Apple Creator Studio Subscription Launches, Will Take On Adobe Creative Cloud

Apple introduces Apple Creator Studio today, a game-changing subscription service that combines its best creative tools under one affordable umbrella. You can sign-up from the App Store starting January 28th for $12.99 per month or $129 per year, with a free month to try it out and see what it’s all about. Students and educators get an even better deal: $2.99 per month, or $29.99 annually. Family Sharing allows you to share your subscription with up to a half-dozen family members.

The bundle truly has everything a creative needs: it covers video editing, music production, image work, and a variety of visual chores across Mac, iPad, and, in some cases, iPhone. Core apps include Final Cut Pro, which is available on both Mac and iPad, as well as Logic Pro, which has touch controls and Apple Pencil support in its new iPad edition. Then there’s Pixelmator Pro, which has recently expanded to iPad, but don’t forget the Mac-only additions of Motion for all graphics, Compressor for encoding and output, and MainStage for live performances. You’ll get elegant templates, a Content Hub full of curated media, and a slew of powerful AI features powered by OpenAI in Keynote, Pages, and Numbers.

Key apps including Final Cut Pro, Logic Pro, Pixelmator Pro, Motion, and Compressor were previously marketed as single purchases for $299.99, $199.99, and $49.99, respectively. Then there came MainStage for only $29.99. Of course, if you bought them all at once, the total cost would quickly balloon to more than $700. However, the Creator Studio subscription eliminates all of that, particularly for those who frequently switch between Mac and iPad.

Recent updates to the tools improved them even more, with Final Cut Pro, for example, being able to detect conversation or specific shots and even sync changes to music. The iPad edition of Final Cut Pro also includes a great new Montage Maker feature that automatically assembles clips. In contrast, Logic Pro has a Synth Player for rapid sound design, as well as a variety of other features such as Chord ID. Pixelmator Pro for iPad is also quite useful, with a new workspace and a plethora of added capabilities such as Super Resolution, and so on.

Keynote, Pages, and Numbers have all received significant enhancements, such as Image Playground, which allows you to make or alter images from text prompts. There are also some beta capabilities, such as creating presentations from outlines, auto-generating presenter notes, and even tidying up slides.

Apple is clearly looking for a diverse spectrum of customers, including pro-creatives who spend their days using these apps, students who simply want to learn, entrepreneurs who are creating content, and anyone who wants to dabble in creative work without spending a fortune up front. This is a fraction of the cost of Adobe Creative Cloud’s all-apps package, which now costs around $59.99 per month.