Adobe 'Doubling Down' on Lightroom in Wake of Apple's Aperture Announcement

Following Apple's announcement that it plans to cease further development on its professional photo editing software, Aperture, Adobe has released a statement encouraging Aperture users to check out its Creative Cloud plan or its standalone Lightroom app, a longtime Aperture competitor. The company says it is committed to helping former Aperture and iPhoto customers transition to Lightroom.

lightroomadobe

Put simply we're doubling down on our investments in Lightroom and the new Creative Cloud Photography plan and you can expect to see a rich roadmap of rapid innovation for desktop, web and device workflows in the coming weeks, months and years. We also continue to invest actively on the iOS and OSX platforms, and are committed to helping interested iPhoto and Aperture customers migrate to our rich solution across desktop, device and web workflows.

Known as Aperture's biggest competitor, Lightroom is another solution for professional photo editing. Adobe has a Creative Cloud subscription plan aimed specifically at photographers, offering access to both Photoshop and Lightroom for $9.99 per month. While this plan used to be temporary, Adobe recently made it a permanent addition to Creative Cloud. Adobe also offers access to its full suite of Creative Cloud apps, including Lightroom, for $49.99 per month.

Adobe has developed Lightroom mobile apps for both the iPhone and the iPad, both of which seamlessly connect to the desktop version of Lightroom, allowing users to edit and manage their library of photos on any device.

While both Aperture and Lightroom offer similar professional photo editing capabilities, Lightroom has enjoyed regular updates as part of Adobe's Creative Cloud, while Aperture has been falling behind for quite some time now. Lightroom received an update earlier this month, while Aperture was last updated in November of 2013.

Top Rated Comments

spaceballl Avatar
128 months ago
I'm happy to give Lightroom a shot, and I'd even pay $50, $100, or more for it if I enjoyed it, but even at only $10 / month, I don't love the idea of adding yet another "small" fee to my monthly recurring expenses. These things add up. I know saas is the future business model all these companies want, but I'd rather just pony up some $ and have everything working, free of monthly charges.
Score: 85 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Agent OrangeZ Avatar
128 months ago
Doubling down... not! Your biggest competitor pulls out. No competition means higher pricing and dragging your feet when it comes to innovation.
Score: 46 Votes (Like | Disagree)
NY Guitarist Avatar
128 months ago
<SIGH> does it work without the 'cloud'?
Score: 19 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Gizmotoy Avatar
128 months ago
Aperture was little competition for Lightroom, at least in the past year or two. It was really behind, so I'm not surprised they killed it.

Unfortunately, this is terrible news for Lightroom users. It's pretty widely-thought that the only reason Adobe sells Lightroom stand-alone is because of competition from Aperture. All Adobe's other Creative Suite apps are now cloud-only.

With the Photoshop/Lightroom cloud offering and Apple killing Aperture, expect the next version of Lightroom to be cloud-only.
Score: 15 Votes (Like | Disagree)
jmpage2 Avatar
128 months ago
Pay your bill? It's freaking $10 a month. I thought Apple owners were in a higher income bracket. Apparently you guys spend it all on Starbucks.

You don't seem to understand why people are irritated. That $10 a month works out (for me) as $600 over the past five years since I started using LR if I was paying for their monthly cloud BS.

Not to mention that I have to keep paying that monthly extortion or I lose access to my library.

People like you are playing right into their schemes where everything is "pay pay pay" and never own anything. $10 might not seem like much, until there's no other game in town and they triple that to $30 a month.

In a world where you don't own any of the software you use and have to pay monthly subscriptions for all of them those costs are going to wind up being what a car payment used to be.

$30 for adobe software.
$50 for MS software
$30 for Quicken software

Do you see why people are irritated? It's like streaming movies. Pay $20 for a virtualized copy of a movie you can't download and watch offline. Maybe doesn't seem like a big deal until the company goes out of business, or loses distribution rights to that movie, or your internet is down for a weekend when you want to watch movies (like during a blizzard).
Score: 13 Votes (Like | Disagree)
pubwvj Avatar
128 months ago
Adobe's subscription model kills the deal. I have been buying and using Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop since versions 1.0. I don't want to be paying them a monthly or an annual subscription fee. The issue is not the cost but that if I stop paying or they go out of business or they discontinue the product I lose access to my data and can't do my work. With my owning a bought copy I don't lose access to my data and I can always still do my work. Subscriptions are a no-go.
Score: 12 Votes (Like | Disagree)

Popular Stories

maxresdefault

Apple Announces 'Let Loose' Event on May 7 Amid Rumors of New iPads

Tuesday April 23, 2024 7:11 am PDT by
Apple has announced it will be holding a special event on Tuesday, May 7 at 7 a.m. Pacific Time (10 a.m. Eastern Time), with a live stream to be available on Apple.com and on YouTube as usual. The event invitation has a tagline of "Let Loose" and shows an artistic render of an Apple Pencil, suggesting that iPads will be a focus of the event. Subscribe to the MacRumors YouTube channel for more ...
Apple Vision Pro Dual Loop Band Orange Feature 2

Apple Cuts Vision Pro Shipments as Demand Falls 'Sharply Beyond Expectations'

Tuesday April 23, 2024 9:44 am PDT by
Apple has dropped the number of Vision Pro units that it plans to ship in 2024, going from an expected 700 to 800k units to just 400k to 450k units, according to Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo. Orders have been scaled back before the Vision Pro has launched in markets outside of the United States, which Kuo says is a sign that demand in the U.S. has "fallen sharply beyond expectations." As a...
iOS 17 All New Features Thumb

iOS 17.5 Will Add These New Features to Your iPhone

Sunday April 21, 2024 3:00 am PDT by
The upcoming iOS 17.5 update for the iPhone includes only a few new user-facing features, but hidden code changes reveal some additional possibilities. Below, we have recapped everything new in the iOS 17.5 and iPadOS 17.5 beta so far. Web Distribution Starting with the second beta of iOS 17.5, eligible developers are able to distribute their iOS apps to iPhone users located in the EU...
iPad And Calculator App Feature

Apple Finally Plans to Release a Calculator App for iPad Later This Year

Tuesday April 23, 2024 9:08 am PDT by
Apple is finally planning a Calculator app for the iPad, over 14 years after launching the device, according to a source familiar with the matter. iPadOS 18 will include a built-in Calculator app for all iPad models that are compatible with the software update, which is expected to be unveiled during the opening keynote of Apple's annual developers conference WWDC on June 10. AppleInsider...
iPhone 15 Pro FineWoven

Apple Reportedly Stops Production of FineWoven Accessories

Sunday April 21, 2024 6:03 am PDT by
Apple has stopped production of FineWoven accessories, according to the Apple leaker and prototype collector known as "Kosutami." In a post on X (formerly Twitter), Kosutami explained that Apple has stopped production of FineWoven accessories due to its poor durability. The company may move to another non-leather material for its premium accessories in the future. Kosutami has revealed...