GIMP

Long-term owners

We were editing pictures at the beginning of the century on Photoshop 6 or something when it was not nearly as good as 2025's Gimp or Affinity of 5 years ago.

Nov 2025 · comment

What hackers pick instead

• Adobe PhotoshopSeen as the industry-standard image editor, with deep features like layers, smart objects and precise print color control; many resent the forced subscription and recent bugs.152recommend
• Acorn by Flying MeatA small, capable macOS image editor that people use for quick edits and pixel-perfect work, bought as paid releases rather than free.12recommend
• PintaFree, Linux-friendly image editor that feels familiar to Paint.NET users and handles simple edits well. Critics say it is buggy, less polished, and not quite as good as Paint.NET.11recommend
• ArcBrushNode-based 2D image editor that people say does a lot. Main caveats: a binary download from its website and no information about the company behind it.5recommend

Every quote

The 40 most detailed of 495 comments. Each links to the original.

1. We were editing pictures at the beginning of the century on Photoshop 6 or something when it was not nearly as good as 2025's Gimp or Affinity of 5 years ago.

   Recommends · Nov 2025 · in “How to declutter, quiet down, and take the AI out of Windows 11 25H2”

2. it is the only "heavyweight" image editor I ever learned to use, and that choice has saved me so much money in software subscriptions!

   Recommends · Mar 2026 · in “Interview with Øyvind Kolås, GIMP developer”

3. Gimp 3 having better font/text behavior, and overall allowing to build a pipeline of effects instead of immediately applying them

   Recommends · May 2026 · in “Photo GIMP – A Patch for GIMP 3 for Photoshop Users”

4. Once you learn your workflows, it becomes quite natural. But I agree that as an entry point it's confusing and feels clunky.

   Mixed · Oct 2026 · in “The Photoshop clone that hurts GIMP”

5. I'm presently surprised with v3. I avoided it for a long time because I remember it being a super confusing interface.

   Recommends · May 2026 · in “Photo GIMP – A Patch for GIMP 3 for Photoshop Users”

6. Try to find a full-time professional photographer or designer that's never tried Gimp, but immediately abandoned it.

   Mixed · Aug 2026 · in “Google News is just Forrest Gump's shrimp boat now”

7. it was too often advertised as a adequate Photoshop replacement, which it is not, so people got disappointed with it

   Mixed · Aug 2026 · in “GIMP Development Update”

8. I think I have donated more for Inkscape, Gimp, Firefox, and Libre Office than I ever spent on proprietary software.

   Recommends · Sep 2026 · in “Nobody pays for FOSS, we can force them to”

9. I do agree though, even the revamped UI does not have a great look and feel, but I'm used to it so I don't mind.

   Mixed · Dec 2025 · in “Gimp Source Code”

10. GIMP will never disappear, as it can be downloaded and forked, has no DRM like Photoshop, no ads, runs anywhere.

    Recommends · May 2026 · in “Photo GIMP – A Patch for GIMP 3 for Photoshop Users”

11. For photo editing, the GIMP is pretty much there, but it's old and crusty and maintained by a handful of people

    Mixed · Jul 2026 · in “Blender 5.2 LTS”

12. I'm using Gimp, but somehow I often find myself seeking for how to do easy tasks that should be more intuitive.

    Mixed · Sep 2026 · in “Paint.net 5.2 alpha now runs on Linux”

13. I love that in Gimp layers can have totally different canvas sizes, and I prefer it's foreground select tool.

    Recommends · May 2026 · in “Photo GIMP – A Patch for GIMP 3 for Photoshop Users”

14. For me the differences between the two are marginal, but that may be because I learned how to use Gimp first

    Recommends · Jan 2026 · in “Netflix Animation Studios Joins the Blender Development Fund as Corporate Patron”

15. It's already free, really capable, and comes from a good and pure place of making software for its own sake.

    Recommends · Oct 2026 · in “REA Reverse – Engineer Anything”

16. Unfortunately, it doesnt get rid of the singularly-offputting name, but that's a matter for another thread.

    Mixed · May 2026 · in “Photo GIMP – A Patch for GIMP 3 for Photoshop Users”

17. gimp is actually pretty good, but things are in different places than photoshop and that's a huge change.

    Mixed · Jan 2026 · in “2026 will be my year of the Linux desktop”

18. gimp is intensely useful software with many amazing features...buried under such an awkward interface.

    Mixed · Dec 2025 · in “Gimp Source Code”

19. actually using the product at version 3.0 is, dare I say, pretty enjoyable once you unlearn things

    Mixed · Mar 2026 · in “Interview with Øyvind Kolås, GIMP developer”

20. It was the first real image editor I used, so the UI/UX is fine to me, but it's clearly a problem.

    Mixed · May 2026 · in “Photo GIMP – A Patch for GIMP 3 for Photoshop Users”

21. I've never understood the negative comments around UX for GIMP. It always feels just fine for me.

    Recommends · Dec 2025 · in “Adobe Photoshop 1.0 Source Code (2013)”

22. I like GIMP and I've unlearned a lot of my photoshop muscle memory but the name is a huge problem

    Mixed · Mar 2026 · in “Interview with Øyvind Kolås, GIMP developer”

23. If you think GIMP and Krita (especially Krita) can replace Photoshop in workplace I'm 100% sure you don't know what professionals pay Photoshop for

    Criticizes · Sep 2026 · in “Leaving Linux”

24. The small vocal community gets used to things like poor UI, and then turns into a NIMBY about any changes that would benefit the masses

    Criticizes · May 2026 · in “Photo GIMP – A Patch for GIMP 3 for Photoshop Users”

25. any unfamiliar grownup is, quite reasonably, going to never ever ever trust anything to do serious work with a name like that

    Criticizes · Dec 2025 · in “Programmers and software developers lost the plot on naming their tools”

26. there is no reason whatsoever something as trivial as drawing a circle has to be as complicated as launching a rocket in GIMP

    Criticizes · Jan 2026 · in “Netflix Animation Studios Joins the Blender Development Fund as Corporate Patron”

27. I think GIMP's deep seated NIH syndrome and refusal to look at or acknowledge anything else is the actual deep seated problem

    Criticizes · Mar 2026 · in “Interview with Øyvind Kolås, GIMP developer”

28. there can tend to be a learning curve with GIMP. Alot of it probably comes from figuring out where tools and functionality

    Criticizes · Dec 2025 · in “Adobe Photoshop 1.0 Source Code (2013)”

29. GIMP's developers are more interested in some strange notion of technical purity than providing good ergonomic software

    Criticizes · Jul 2026 · in “An Infuriating Goodbye to Photoshop”

30. ignoring industry standard options/conventions and instead they are following open source ideas just to be different

    Criticizes · Aug 2026 · in “GIMP Development Update”

31. These are all apps with excellent fundamental underlying engines/tech which are handicapped hugely by their UI/UX.

    Criticizes · Feb 2026 · in “LibreOffice blasts OnlyOffice for working with Microsoft to lock users in”

32. I wish it did those things better, but on the other hand it seems like it would be appropriate to have a simpler program for quick tasks as well.

    Mixed · Mar 2026 · in “Interview with Øyvind Kolås, GIMP developer”

33. The main reason for me to consider non-free software for graphic design is not that Gimp, Inkscape, etc. are not good enough

    Mixed · Nov 2025

34. I wonder how many people shouting "Claude vibed a Photoshop clone, Adobe is done!!" were even aware Krita or GIMP existed

    Recommends · Oct 2026 · in “Open-source Microsoft Excel, PowerPoint, and Word replications”

35. Most of the complains come from people who never used Gimp or only tried it for a couple of tried minutes.

    Recommends · Nov 2025 · in “How to declutter, quiet down, and take the AI out of Windows 11 25H2”

36. That's one less person who might use GIMP, and one less person who might introduce GIMP to other people

    Recommends · May 2026 · in “Photo GIMP – A Patch for GIMP 3 for Photoshop Users”

37. try opening a document in the latest Libreoffice (or gimp, etc) and then exporting it to another format

    Recommends · Nov 2026 · in “Running a bootstrapped SaaS for 20 years with my brother”

38. Seems to be a big project that is managed well to keep a good pace and keep the community in the loop.

    Recommends · Aug 2026 · in “GIMP Development Update”

39. Not adding format features that you are not willing/able to maintain in perpetuity is a positive, yes.

    Recommends · Aug 2026 · in “GIMP Development Update”

40. Now, if we are talking about doing batch image editing in python. Gimp us the best tool I've found.

    Mixed · Feb 2026 · in “FreeCAD is an open-source parametric 3D modeler”