Pinta

Pinta is an open-source raster image editor designed for straightforward drawing and photo manipulation across Linux, macOS, and Windows. It provides essential multi-layer editing and basic adjustments without the interface density or hardware demands of full-scale digital art suites. Users get an uncluttered workspace that opens immediately and handles everyday graphic tasks locally.

Why Pinta instead of Photopea

Photopea mimics Adobe Photoshop inside a browser tab, supporting PSD smart objects, layer masks, and extensive text formatting. Pinta targets a narrower scope modeled on classic desktop tools like Paint.NET. It provides multi-layer compositing, transparency, basic selections, brushes, and essential color corrections, but omits vector typography, clipping masks, and CMYK print previews.

The cost difference is immediate. Photopea monetizes its free tier with animated sidebar ads and charges a recurring subscription for an ad-free interface, while running inside a browser that demands bandwidth and substantial memory. Pinta costs nothing, carries no paid tiers or ad banners, and runs completely offline on your desktop. Casual users wanting to touch up photos or crop images avoid subscriptions without sending personal files to third-party servers.

What it does well

• Multi-layer composition: Separates elements onto transparent layers to test changes, draw callouts, or paste graphics without altering the original picture.
• Step-by-step history: Keeps a full undo list so users can revert mistake brushstrokes or adjustments at any point.
• Familiar drawing tools: Provides standard pencils, brushes, paint buckets, gradients, and magic wand selections that require no training.
• Built-in adjustments: Includes one-click controls for brightness, contrast, hue, saturation, and red-eye correction.
• Live effect previews: Displays real-time previews for filters like Gaussian blur, sharpen, and emboss before applying them.
• Cross-platform parity: Runs identically on Linux, Windows, and macOS, keeping menus and shortcuts consistent across systems.

Limitations

• Non-editable text: Text turns into flat pixels once committed to the canvas, so typos cannot be edited later without retyping (tracked in GitHub issue #1337).
• No layer masks: Lacks non-destructive masking, requiring users to erase pixels permanently or duplicate layers for transparency work.