Best Mac Apps for Designers

A designer's Mac setup usually has three layers: a main design tool for interfaces or illustration, an image editor for photos and assets, and a handful of small utilities that save minutes every day (picking colors, measuring spacing, finding icons, handing designs to developers). This guide covers the apps worth knowing in each layer, what they cost today, and who each one suits.

The design app market has also changed a lot recently. Vectornator is now Linearity Curve, Affinity's three apps became one free app, Pixelmator Pro is now an Apple app, and Abstract, the version-control tool for Sketch files, is gone. Here's where things stand.

Quick Picks

• UI and product design with a team: Figma.
• Native Mac UI design, or a one-time license: Sketch.
• Free all-in-one for vector, photo and layout: Affinity.
• Mac-first image editing: Pixelmator Pro.
• Vector illustration on Mac and iPad: Linearity Curve.
• Lightweight image editor without a subscription: Acorn.
• Small utilities: Sip or ColorSnapper for color, IconJar for icons, PixelSnap for measuring.

UI and Vector Design

Figma

Figma is the default tool for UI and product design in most teams. It runs in the browser and in a desktop app, and several people can work in the same file at once, comment, and build prototypes without exporting anything. Dev Mode gives developers inspection tools, and shared libraries keep components consistent across files.

The free Starter plan includes unlimited drafts and limited access to Figma's products. In Figma's US pricing view, a Professional full seat is $16/month, Organization $55/month and Enterprise $90/month, with cheaper Dev and Collab seats for people who don't design.

Choose Figma if you work with other designers, product managers or developers, or you need to switch between Mac and Windows. If you want something more local or cheaper, see our Figma alternatives guide.

Sketch

Sketch is the native Mac design app that defined modern UI design tools. It works offline, saves files locally, and feels like a Mac app, while its subscription plans add collaboration, prototyping and developer handoff.

Subscriptions are $12 per editor per month (Standard) or $24 (Professional), billed yearly, with a 30-day free trial. Sketch also still sells a Mac-only license for $120 per seat with one year of updates; it covers designing, prototyping and local files, but not collaboration, online sharing or iOS previewing.

Choose Sketch if you design mostly alone or in a Mac-only team, want local files, or prefer paying once.

Linearity Curve (formerly Vectornator)

Linearity Curve is a vector illustration app for Mac, iPad and iPhone. It has pressure-sensitive vector brushes, advanced gradients, non-destructive vector effects, and AI background removal, so it suits illustrators who sketch on iPad and finish on a Mac. Its sister app, Linearity Move, handles animation.

Curve is free to start on the App Store. The Pro plan, which adds advanced export options and unlimited use of Curve and Move, showed €10/month or €8/month billed yearly in our EU region; prices vary by country.

Choose Linearity Curve if you draw illustrations, icons or logos and want the same app on your iPad. Our Adobe Illustrator alternatives guide compares it with other vector apps.

Image Editing

Affinity

Affinity used to be three paid apps: Photo, Designer and Publisher. After Canva bought it, they became one app with Pixel, Vector and Layout studios, and it's free for individuals. You need a free Canva account to download it. It opens PSD, AI and IDML files, among others, and Canva premium subscribers can unlock Canva AI tools inside the app.

It runs on Mac and Windows, and an iPad version is on the way.

Choose Affinity if you want professional photo editing, vector work and page layout without a subscription. Our Photoshop vs Affinity, Pixelmator Pro and GIMP comparison goes deeper.

Pixelmator Pro

Pixelmator Pro is now made by Apple. It's an approachable, Mac-first editor for photos and graphics, with AI features built on Apple Intelligence, vector tools, templates, and round-trip support for other formats.

You can still buy it once for $49.99 on the Mac App Store. It's also part of Apple Creator Studio, a subscription that bundles it with Final Cut Pro, Logic Pro and other creative apps for $12.99/month or $129/year after a free month.

Choose Pixelmator Pro if you want a polished, easy-to-learn editor that feels like part of macOS.

Acorn

Acorn from Flying Meat is a fast, lightweight image editor with no subscription. Acorn 8 added Synth Fill for removing unwanted objects and a new healing brush, and it covers the everyday jobs (layers, masks, filters, cropping and exporting assets) without the weight of a full suite.

Acorn 8 is $29.99 on the Mac App Store or from Flying Meat's site, with a 14-day free trial. It needs macOS 14 Sonoma or later.

Choose Acorn if you need a capable editor for quick edits and assets, and you don't want a subscription.

Utility and Asset Tools

Sip

Sip is a color picker and palette manager. It lives in your menu bar, can dock your favorite colors on any edge of the screen, and sends colors to your design tools. A license is $29.99 per seat with one year of updates (renewals cost 70% of the original price), and there's a 15-day free trial.

ColorSnapper 2

ColorSnapper 2 focuses on picking: a precise magnifying glass, a high-precision mode, and more than 30 export formats that paste straight into your code in your own style. It's now sold directly (the developer says Apple stopped letting it ship updates on the Mac App Store), with a free trial, and needs macOS 14.6 or later.

IconJar

IconJar organizes your icon library. Drag icons into any app in the size and color you need, bulk export with presets for iOS, Android and macOS, optimize SVGs, and group icons into Smart Sets. It's $25/year or $75 once, with a 14-day trial.

PixelSnap 2

PixelSnap 2 measures anything on screen: detect and measure objects in a moment, add snappable guides, hold a distance on screen, and measure several objects at once. It's $39 with a 30-day money-back guarantee.

PixelSnap comes from the makers of CleanShot X, and the two integrate. CleanShot X is a good addition if you share a lot of screenshots and recordings with clients or developers; it costs $35 once (Basic, with one year of updates) or $10 per user per month billed yearly for Pro with cloud features. Our CleanShot X review covers it in detail.

Get several at once: Sip, IconJar and PixelSnap are also included in Setapp, a subscription to a catalog of Mac apps (from $14.99/month on their app listings), which can work out cheaper if you'd use several apps from it.

Design Workflow Tools

Zeplin

Zeplin is a handoff tool: designers publish screens from Figma or Sketch, and developers get specs, assets, styleguides and an organized place to find what's ready to build. It's free for one project, and paid plans are priced per project with unlimited designers and developers.

ProtoPie

ProtoPie builds realistic, interactive prototypes with real logic, multi-device interactions and hardware integration, which makes it popular for automotive, IoT and complex app flows. It imports from Figma and Sketch, and has a free plan (2 prototypes) plus paid individual and team plans.

What happened to Abstract?

Abstract, which added Git-style version control to Sketch files, appears to be gone: its old web app no longer loads, and abstract.com now belongs to an unrelated company. Sketch and Figma both have built-in version history and shared libraries, which cover much of what designers used Abstract for.

Which Apps Should You Use?

• Freelance UI designer on a budget: Figma's free Starter plan, Affinity for assets and images, and PixelSnap for measuring.
• In-house product team: Figma for design and prototyping, Zeplin or Figma's Dev Mode for handoff.
• Mac-only designer who likes local files: Sketch with the Mac-only license, plus Pixelmator Pro or Acorn.
• Illustrator who works on iPad too: Linearity Curve, with Affinity for layout.
• Photo-heavy work: Affinity for depth, Pixelmator Pro for speed and simplicity.

Final Verdict

Figma is the safest main tool for UI design in a team, and Sketch is the best choice for a native Mac workflow with local files. For images, Affinity gives you the most for free, while Pixelmator Pro is the friendliest Mac editor and still sells as a one-time purchase. Add a color picker (Sip or ColorSnapper), IconJar and PixelSnap, and you'll save time every day.

Catch these apps on sale: many paid Mac apps, including design apps, run discounts at least once a year, most often around Black Friday. Subscribe to the Apps.Deals newsletter to hear when the deals arrive.

Note: First published in January 2025 and updated in October 2026. Features and prices are current as of October 2026 and can change; verify them on each official site before buying.

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