Affinity vs Balsamiq Pricing (2026)
How do these two stack up on price? Here's what each one costs, what you get, and where the value sits.
Affinity
- Fully-featured toolsets
- Customizable studios
- Non-destructive editing
- Pixel-perfect export
- Access all vector design, photo editing, and page layout tools in one app
- Combine vector and pixel work on the same .af document
- Customize your workspace with floating toolbars and studio presets
- Real-time performance engine for ultra-smooth editing
- Non-destructive editing across layers, filters, and adjustments
- Import PSD, AI, PDF, SVG, IDML and more with high fidelity
- Export with one-click presets or custom slice-based output
- Quick export direct to Canva
- Live filters and adjustments with instant preview
- Full RAW editing, tone mapping, and lens correction
- Advanced retouching: inpainting brush, healing tools, dodge and burn
- Batch processing with recordable macros, HDR merge, panorama stitching, and more
- Precision drawing with pen, node, and pencil tools
- Live shape editing, booleans, and shape builder
- Flexible gradients with full control
- Trace pixel images
- Pixel-perfect vector tools for illustration and layout
- Linked text frames with autoflow and live text wrapping
- Smart master pages with overrides and reusable layouts
- Pro typography: ligatures, stylistic sets, drop caps, and variable fonts
- Print-ready output: CMYK, spot colors, preflight, and bleed support
- Data merge from .csv with tokens, image merge, and conditional logic
Starter
- Up to 10 projects
- Invite unlimited reviewers
- 500 monthly Balsamiq AI credits per editor
- Balsamiq MCP server
- Slack integration
- Create custom, reusable UI components
- Export to PDF or image
Teams
Popular- Up to 100 projects
- Invite unlimited reviewers
- 1,000 monthly Balsamiq AI credits per editor
- Balsamiq MCP server
- Billing admin role and permissions
- Create custom, reusable UI components
- Export to PDF or image
- Priority support
Enterprise
- Up to 400 projects
- 2,500 monthly Balsamiq AI credits per editor
- Balsamiq MCP server
- SSO with SAML
- Legal and security review support
- Data storage in the US or EU
- Premium support
Affinity vs Balsamiq FAQ
- Which one is cheaper?
- One or both use custom pricing, so it depends on your specific needs.
- Can I use either one for free?
- Affinity has a free plan. Balsamiq doesn't — though they do offer a free trial.
- How do they charge?
- Different approach here. Affinity uses flat-rate pricing, while Balsamiq goes with per-seat. That changes the math depending on your team size and usage.
- Which one is a better deal?
- Depends on what you need. Affinity: This is the ultra-low end of the design tool market, undercutting paid tools like Adobe or even Canva's own paid tiers on the base product. But it's a bit of a Trojan horse — they're winning users with free core functionality while quietly routing anyone who wants modern AI capabilities toward Canva's paid plans. Balsamiq: At $16-35/seat/month, Balsamiq sits cheap relative to full-blown design/prototyping suites like Figma or Sketch, which makes sense since it's a lo-fi wireframing tool, not a pixel-perfect design platform. They're clearly courting budget-conscious teams and nonprofits (hence the 50% discount) rather than trying to win enterprise design orgs outright.
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