Following a series of artificial intelligence (AI) acquisitions alongside layering the Magic Suite product with extensive generative AI functionality, it was perhaps inevitable that those costs will add up. And users will have to pay for the perceived added value. Canva, which can be described as a one of its kind application suite spanning visual communication and workplace tools, has announced changes to the Canva Teams subscription pricing for many countries – in some cases by as much as 300%. The company confirms to HT, that Teams users in India (and indeed Pro users as well) will not be subject to any subscription pricing changes. That is, at least for now.
“There has been no surge in pricing for Canva in India,” Canva says, in a statement shared with HT. In the US, for example, Canva Teams pricing will cost $500 per year for up to 5 members, up from the present $120 per year pricing. Canva has four subscription tiers – Canva Free, Canva Pro, Canva Teams and Canva Enterprise. In India, the pricing will remain as is. This means Canva Pro will still cost ₹500 per month per user, Canva Teams will be priced at ₹380 per person per month while Canva Enterprise pricing hinges on specific requirements.
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For Canva, their argument includes pitching a rapidly revamped and more capable Magic Studio and the Visual Suite, while subscription pricing for most users remained unchanged since its launch in 2020.
“Canva Teams has come a long way since launching in 2020, with major enhancements in team collaboration, brand management, the launch of our Visual Suite and our investments in Magic Studio. Our original pricing reflected the early stage of this product and has remained unchanged for the last four years. We’re now updating the price for customers on this older plan to reflect our expanded product experience, while those who joined since April are already on the updated rates,” a Canva spokesperson told HT.
Subscription price hikes for Canva come a month ahead of rival Adobe’s annual creativity conference, Adobe Max 2024, which is expected to showcase the company’s relentless AI push including their Firefly models, across consumer and business focused platforms such as Photoshop, Lightroom, Acrobat and InDesign.
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There is a layer of complexity to when and how the new subscription prices become applicable, because the conditions aren’t immediately clear. “To ease this transition, eligible impacted customers will benefit from 12 months of discounted pricing before the changes take full effect,” adds the Canva spokesperson. They also confirm that the cost of Canva Pro subscription in all countries remains unchanged, and that subscription remains available to all users not working in a team environment.
A few weeks ago, Canva wrote the latest chapter of its AI acquisition spree, completing a deal for Leonardo.AI, an Australian company. At that time, HT had reported the Canva will bring Leonardo.AI’s foundation model called Phoenix, and a number of tools for developers as well as customers (these include an AI art generator, an AI video generator, a transparent PNG generator), within their fold. A lot of these will find their way within Canva’s Magic Studio, which has rapidly adopted versatile tools and capabilities, in the last year.
Canva which now has more than 190 million users worldwide, of which around 20 million are paying premium ‘Pro’ subscribers, clocking $2.3 billion in annual revenue. Leonardo’s another 19 million paying business and enterprise customers, join.
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For Canva, in-house development costs too would have increased over time. In May, at the Canva Create 2024 showcase, Cameron Adams, who is Canva’s co-founder and Chief Product Officer detailed a mix of AI models that are being used across the product. A large chunk of that underlier is developed in-house. “A huge amount of the AI in Canva is developed in-house. We’ve got a got a huge team of machine learning engineers, which is close to 100 machine learning engineers within Canva, and they’re constantly working on our own tech,” Adams told HT, at the time.
Over the past year, Canva’s sped up innovation with smart acquisitions. It needed to find that pace, as it competes with tech giants including Adobe, Google and Microsoft as well as every generative AI platform available. Previously, the acquisition of three apps from UK based Serif (the apps are Affinity Designer 2, Affinity Photo 2 and Affinity Publisher 2), provided a foundation for Canva suite’s transformation into a “fullstack solution for all designers, including professional graphic designers, illustrators and typographers.”
Also read:9 in 10 Indian businesses rely on AI for content creation: Canva
In June, Canva released its annual Visual Economy Report, which indicates that 9 out of 10 surveyed businesses and enterprises in India are beginning to take first steps towards the use AI for content creation and visual communication tasks. Alongside, 85% business leaders are realising that resistance towards adopting tech and AI tools for designing communication, shackles creativity.