The Best Photo Editing Apps of 2024
Written by: BestApp.com App Testing Team - Updated: Mar 04, 2022
If you’re looking for the best mobile photo editing app, we recommend Photoshop Express for its high-quality filters and effects, user-friendly photo retouching features, and professional-grade photo editing tools. But if Photoshop Express doesn’t suit your needs, we found nine other great photo editing apps to check out. Here are the 10 best photo editing apps on iOS and Android.
Top 10 Photo Editing Apps to Try
- Photoshop Express — Top Pick
- Snapseed — Best Free Photo Editing App
- Adobe Lightroom — Best for Photographers
- VSCO — Best for Presets
- Picsart — Best for Video Editing
- Pixelmator Photo — Best for Hands-Off Editing
- TouchRetouch — Best for Photo Retouching
- Afterlight — Best for Custom Filters
- ON1 Photo RAW — Best Built-In Camera
- Prisma — Most Creative Filters
How We Chose the Best Photo Editing Apps
Our selection of the 10 best photo editing apps is based on a handful of important features that contribute to a user-friendly photo editing experience. The best photo editing apps include a built-in camera, a text editor, video editing tools, raw editing tools, photo retouching features, and the ability to share your images directly from the app.
Choose the photo editing app that’s right for you
Most of the photo editing apps on our list offer a free version to let users test out their basic features and editing tools. Apps like VSCO and Picsart are great for users who also want to edit videos, while apps like Photoshop Express and Lightroom are great options for photographers looking for professional-grade photo editing and retouching tools. We recommend testing out several apps for yourself to find the one that best suits your needs.
Great photos start with high-quality cameras
While the photo editing apps on this list offer a wide range of high-quality editing and retouching tools to help you improve your pictures, they can only do so much. If you’re unhappy with your photo’s quality even after retouching it with one of these apps, you may need to upgrade your camera for better results.
Our Photo Editing App Reviews
Photoshop Express — Top Pick
Download: Android ★★★★★★★★★★ | iOS ★★★★★★★★★★
Photoshop Express is our pick for the best photo editing app as it brings the professional-grade photo editing tools offered by Photoshop to mobile devices. Users can easily edit, retouch, collage, and combine photos. Photoshop Express offers a great selection of high-quality effects and filters that you can add to your photos, and you can use retouching tools like the blemish remover or unique makeup transfer tool to quickly improve your photos. You can automatically correct distorted camera angles with the Transform tool, and you can save high-contrast images as PNG files that can be layered over other images. Photoshop Express is also great for editing social media photos thanks to its high-quality fonts, borders, frames, and collage tools.
Notable features:
- Free version available
- In-app purchases: $2.99 – $34.99/item
- Support available: Help Center, FAQ
| Photoshop Express Pros & Cons | |
|---|---|
| What we like | What we don’t like |
| High-quality photo retouching tools | Includes expensive in-app purchases |
| Great selection of filters and effects | Doesn’t include video editing features |
| Includes custom sticker maker | |
Snapseed — Best Free Photo Editing App
Download: Android ★★★★★★★★★★ | iOS ★★★★★★★★★★
Snapseed, made by Google, is a popular photo editing app and the only one on our list to offer all its tools and features free. The app includes 29 tools and filters, including Healing, Brush, Structure, HDR, Perspective, and Face Enhance, making it a great option for quick photo retouches. Snapseed supports both JPEG and RAW files, and the app includes tutorial cards to help new users learn how to use photo editing tools. Unlike other apps, you can save your own custom photo editing presets to use on other photos. Users can choose from a selection of basic filters, adjust white balance and lighting, add and edit text, and more.
Notable features:
- Free version available
- In-app purchases: None
- Support available: Help Center
| Snapseed Pros & Cons | |
|---|---|
| What we like | What we don’t like |
| Includes tutorial cards | No built-in camera |
| Users can save custom presets | Doesn’t support video editing |
| All features included for free | |
Adobe Lightroom — Best for Photographers
Download: Android ★★★★★★★★★★ | iOS ★★★★★★★★★★
Adobe Lightroom is the ultimate photo editing app for photographers thanks to its high-quality built-in camera and wide range of photo enhancement tools. Users can use the app’s built-in camera to take advantage of advanced controls like exposure, timer, instant photo presets, and more. The unique Lightroom Auto feature lets users enhance their photos with a single tap, making it a great option for amateurs and professionals alike. Lightroom also includes more than 150 photo presets, an AI that recommends the best preset, color correction and enhancement features, and a high-quality object removal tool. Lightroom also stands out thanks to its community features. Users can find community-made presets, learn from community-created tutorials, and follow their favorite users.
Notable features:
- Free version available
- In-app purchases: $1.99 – $49.99/item
- Support available: Help Center
| Adobe Lightroom Pros & Cons | |
|---|---|
| What we like | What we don’t like |
| Automatic photo enhancement | Many features require an Adobe subscription |
| High-quality built-in camera | No video editing |
| Great community features | |
VSCO — Best for Presets
Download: Android ★★★★★★★★★★ | iOS ★★★★★★★★★★
VSCO is an all-in-one photo and video editing app that offers an incredible selection of high-quality presets for users to choose from. Users can import RAW photos and take advantage of powerful features like Contrast, Saturation, Grain, Fade, and more to add life to their photos. VSCO stands out from other apps on our list thanks to its more than 200 presets you can use to quickly create high-quality photo and video edits. The VSCO Montage feature lets users easily create videos by layering videos, images, and shapes. For inspiration, users can join the VSCO community and explore photos, videos, and editorials.
Notable features:
- Free version available
- Subscription plans: $7.99/month or $19.99/year
- Support available: Help Center
| VSCO Pros & Cons | |
|---|---|
| What we like | What we don’t like |
| 200+ high-quality presets | Doesn’t include a text editor |
| Includes video editing tools | Free version only includes 10 presets |
| Great community features | |
Picsart — Best for Video Editing
Download: Android ★★★★★★★★★★ | iOS ★★★★★★★★★★
Picsart is the best photo editing app on our list for users who are also interested in video editing. Picsart lets users easily make professional-level collages, design and add custom stickers, quickly remove and change backgrounds, add filters and effects to photos, and more. Picsart’s powerful video editor lets users add music to videos, making it perfect for creating social media videos, and the smart video merger makes it easy to blend videos. You can also create video collages and slideshows and crop video clips. Picsart includes a unique drawing tool that lets you use customizable brushes, layers, and professional drawing tools to create illustrations.
Notable features:
- Free version available
- Subscription plans: Picsart Gold: 1 month: $8.99; 12 months: $4.66/month
- In-app purchases: $0.99 – $119.99/item
- Support available: Help Center
| Picsart Pros & Cons | |
|---|---|
| What we like | What we don’t like |
| Includes high-quality drawing tool | In-app purchases can be expensive |
| Advanced video editing features | Doesn’t include a built-in camera |
| Includes a custom sticker maker | Doesn’t support RAW photo editing |
Pixelmator Photo — Best for Hands-Off Editing
Download: iOS ★★★★★★★★★★
Pixelmator Photo is one of the most advanced photo editing apps available, giving users access to a great selection of professional-grade photo editing tools. The app features over 30 color adjustments, support for over 600 RAW image formats, deep integration iCloud Photos, and more. Pixelmator Photo stands out from other photo editing apps because of its photo editing features that use machine learning to automatically enhance your photos. With these tools, users can automatically fine-tune, remove camera noise, match colors, crop, and increase resolution. While Pixelmator Photo is a powerful photo editing app, it doesn’t offer a free version and costs $7.99 to download.
Notable features:
- Free version not available
- Subscription plans: None
- Support available: Help, Email
| Pixelmator Photo Pros & Cons | |
|---|---|
| What we like | What we don’t like |
| AI-powered photo editing tools | No free version (costs $7.99) |
| Supports 600 RAW image formats | No video editing tools |
| Desktop-grade color adjustments | Doesn’t include a built-in camera |
TouchRetouch — Best for Photo Retouching
Download: Android ★★★★★★★★★★ | iOS ★★★★★★★★★★
If you’re looking for a powerful photo retouching app, then TouchRetouch is a great option. Its features include a single-tap blemish removal tool, smart editing tools, flexible selection tools, automatic retouching, object cloning, and 360-degree editing tools. For new users, TouchRetouch features in-app tutorials to help you learn how to retouch photos using the app’s powerful editing tools. TouchRetouch is not free, but for $3.99 on iOS and $2 on Google Play, users get access to all the app’s features with no additional in-app purchases or subscriptions. It’s also worth mentioning that, with the recent 5.0 update, users now have access to additional features such as object-aware retouching, flexible line removal, and mesh removal.
Notable features:
- Free version not available
- Subscription plans: None
- Support available: FAQ, Contact Us Form
| TouchRetouch Pros & Cons | |
|---|---|
| What we like | What we don’t like |
| Automatic object removal | No free version (costs $3.99 or $2) |
| Smart editing | No video editing tools |
| 360-degree photo editing | No built-in camera |
Afterlight — Best for Custom Filters
Download: Android ★★★★★★★★★★ | iOS ★★★★★★★★★★
Afterlight is the best photo editor for users interested in creating custom filters and effects. Unlike other apps on our list, Afterlight makes it easy to create custom filters by fusing multiple filters, and the app includes more than 70 Fusions that are updated weekly to give users more variety. Afterlight also includes over 150 filters, more than 60 textures and overlays, over 120 hand-picked fonts, and more than 20 photo editing tools. The app’s touch editing tools make it easy to enhance photos with more precision, and the unique Double Exposure feature lets you blend photos to create unique images.
Notable features:
- Free version available
- In-app purchases: $0.99 – $35.99/item
- Support available: Contact Us Form
| Afterlight Pros & Cons | |
|---|---|
| What we like | What we don’t like |
| Users can create custom filters | Lacks photo retouching tools |
| 150+ unique filters | Doesn’t support video editing |
| 120+ fonts | |
ON1 Photo RAW — Best Built-In Camera
Download: Android ★★★★★★★★★★ | iOS ★★★★★★★★★★
ON1 Photo RAW is a powerful photo editing app that lets users easily capture, edit, and organize their photos all in one place. ON1 Photo RAW stands out due to its professional-grade built-in camera with advanced controls you can use to capture RAW photos. The app also includes the best photo organizer out of any of the apps on our list, letting users organize their photos by star ratings, likes, dislikes, or rejects. You can search and filter your library to easily find your photos at any time. Users can use ON1 to process RAW files, edit photos, retouch photos, and add professional effects and presets to their pictures.
Notable features:
- Free version available
- Subscription plans: Monthly: $7.99 with 200GB or $15.99 with 1TB; Yearly: $89.99 with 200GB or $179.99 with 1TB; 2022 Upgrade: $79.99
- Support available: Help Support
| ON1 Photo RAW Pros & Cons | |
|---|---|
| What we like | What we don’t like |
| Powerful built-in camera | No video editing |
| User-friendly photo organization features | |
| Great selection of effects and presets | |
Prisma — Most Creative Filters
Download: Android ★★★★★★★★★★ | iOS ★★★★★★★★★★
Prisma is designed to help inexperienced photo editors create high-quality images using a variety of filters and effects. With over 500 creative filters to choose from, including Portrait styles for selfies, Prisma offers more high-quality filters than any other app on our list. After choosing a filter, you can adjust the exposure, brightness, saturation, contrast, and vibrance to customize it to your liking. New filters are added to the app every day. Prisma also offers a powerful background editing tool that lets you easily replace the background of any photo with a template or another photo from your library.
Notable features:
- Free version available
- Subscription plans: Premium: $7.99/month or $29.99/year
- In-app purchases: $0.99 – $99.99/item
- Support available: Email
| Prisma Pros & Cons | |
|---|---|
| What we like | What we don’t like |
| 500+ filters | Expensive in-app purchases |
| New filters added daily | Doesn’t support RAW files |
| Background editing tool | No text editor |
Photo Editing Apps: Features Summary Table
| Photo Editing Apps Comparison Table | ||
|---|---|---|
| App | Subscription Fees or In-App Purchases | Features |
| Photoshop Express — Top Pick | $2.99 – $34.99/item | ✓ Built-In Camera ✓ Text Editor ✓ Photo Retouching X Video Editing ✓ Raw Editing ✓ Sharing |
| Snapseed — Best Free Photo Editing App | None | X Built-In Camera ✓ Text Editor ✓ Photo Retouching X Video Editing ✓ Raw Editing ✓ Sharing |
| Adobe Lightroom — Best for Photographers | $1.99 – $49.99/item | ✓ Built-In Camera ✓ Text Editor ✓ Photo Retouching X Video Editing ✓ Raw Editing ✓ Sharing |
| VSCO — Best for Presets | $7.99/month or $19.99/year | ✓ Built-In Camera X Text Editor ✓ Photo Retouching ✓ Video Editing ✓ Raw Editing ✓ Sharing |
| Picsart — Best for Video Editing | Picsart Gold: 1 month: $8.99; 12 months: $4.66/month; $0.99 – $119.99/item |
X Built-In Camera ✓ Text Editor ✓ Photo Retouching ✓ Video Editing X Raw Editing ✓ Sharing |
| Pixelmator Photo — Best for Hands-Off Editing | None | X Built-In Camera ✓ Text Editor ✓ Photo Retouching X Video Editing ✓ Raw Editing ✓ Sharing |
| TouchRetouch — Best for Photo Retouching | None | X Built-In Camera X Text Editor ✓ Photo Retouching X Video Editing ✓ Raw Editing ✓ Sharing |
| Afterlight — Best for Custom Filters | $0.99 – $35.99/item | ✓ Built-In Camera ✓ Text Editor X Photo Retouching X Video Editing ✓ Raw Editing ✓ Sharing |
| ON1 Photo RAW — Best Built-In Camera | Plus: Monthly: $7.99 with 200GB or $15.99 with 1TB Yearly: $89.99 with 200GB or $179.99 with 1TB; 2022 Upgrade: $79.99 |
✓ Built-In Camera ✓ Text Editor ✓ Photo Retouching X Video Editing ✓ Raw Editing ✓ Sharing |
| Prisma — Most Creative Filters | Premium: $7.99/month or $29.99/year; $0.99 – $99.99/item |
✓ Built-In Camera X Text Editor ✓ Photo Retouching X Video Editing X Raw Editing ✓ Sharing |