disappointed with the functionality of the cloud storage [36] [37] [38] and were "far from convinced by Adobe's subscription model". [39] Some users were concerned that they would be forced to upgrade their computer hardware when it is no longer supported by the current version of the Creative Cloud software. [40]
Some of their customers experienced a loss of trust in Adobe as a company and an attendant rise in anxiety. [41] [42] Despite significant customer criticism over Adobe's move to subscription-only pricing, [43] the company announced that it would not sell perpetual licenses to its software alongside the subscriptions: "We understand this is a big change, but we are so focused on the vision we shared for Creative Cloud, and we plan to focus all our new innovation on the Creative Cloud". [44]
In May 2014 the service was interrupted for over a day due to a login outage leaving graphics professionals locked out of Creative Cloud. [45] [46] [47] [48] [49] Adobe apologized for this global Creative Cloud failure. [50] [51] When initially asked whether customers would be compensated, the company's Customer Service responded: "We cannot offer compensation for the outage. I'm so sorry again for the frustration." [52] [53] Adobe later announced that it would review compensation on "a case by case basis". [54] The outage was heavily criticized, as was Adobe's software as a service model in general. [55]
Online articles began offering examples of replacements of Adobe products, [56] [57] [58] [59] [60] with competing products directly offering alternatives, and launching promotions for dissatisfied Adobe customers. [61] Adobe, however, claimed that Creative Cloud is its "highest customer satisfaction product in the creative space" and that even prior to Adobe's move to a pure subscription model, "more than 80 percent of customers who bought products from Adobe's Web site picked CC over CS." [44]
Although Creative Cloud was expected to curtail the piracy of Photoshop, [62] which is one of the most pirated pieces of software, [63] Creative Cloud was hacked and its applications made available via unauthorized means a day after it officially launched. [64] [65] Adobe claimed that the subscription payment plan would make its software more accessible to users who previously pirated it. [66]
On May 14, 2019, some Creative Cloud users received emails from Adobe stating that licenses to previous versions of Creative Cloud applications had been terminated and that users could face civil action from third parties if they did not update the software on their personal computers. A representative from Adobe confirmed the letter's authenticity. The situation prompted renewed criticism of Adobe's subscription-only business model. [67]
Adobe Inc., formerly Adobe Systems Incorporated, is an American multinational computer software company incorporated in Delaware and headquartered in San Jose, California. It has historically specialized in software for the creation and publication of a wide range of content, including graphics, photography, illustration, animation, multimedia/video, motion pictures, and print. Its flagship products include Adobe Photoshop image editing software; Adobe Illustrator vector-based illustration software; Adobe Acrobat Reader and the Portable Document Format (PDF); and a host of tools primarily for audio-visual content creation, editing and publishing. Adobe offered a bundled solution of its products named Adobe Creative Suite, which evolved into a subscription software as a service (SaaS) offering named Adobe Creative Cloud. The company also expanded into digital marketing software and in 2021 was considered one of the top global leaders in Customer Experience Management (CXM).
Microsoft Office, or simply Office, is a family of client software, server software, and services developed by Microsoft. It was first announced by Bill Gates on August 1, 1988, at COMDEX in Las Vegas. Initially a marketing term for an office suite, the first version of Office contained Microsoft Word, Microsoft Excel, and Microsoft PowerPoint. Over the years, Office applications have grown substantially closer with shared features such as a common spell checker, Object Linking and Embedding data integration and Visual Basic for Applications scripting language. Microsoft also positions Office as a development platform for line-of-business software under the Office Business Applications brand.
Adobe Photoshop is a raster graphics editor developed and published by Adobe for Windows and macOS. It was originally created in 1987 by Thomas and John Knoll. Since then, the software has become the most used tool for professional digital art, especially in raster graphics editing. Owing to its fame, the program's name has become genericised as a verb although Adobe disapproves of such use.
QuarkXPress is desktop publishing software for creating and editing complex page layouts in a WYSIWYG environment. It runs on macOS and Windows. It was first released by Quark, Inc. in 1987 and is still owned and published by them.
Adobe Illustrator is a vector graphics editor and design software developed and marketed by Adobe. Originally designed for the Apple Macintosh, development of Adobe Illustrator began in 1985. Along with Creative Cloud, Illustrator CC was released. The latest version, Illustrator 2024, was released on October 10, 2023, and is the 28th generation in the product line. Adobe Illustrator was reviewed as the best vector graphics editing program in 2021 by hpMagazine.
Adobe Creative Suite (CS) is a discontinued software suite of graphic design, video editing, and web development applications developed by Adobe Systems.
Adobe Premiere Pro is a timeline-based and non-linear video editing software application (NLE) developed by Adobe and published as part of the Adobe Creative Cloud licensing program. First launched in 2003, Adobe Premiere Pro is a successor of Adobe Premiere. It is geared towards professional video editing, while its sibling, Adobe Premiere Elements, targets the consumer market.
Adobe Bridge is a free digital asset management app made by Adobe Inc. and first released with Adobe Creative Suite 2. It is a mandatory component of Adobe Creative Suite, Adobe eLearning Suite, Adobe Technical Communication Suite and Adobe Photoshop CS2 through CS6. Starting with Creative Cloud, however, it has become an optional component downloaded via Creative Cloud subscription.
Adobe Lightroom is an image organization and image processing software developed by Adobe as part of the Creative Cloud subscription family. It is supported on Windows, macOS, iOS, Android, and tvOS. Its primary uses include importing, saving, viewing, organizing, tagging, editing, and sharing large numbers of digital images. Lightroom's editing functions include white balance, presence, tone, tone curve, HSL, color grading, detail, lens corrections, and calibration manipulation, as well as transformation, spot removal, red eye correction, graduated filters, radial filters, and adjustment brushing. The name of the software is based on darkrooms used for processing light-sensitive photographic materials.
Photoshop plugins are add-on programs aimed at providing additional image effects or performing tasks that are impossible or hard to fulfill using Adobe Photoshop alone. Plugins can be opened from within Photoshop and several other image editing programs and act like mini editors that modify the image.
Eye-Fi was a company based in Mountain View, California, that produced SD memory cards with Wi-Fi capabilities. Using an Eye-Fi card inside a digital camera, one could wirelessly and automatically upload digital photos to a local computer or a mobile device such as a smartphone or tablet computer. The company ceased business in 2016.
The iOS SDK, formerly the iPhone SDK, is a software development kit (SDK) developed by Apple Inc. The kit allows for the development of mobile apps on Apple's iOS and iPadOS operating systems.
Wix.com Ltd. is an Israeli software company, publicly listed in the US, that provides cloud-based web development services. It offers tools for creating HTML5 websites and mobile sites using online drag-and-drop editing. Along with its headquarters and other offices in Israel, Wix also has offices in Brazil, Canada, Germany, India, Ireland, Japan, Lithuania, Poland, the Netherlands, the United States, Ukraine, and Singapore.
Adobe Animate is a multimedia authoring and computer animation program developed by Adobe.
Adobe Edge Animate, formerly known as just Adobe Edge, is a web development tool developed by Adobe Systems that uses HTML5, JavaScript, and CSS3 functionality. It later became part of the Adobe Edge suite, and was available as a free 30-day trial download from Adobe Creative Cloud. As of November 2015, Edge Animate is no longer being actively developed.
Google Drive is a file storage and synchronization service developed by Google. Launched on April 24, 2012, Google Drive allows users to store files in the cloud, synchronize files across devices, and share files. In addition to a web interface, Google Drive offers apps with offline capabilities for Windows and macOS computers, and Android and iOS smartphones and tablets. Google Drive encompasses Google Docs, Google Sheets, and Google Slides, which are a part of the Google Docs Editors office suite that permits collaborative editing of documents, spreadsheets, presentations, drawings, forms, and more. Files created and edited through the Google Docs suite are saved in Google Drive.
Adobe Edge is a discontinued suite of web development tools that Adobe Inc. started developing in 2011. The tools enhances the capabilities of other Adobe apps, such as Dreamweaver. The first app in the suite was the eponymous Adobe Edge, released in August 2011 as a multimedia authoring tool designed to succeed the Flash platform. In September 2012, Adobe renamed the app Edge Animate, and announced Edge Reflow, Edge Code, and Edge Inspect. Also packaged with the suite are Edge Web Fonts, the PhoneGap app, and an Adobe Typekit subscription. In October 2015, Adobe announced an end to the development of the Edge family. By the end of September 2019, all Adobe Edge products were removed from the Creative Cloud offering.
Adobe XD is a vector design tool for web and mobile applications, developed and published by Adobe Inc. It is available for macOS and Windows, and there are versions for iOS and Android to help preview the result of work directly on mobile devices. Adobe XD enables website wireframing and creating click-through prototypes.
Microsoft 365 is a product family of productivity software, collaboration and cloud-based services owned by Microsoft. It encompasses online services such as Outlook.com, OneDrive, Microsoft Teams, programs formerly marketed under the name Microsoft Office, enterprise products and services associated with these products such as Exchange Server, SharePoint, and Viva Engage. It also covers subscription plans encompassing these products, including those that include subscription-based licenses to desktop and mobile software, and hosted email and intranet services.