It's $12.99/mo or $129/yr for a subscription that includes Final Cut Pro, Logic Pro, Pixelmator Pro, Motion, Compressor, MainStage, Keynote, Pages, and Numbers
Educational discount with verification required drops the price to $2.99/mo / $29.99/yr.
The regular-price subscription includes family sharing, education price does not.
One-time purchase versions remain available: Final Cut Pro ($299.99), Logic Pro ($199.99), Pixelmator Pro ($49.99), Motion ($49.99), Compressor ($49.99), and MainStage ($29.99).
The most important benefits in my opinion are choice and price - people like me who prefer to buy software outright can still do so at a reasonable cost, while others who opt for a subscription can also do so (again, at a reasonable cost).
It's pretty clever that they keep the "pay one time" option still alive while announcing the availability of subscription, so anyone who says "Boo, not you too Apple" can easily be shut down with "You still have the option to buy it!" instead of leaving those critics without answers. Of course, they'll eventually remove the option to buy the software by paying once, I think everyone can see the writing on the wall, but still clever of them to choose to do it later for PR purposes. 1-0 to Apple :)
The one-time purchase version of Microsoft Office is not available worldwide. Where offered, it is reduced to Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and OneNote, with Outlook as a Business edition extra. Individual apps can sometimes be bought separately, but pricing usually makes this impractical. This is to push buyers to Microsoft 365 subscriptions which is the primary product.
Yes - but perpetual purchases have an interesting gotcha that Microsoft didn't realise at first. To encourage subscription over perpetual, ongoing or evergreen updates are limited to subscription version.
Office 2024 has every feature that was added since Office 2021 to the subscription version - while a chunk of loyal customers are unaware of them.
Back when Google was competing hard with Google Suite, a big perception problem formed with the perpetual customers believing and convincing others that Google were far ahead, with collab editing and other features - after Office had added equivalent.
So for me, If there's a subscription and one-time option - I wonder if the one-time gets all updates going forward. If it doesn't, I realise that they'll regret that if competition picks up, and try to fix it later.
If it does include updates... I worry it will be like many other lifetime updates one-time purchases - when competition is low they'll renege on that promise.
So far from what I can tell, Final Cut Pro has gotten perpetual updates. Since you can only buy it via the Mac App Store, ther can’t do upgrade pricing.
The other thing that’s going to go away is purchasing only what you need. I want exactly one of these apps, I bet virtually nobody uses all of them, and yet the suckers are going to be telling us that being made to buy stuff we don’t want or use is “more value”.
Why do you think they will remove the option to buy the software?
They’ve kept the model for years. They’re targeting different audiences with the move.
> Of course, they'll eventually remove the option to buy the software by paying once, I think everyone can see the writing on the wall
There's no indication Apple is planning to end the option of paying once for these apps.
Apple introduced subscriptions for Final Cut and Logic nearly three years ago [1]; this isn't new by any means. Pages, Numbers and Keynote remain available at no cost.
> so anyone who says "Boo, not you too Apple" can easily be shut down with "You still have the option to buy it!" instead of leaving those critics without answers
This is like saying that it's clever for Mars to keep Mars Bars while launching a new bar, as it "shuts down" complaints that Mars Bars will no longer exist.
Yea I've already purchased some of these apps so I was not going to thrilled if they pulled an Adobe and made me pay for an overpriced subscription on top of it >:(
It's not outrageous, for sure, specially if you happen to have a use case for all the bundled apps. But things change if you consider that the one time payment for Logic Pro equals about 18 months of the subscription. In my case, I bought Logic Pro in 2013 for 180€. Obviously a subscription seems expensive no matter what the price is.
> It's pretty clever that they keep the "pay one time" option still alive while announcing the availability of subscription, so anyone who says "Boo, not you too Apple" can easily be shut down with "You still have the option to buy it!"
Probably not. Those customers are almost completely irrelevant and not people who Apple or anybody else cares about. They won't mind if you kick and scream.
Yes, of course, ultimately every choice they ever do is for money, because they're a for-profit company. But maybe we can be slightly more granular about exactly how that choice makes them more money, which is because it gives them good PR. I was just being more specific, but we're saying the same thing :)
Parent isn’t insinuating otherwise. They’re saying the subscription model is more lucrative, so eventually they’ll remove the one time payment option, but keeping it as an option for the announcement keeps the bad PR at bay.
So what about next year when all of the apps receive updates/upgrades? Will the paid-in-full versions receive the upgrade for free, or will they have upgrade prices? I remember the days of Adobe's annual version upgrades, and they were at least $99 per app. Using that as the basis, the Adobe subscription plan is not more expensive that just broken up into 12 payments. People that kept running v4 to avoid the upgrade prices eventually got left out as they could not open files provided to them from others using the most recent version. Let's not forget our history on the one-time purchase pros/cons
All companies should do this. Sometimes I want a one-time purchase. Sometimes I want to try the program for a few months and I prefer a cheap subscription over a big upfront cost. And very, very rarely, I'll prefer the subscription, even though it's more expensive over time, to support a cool indie studio with recurring revenue instead of one-time purchases that may dry up and lead to lack of interest from the devs.
This is my argument for the Adobe subscription. One day, I'm a photographer needing apps like Photoshop and Lightroom and After Effects (because I do a lot of timelapse). One day, I'm a graphic designer, so I need Photoshop and Illustrator. One day, I'm an editor, so Photoshop, Premiere, Illustrator, and After Effects. One day, I'm doing desktop publishing with Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign.
The competition for the Creator Studio is not exactly Adobe. Of course Apple will be happy to build on their offerings to be able to really take on Adobe, but this subscription is priced to compete with the online services popping up from nowhere that have stolen the ease of use market away from Adobe.
The real competition in this market in 2026 is Canva.
I would assume it's because younger generations of creatives are using their software less and less, increasing the risk of losing the market completely on the software side. At this pricing, more of them will turn to paying Apple rather than paying for multiple services, keeping them tied into the ecosystem.
Also so many people are paying for Canva, Capcut etc that taking a piece of that cake is quite a low hanging fruit if you have a distribution platform.
The acquisition of the Affinity software by Canva I imagine motivated this.
It’s even a similar pricing model, though technically with Pages / Numbers / Keynote covers a little more ground but I think the main intent is to get creatives using Apple’s creative software again
Pixelmator being the only 3rd party software because Apple never made a competitor to Photoshop
Though since Canva went full on toward more robust tools I imagine they have started capturing the entire editing chain more than they did 2-3 years ago, hence the Affinity acquisition
Apple hardware has "only" a 36% margin, while their software and services have a 75% margin. They definitely want to make more money on software with absurd margins.
They want marketshare to enhance their other market positions and give them optionality for future strategy.
They'd love the whole market, but they don't need it and they won't employ too many resources chasing that.
They're a powerful giant with hands in so many places. Each enforcing other endeavors.
This encourages people to stay in the Apple hardware ecosystem, for instance. It dog foods their silicon. It keeps people thinking of Apple as the creative brand and operating system. More creatives buying Apple -> more being produced and consumed for and on Apple.
Also the strategy of getting kids young has always been genius. They started that in the eighties, I think.
Pretty spot on. I think what's new is that Apple is employing this tactic, before they always went with "Our stuff is more expensive because it's better", but as they seem to slightly pivot into other directions now, this choice also seems to align with the new direction.
There are far too many tools out there (from FL Studio on one end, to MuseScore on the other) that present piano-roll-based rapid prototyping and traditional western score notation as diametric opposites. From day 1, Logic challenged itself "what if we can use the same event-based data model to render both."
None of this complexity is hidden - you can edit the raw event stream directly. If you're a developer familiar with, say, React, it makes music creation quite intuitive - everything from visual to audio output is a function of a transparently formatted data store.
And while that has its challenges, and some of the UX innovations of e.g. MuseScore have been slower to arrive in Logic, because of this "dual life" it's unmatched as a pedogogical tool, and a professional creative tool as well.
Thank god they preserved the one time purchase. I bought all of these apps back in like ~2013 and have been using them for literally 13 years with all updates (fcp, compressor, motion)
It's rare for a company to not only offer one-time purchases, and keep updating them, but also not rebranding/renaming/version cut-off charging at some point.
It helps that you have to continue to buy their hardware to keep running said software. I guess they could be greedy and keep making me pay for Logic every few years so I'm happy they don't do that but they're still making money off my initial purchase of logic just in a different way.
the other benefit is that subs can be a sort of extended trial. Ive been wanting to try out final cut pro but I don't want to do a full video project if i'm going to be evaluating it. better to have 1-3 months to really know before I plunk down 299 bucks.
Not related to your comment exactly but I feel like I need to get this out in this thread somewhere:
As someone who defended FCPX and used it professionally for years even when it was at its most hated (2011 or so), it’s been woefully supported the last few years and no one should be on it anymore. Resolve Studio outclasses it top to bottom for the same one-time cost and runs great on both MacOS and Windows. Linux it’s bumpy unfortunately but it does technically run lol
> Resolve Studio outclasses it top to bottom for the same one-time cost and runs great on both MacOS and Windows
Best 200-300 EUR I spent some years ago, and still receives free updates, Blackmagic Design is a really nice company. And, not only does Resolve run great on macOS and Windows, they have Linux native builds that run even better than it does with the same hardware using Windows, which is REALLY nice.
Runs like a dream for me, albeit on workstation-hardware so YMMV. It runs better under X than Wayland, at least the version I'm still stuck on, but otherwise the performance is top notch and easily worth a try :)
It lacks a lot more than flashy social media features - and given their biggest driver in the 2010’s was arguably YouTubers, they actually need more robust social media features. For starters, they just added voice isolation what? A year ago? That has been bog-standard for resolve and premiere for years now. The audio tools in general are still very subpar.
I used it professionally from 2011-2020 or so. Around 2020 the gaps in feature parity became wider and more apparent, it’s clearly not a priority anymore. Once I went to resolve I basically abandoned it. I use maybe every 6mo tops now for quick stuff for friends and family or to open an old project.
The one thing I will say is for speed cutting, it’s probably the best. And that’s no small thing! But that’s about it.
I finally had to give mine up. Needed to reset the password which required a trip to 4HELP office and I live halfway around the globe now. But the kiddo will be starting college soon so I can mooch off their edu email address.
If you are planning anyway to break the terms of the license and effectively steal the software, why even bother paying something for the privilege? Just get it for free, surely it has to be available cracked
> break the terms of the license and effectively steal the software
We're all (mostly/some) software people here, you don't need to use terms established by the "anti-piracy" firms to make your point, no one is "stealing" anything here, even if they were getting it for free from TPB or whatever.
Indeed. But people are stuck on these archaic unrelated terms for now. AI firms will make the whole thing obsolete while luddites cry about “stealing from artists” and stuff like that.
There was no morality play. My point is your copy/use of software is equally "illegal" whether you just download a cracked copy or pretend to be an active college student and pay the student price, when you are not in fact an active college student. Either way, you won't have a valid license. So why bother paying?
This is quite the slippery argument IMO. So it’s not about morality, it’s about legality. But also it’s about paying for a valid license, so they shouldn’t pay at all?
I bought a license for Pixelmator Pro a couple of years ago. IIRC it cost 30 or 40 EUR. I don't use it much, but it is unlikely you're going to need all of that software.
I could see using an iPad for automation, triggered by midi, but I use an Air for that (and even if I used an my Pro, I still have to use a USB C hub because for some reason Apple things 1 (or 2) USB ports is enough. Sigh.
My concern here is are they going to start locking features for Pages, Numbers, and Keynote behind a paywall? Yes, it’s free—but will they still have all of the newer features without a subscription?
The individual one time purchase versions are still available for all the apps. Final Cut, Logic, Motion, Compressor, and MainStage are offered in a bundle for education by Apple as a $199.99 one time purchase (no education status is verified) [1]. Pixelmator Pro is available as a one time purchase as well for $49.99 [2]. Not included in the Creator Studio is the Lightroom alternative Photomator, which is available as a one time purchase of $119.99. You could recreate just the Creator Studio as a one time $250 purchase, or the entire suite (including Photomator) for $370.
Not available for one time purchase are the AI features and templates available for the free apps (Keynote, Pages, Numbers, Freeform).
Personally, I'm glad that one time purchases are still options for the core pro suite: long term they do hold value compared to paying Adobe a subscription (or dealing with the high seas on macOS). However, I don't see things like the education bundle sticking around much longer, so purchase it sooner rather than later.
The inclusion of Pixelmator Pro is simply so they no longer have a hole in the software lineup as a competitor vs Affinity (I think the real competitor to this bundle) and Adobe
I think they view Photos as a viable replacement for Lightroom and equivalents.
That's probably a clue that maintaining Photomator is not on Apple's long-term roadmap. I imagine they'll merge some features into Photos and eventually discontinue it.
> These apps will continue receiving updates, with the latest versions adopting the beautiful new visual design language with Liquid Glass on all platforms
Are the Apple people really this oblivious, or is someone in PR trolling us?
I read it less as obliviousness and more as internal language leaking into marketing. What’s “Liquid Glass” to Apple reads like an aesthetic system though but to outsiders it sounds like jargon inflation. I feel the gap between internal coherence and external clarity shows up in these releases a lot.
You’ve never worked at BigCorp have you? At Amazon, part of the initial indoctrination when I was hired there was competitive messaging when talking to clients (I worked in ProServe) and what you were never allowed to say. I remember we could never say we had a “moat”.
I guess it's enforced top-down. Yesterday I picked up my MacBook from a logicboard repair and they forced Tahoe on it despite running Sonoma originally so I spent most of yesterday getting rid of Tahoe and reverting back to Sonoma.
I’ve been waiting to see what happens with Photomator, and the fact that it’s not being included in anyway here makes me think it might not survive? Either that, or it’s gonna be heavily integrated into Photos…
It's a pity Apple didn't choose to acquire Affinity when there was a chance. Pixelmator Pro looks like a toy app compared to Logic or Final Cut. I don't see how it could ever catch up to Photoshop. Even at such small scale it's always been very buggy in my experience and development seems to have stalled (apart from some obligatory AI features).
I am glad the standalone purchases are still available and I assume they will stay updated in sync with the subscription-based ones. I would hate my copy of Logic getting slowly obsolete..
> Final Cut Pro, Logic Pro, Pixelmator Pro, Motion, Compressor, and MainStage — plus new AI features and premium content in Keynote, Pages, and Numbers — come together in a single subscription
> Name me something a product, not a service which you can only subscribe in Apple's ecosystem.
The shows on Apple TV are only available via a subscription; there's no way to have a perpetual purchase (at least as far as that a la carte style of purchase is perpetual).
Well really they are copying the original Microsofts suite packaging which everyone has copied over the years! But yes specific they are trying to take market share on Adobe.
Its actually like taking on MS and Adobe together... but they aren't really taking on MS office.
Subscription model so it’s adobes model. But you can buy “one time”. Though they have a tendency to just end product support (aperture software was canceled leaving a lot of bad taste for photographers that used it)
Wonder what Adobe thinks of this. Their support for Mac was pretty important in getting OS X off the ground, now they’re competing with a unified stack.
When I was a Mac user I remember buying Logic express 9 (I still have the disk). The price is a good deal, but you really are all in forever..
You're never free to unsubscribe because you become accustomed to the tools, and use the file formats, etc. (That's why I don't do subscription, ever.)
FTA: “Alternatively, users can also choose to purchase the Mac versions of Final Cut Pro, Pixelmator Pro, Logic Pro, Motion, Compressor, and MainStage individually as a one-time purchase on the Mac App Store.”
It’s cheap enough it’s not enough to fund development of Final Cut but also not enough money to bother spending time on it. Find it odd personally, just offering them free to keep hardware makes more sense than trying to push a tiny subscription revenue number.
> It’s cheap enough it’s not enough to fund development of Final Cut but also not enough money to bother spending time on it. Find it odd personally, just offering them free to keep hardware makes more sense than trying to push a tiny subscription revenue number.
Apple doesn't work that way.
Unlike almost all other tech companies that are organized by divisions, Apple uses a functional organizational structure.
So all of the software teams are under one head of software; there's no senior vp of the Final Cut division, for example.
For accounting purposes, all software is lumped together.
Apple made $391 billion in revenue last fiscal year; when you're making that kind of money, you can afford to do things for reasons other than the amount of money you could make.
Whatever revenue Final Cut generates isn't required to fund the Final Cut team.
$129/year is surely better than $300 once, 15 years ago. Though I'm guessing not offering it for free is to keep it distinct from iMovie and to maintain some semblance of "Pro"-ness (which I'm gathering is up for debate either way.. the last time I did any actual video editing it was on Final Cut Pro 5 so I'm out of the loop)
It's the problem that the whole industry is facing - the current generation of hardware is sufficient that hardware refreshes will continue to decline, and companies that want to keep milking us for money regularly need to find a new way to do it.
I hate subscriptions as much as the next person but how would you pay for continued development of software? Do you say a person can continue to run version X forever but if they want a new version they pay for it?
> the current generation of hardware is sufficient that hardware refreshes will continue to decline
If anything, Apple is refreshing their hardware much faster now compared to the Intel days. There's literally a new MacBook Pro and MacBook Air every year. And of course there are 3-4 new iPhones every year.
When there are no more new buyers to sell devices, or new versions of existing software packages, the only way to keep the curve growing for shareholders and MBAs is to sell subscriptions.
It is also the only way to convince developers to pay for software.
Having a part hosted on some server is so much better than whatever anti-piracy schemes one can think of, and provides the continuous growth curve for printing money.
Thus subscriptions aren't going away in the modern software world.
Seems like a pretty solid deal, if you need everything. I don't know who that person is though. The intersection between Final Cut Pro and Logic users is pretty small, I'd imagine.
I'm that kind of user but I would rather not use Logic, Final Cut, or PixelMator unless Apple really improves those. On top of that there's also the platform lock-in concern.
I played once with hosting a VSCode server on a raspberry pi for general development and it was actually quite powerful, when used from an iPad. Just not strictly for Swift unfortunately
I'm hosting a VSCode server with Termux/Ubuntu container on my old Pixel 6a and I cannot overstate how awesome it is for just a fun dev setup, especially with a tablet. Easy to nuke and start clean too!
The ecosystem is fine for non-Apple development. It's just building apps for iOS, macOS, etc. that is impossible on iPad right now past some basic applications.
I think this is a huge mistake at least as far as the office software goes. One of the key advantages to Pages.app and friends is that they are pre-installed and free on MacOS. This will just drive people to M365 and Google Docs.
Pages and other iWork apps will remain free. The premium features are for curated images and templates, and AI assisted document creation. If you don't care for those features, you will not be affected by the change.
This seems like an Apple AI subscription under the guise of a software bundle.
It’s a good value for some, especially if you want to use FCP, but seems like a bad value for most users who are expecting more value from their Mac purchase.
I wonder if new Macs will offer a three-month trial for this suite, or if the standard apps will be pre-installed and the AI features are unlocked through a subscription.
If bundled versions of iWork go away, we may see a renaissance for G Suite.
Sounds plausible. Someone internally likely has AI sales numbers to meet, so creating new subscriptions and adding "AI" to them can help juice AI-related numbers toward that quota.
TikTokers ("influencers" in general) don't do their editing or any part of their "production pipeline" on computers, kids are doing the full thing via smartphones nowadays. Blew my mind initially too, as I always did "serious work" at a computer and never the phone, but seems they're managing it somehow.
They often start there, some stay there, some graduate to an iPad, but a a lot of the higher end creators absolutely edit in desktops or laptops (usually MacBooks)
My old job dealt with this quite a lot as they were our target market, so I got some up close views of how for example, creators like MrBeast go about their editing (well the employees anyway)
Though I did note a lot of creators that do graduate to more robust software basically go from lightweight editor via Canva -> iMovie or equivalent -> professional software e.g. FCPX or Premiere
Yeah, that matches what I've seen too, bigger productions adopting a more traditional pipeline, while "influencers" or whatever they're called today, kind of stick with the tools they've learned, until they "graduate" as they expand the team and bring in actual professionals.
I don’t get why they think “professional” is a generic tier.
If I’m a music producer, what’s the value of being given a digital art drawing program? If I’m an illustrator, why do I need a cinema post production suite?
Some people might happen to do both, but overlap is largely accidental, right? The fact that they think of all professions as a bundle is even insulting as it signals the products are mostly toys/hobbyist stuff.
I think that's why they call it "Creator" studio. Creators - in the way the term is usually used today - indeed do use many of these tools. Maybe you produce music, create a video about you producing music and also need an engaging thumbnail for YouTube.
In a feature film production, these would certainly be separate roles. But apart from maybe Logic Pro for composers, Apple's tools are not really relevant at those levels of the entertainment business anymore. Post-pro would be Pro Tools for audio, something like Avid Media Composer for editing etc.
I think Apple has realized they are not playing on that level anymore and target their marketing to where they are still in the game. That's not necessarily a bad move.
The real difference is that a "true professional" already has the software—purchased at full price by themselves or by their employer—and doesn't need a subscription in the first place.
The biggest distinction, in my experience, is that prosumers tend to be means-focused and professionals tend to be ends-focused, so there's less zealotry and evangelism in professional circles.
A lot of people round trip through various softwares to create things. As a film editor I use NLE’s, DAW’s, music production tools, various encoders (like compressor), graphic design tools…I’d say it’s the norm not the exception to need 2-3 specialized pieces of software during projects.
> If I’m a music producer, what’s the value of being given a digital art drawing program? If I’m an illustrator, why do I need a cinema post production suite
Many years ago, before Final Cut Pro x my cousin asked me to help inject some video from tapes and keep the time code. In Final Cut Pro. I couldn’t figure it out.
So in desperation I read the manual. It was seriously well written and I understood the program, what needed to be done and how to do it.
I find it useful as a massive canvas for keeping a bunch of stuff in context, visually. And accessible via Mac and iPhone. But it is sorely lacking a major feature: highlight text to add a hyperlink. I end up with full URLs instead of hyperlinked words and it's pretty messy.
I use it regularly to do rough sketches of objects on my iPad to model in CAD later on the computer. It doesn't feel right for artwork or notes or basically anything else.
I can’t help but notice Apple in the last decade has kind of been spinning in circles software wise while their hardware division makes breakthroughs with M-series chips.
Yeah! They were courageous enough to take the step that Microsoft did with the Office suite (announced 1988, launched 1990) and with Microsoft 365 as subscription in 2011.
I'm curious how many people actually use all this stuff themselves. It seems like an extreme niche, and more often than not will have people paying for apps they will never use.
Maybe I'm old skool... but for the last 30+ years I've been using a combination of photoshop, illustrator, FCP, after effects (back when it was CoSA...), some audio editing and mixing in quite a bit of code as well. While others on my team specialize in one or two domains, I've managed to keep my skills in many.
Back in the day I was considered a 'MultiMedia' creative. I don't even know what to call myself these days.
Keynote is so much better for presentations that PowerPoint it's not even funny. But if you're not doing presentations, I can understand dumping it. I do like to have Pages because it means I don't have to bother with Word's annoying ribbon interface and Copilot AI when I'm writing...though sounds like that may be changing?
I absolutely would. I've used them for years, alongside MS Office on Windows and Libre Office on Linux, and while they lack a few features they're not ones I've ever needed and the UI and ease of use is far superior to Office. Especially Pages is a pleasure to work with compared with Word.
Doesn't sound like it
> Alternatively, users can also choose to purchase the Mac versions of Final Cut Pro, Pixelmator Pro, Logic Pro, Motion, Compressor, and MainStage individually as a one-time purchase on the Mac App Store.5
> Alternatively, users can also choose to purchase the Mac versions of Final Cut Pro, Pixelmator Pro, Logic Pro, Motion, Compressor, and MainStage individually as a one-time purchase on the Mac App Store.
I'm keeping an eye on Graphite (https://graphite.art/) as something to move to from Affinity's stuff, but it's good there's a new option for people who need more.
Except that isn’t an alternative title, unless you want to lie by omission thus being wrong.
“Apple offers new option for subscription in addition to existing one-time purchase optinos” might be an alternative though, and reduce the number of cynically inane comments from people that apparently didn’t RTFA before commenting.
God fucking damn not you too, Apple. Adobe isn't a role model to emulate. I hate Adobe's practices. The whole world hates Adobe's practices. I want to pay for a thing with my money and then use it without worrying about ongoing costs, the UI changing, features breaking, or shit being shoved down my throat because some seedy PM wants a raise.
EDIT: I know you can still buy the software... but for how long?
And here's the ruining of Pixelmator Pro everyone was waiting for. I paid one time 20 euros for it (discounted). And I would gladly pay again even full price for a new major version.
I don't want yet another subscription.
I see that they can still be bought (for now) but I wonder how long that will last.
Educational discount with verification required drops the price to $2.99/mo / $29.99/yr.
The regular-price subscription includes family sharing, education price does not.
One-time purchase versions remain available: Final Cut Pro ($299.99), Logic Pro ($199.99), Pixelmator Pro ($49.99), Motion ($49.99), Compressor ($49.99), and MainStage ($29.99).
Comes out January 28th
Microsoft still offers a one time purchase of Office. There is precedent for Bigcorp keeping a one time purchase version and offer a prescription.
Office 2024 has every feature that was added since Office 2021 to the subscription version - while a chunk of loyal customers are unaware of them. Back when Google was competing hard with Google Suite, a big perception problem formed with the perpetual customers believing and convincing others that Google were far ahead, with collab editing and other features - after Office had added equivalent.
So for me, If there's a subscription and one-time option - I wonder if the one-time gets all updates going forward. If it doesn't, I realise that they'll regret that if competition picks up, and try to fix it later. If it does include updates... I worry it will be like many other lifetime updates one-time purchases - when competition is low they'll renege on that promise.
Apple wants its customers to buy/subscribe to these tools so that you’re in the Apple ecosystem and buy more hardware and services.
Unlike Adobe, they have profit-maximizing incentives to let you stay on the buy/rent model that you prefer.
There's no indication Apple is planning to end the option of paying once for these apps.
Apple introduced subscriptions for Final Cut and Logic nearly three years ago [1]; this isn't new by any means. Pages, Numbers and Keynote remain available at no cost.
[1]: https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2023/05/apple-brings-final-cu...
Mr. Dung: "wOrKiNg As InTeNdEd"
This is like saying that it's clever for Mars to keep Mars Bars while launching a new bar, as it "shuts down" complaints that Mars Bars will no longer exist.
Seriously? This is incredibly reasonable.
Probably not. Those customers are almost completely irrelevant and not people who Apple or anybody else cares about. They won't mind if you kick and scream.
They're doing it because it makes them more money. Corporations are not your friend.
Adobe also started out as a choice between subscription or buying. The only thing maybe keeping Apple honest is that their stuff isn't as popular.
The real competition in this market in 2026 is Canva.
Ah, yes - cross finance your loses by selling compute in your own data centres / hosting service because you can.
Also so many people are paying for Canva, Capcut etc that taking a piece of that cake is quite a low hanging fruit if you have a distribution platform.
It’s even a similar pricing model, though technically with Pages / Numbers / Keynote covers a little more ground but I think the main intent is to get creatives using Apple’s creative software again
Pixelmator being the only 3rd party software because Apple never made a competitor to Photoshop
Though since Canva went full on toward more robust tools I imagine they have started capturing the entire editing chain more than they did 2-3 years ago, hence the Affinity acquisition
Pixelmator isn’t third party. https://www.pixelmator.com/blog/2024/11/01/a-new-home-for-pi...:
“November 1, 2024
A new home for Pixelmator
Today we have some important news to share: the Pixelmator Team plans to join Apple”
That deal completed almost a year ago.
"software and services" really should be broken out from the App Store cut.
Anyway, this isn’t really a meaningful quibble argument-wise, it is obvious what you mean!
They want marketshare to enhance their other market positions and give them optionality for future strategy.
They'd love the whole market, but they don't need it and they won't employ too many resources chasing that.
They're a powerful giant with hands in so many places. Each enforcing other endeavors.
This encourages people to stay in the Apple hardware ecosystem, for instance. It dog foods their silicon. It keeps people thinking of Apple as the creative brand and operating system. More creatives buying Apple -> more being produced and consumed for and on Apple.
Also the strategy of getting kids young has always been genius. They started that in the eighties, I think.
Apple absolutely has data centres. Where do you think Apple TV, Apple Music, iCloud, Maps, etc compute happens?
Here's a press release straight from the horse's mouth about one in Denmark, in late 2020: https://www.apple.com/uk/newsroom/2020/09/apple-expands-rene...
> Can people purchase compute on Apple's data centers?
Not to my knowledge, but that's not saying much.
But that's the entire crux of their comment: undercut the competition, and make them pay for compute on Apple's data centers.
There are many discussions e.g. https://gearspace.com/board/music-computers/1433515-why-does... about the reasons for its popularity, but one stands out to me - its event data model.
There are far too many tools out there (from FL Studio on one end, to MuseScore on the other) that present piano-roll-based rapid prototyping and traditional western score notation as diametric opposites. From day 1, Logic challenged itself "what if we can use the same event-based data model to render both."
None of this complexity is hidden - you can edit the raw event stream directly. If you're a developer familiar with, say, React, it makes music creation quite intuitive - everything from visual to audio output is a function of a transparently formatted data store.
And while that has its challenges, and some of the UX innovations of e.g. MuseScore have been slower to arrive in Logic, because of this "dual life" it's unmatched as a pedogogical tool, and a professional creative tool as well.
> plus new AI features and premium content in Keynote, Pages, and Numbers
good on them
I wonder why? Why not today but 28th of Jan?
Part of me thinks M5 MacBook Air and M5 Pro MacBook Pro will also be released on January 28th.
As someone who defended FCPX and used it professionally for years even when it was at its most hated (2011 or so), it’s been woefully supported the last few years and no one should be on it anymore. Resolve Studio outclasses it top to bottom for the same one-time cost and runs great on both MacOS and Windows. Linux it’s bumpy unfortunately but it does technically run lol
Best 200-300 EUR I spent some years ago, and still receives free updates, Blackmagic Design is a really nice company. And, not only does Resolve run great on macOS and Windows, they have Linux native builds that run even better than it does with the same hardware using Windows, which is REALLY nice.
It lacks some flashy social media features and modern conveniences for sure, but it's still a very good and widely used editor.
I used it professionally from 2011-2020 or so. Around 2020 the gaps in feature parity became wider and more apparent, it’s clearly not a priority anymore. Once I went to resolve I basically abandoned it. I use maybe every 6mo tops now for quick stuff for friends and family or to open an old project.
The one thing I will say is for speed cutting, it’s probably the best. And that’s no small thing! But that’s about it.
We're all (mostly/some) software people here, you don't need to use terms established by the "anti-piracy" firms to make your point, no one is "stealing" anything here, even if they were getting it for free from TPB or whatever.
Even if I had to purchase an occasional update (assuming they were reasonably priced), I'd still be coming out ahead.
I hate "renting" software.
I could see using an iPad for automation, triggered by midi, but I use an Air for that (and even if I used an my Pro, I still have to use a USB C hub because for some reason Apple things 1 (or 2) USB ports is enough. Sigh.
Not available for one time purchase are the AI features and templates available for the free apps (Keynote, Pages, Numbers, Freeform).
Personally, I'm glad that one time purchases are still options for the core pro suite: long term they do hold value compared to paying Adobe a subscription (or dealing with the high seas on macOS). However, I don't see things like the education bundle sticking around much longer, so purchase it sooner rather than later.
[1]: https://www.apple.com/us-edu/shop/product/bmge2z/a/pro-apps-...
[2]: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/pixelmator-pro/id1289583905
I think they view Photos as a viable replacement for Lightroom and equivalents.
Are the Apple people really this oblivious, or is someone in PR trolling us?
An idiotic aesthetic system that ignores all the human interface guidelines that the Apple of 30+ years ago helped start.
/S
I’m sure there is approved marketing copy.
the beatings with liquid glass will continue till morale improves
Lightroom never matched Aperture's organizational abilities for libraries with tens of thousands of RAW photos.
I am glad the standalone purchases are still available and I assume they will stay updated in sync with the subscription-based ones. I would hate my copy of Logic getting slowly obsolete..
So Apple is copying Adobe's business model?
I don't care about video, so I'll be buying Pixelmator now, and maybe music stuff later, and Video part never.
So it works like before, if you want.
...and they integrated some of the Aperture to new Photos app, which is again was a transition to free.
Name me something a product, not a service which you can only subscribe in Apple's ecosystem.
The shows on Apple TV are only available via a subscription; there's no way to have a perpetual purchase (at least as far as that a la carte style of purchase is perpetual).
Its actually like taking on MS and Adobe together... but they aren't really taking on MS office.
Wonder what Adobe thinks of this. Their support for Mac was pretty important in getting OS X off the ground, now they’re competing with a unified stack.
When I was a Mac user I remember buying Logic express 9 (I still have the disk). The price is a good deal, but you really are all in forever..
Apple doesn't work that way.
Unlike almost all other tech companies that are organized by divisions, Apple uses a functional organizational structure.
So all of the software teams are under one head of software; there's no senior vp of the Final Cut division, for example.
For accounting purposes, all software is lumped together.
Apple made $391 billion in revenue last fiscal year; when you're making that kind of money, you can afford to do things for reasons other than the amount of money you could make.
Whatever revenue Final Cut generates isn't required to fund the Final Cut team.
If anything, Apple is refreshing their hardware much faster now compared to the Intel days. There's literally a new MacBook Pro and MacBook Air every year. And of course there are 3-4 new iPhones every year.
Not quite “buying on release week” basis but some % of employees always getting new hardware at max specs in the design org
Makes even engineering jealous sometimes
It is also the only way to convince developers to pay for software.
Having a part hosted on some server is so much better than whatever anti-piracy schemes one can think of, and provides the continuous growth curve for printing money.
Thus subscriptions aren't going away in the modern software world.
But having one simple opex line item for "software I buy for the creative types" is appealing for a lot of orgs.
Photohsop, Illustrator and After Effects are pretty much industry standards.
They look AWEFUL.
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/01/08/technology/apple-ceo-tim-...
It’s a good value for some, especially if you want to use FCP, but seems like a bad value for most users who are expecting more value from their Mac purchase.
I wonder if new Macs will offer a three-month trial for this suite, or if the standard apps will be pre-installed and the AI features are unlocked through a subscription.
If bundled versions of iWork go away, we may see a renaissance for G Suite.
If not, then this would likely go the way of others before where it will eventually be removed.
(For what it's worth, the iWorks apps – Pages/Keynote/Numbers are free and bundled with macOS.)
My old job dealt with this quite a lot as they were our target market, so I got some up close views of how for example, creators like MrBeast go about their editing (well the employees anyway)
Though I did note a lot of creators that do graduate to more robust software basically go from lightweight editor via Canva -> iMovie or equivalent -> professional software e.g. FCPX or Premiere
To them what Apple just announced is trash.
I'll say this loud for the people in the back: YOU CAN STILL BUY IT OUTRIGHT
They are still offering one-time purchases, calm down.
If I’m a music producer, what’s the value of being given a digital art drawing program? If I’m an illustrator, why do I need a cinema post production suite?
Some people might happen to do both, but overlap is largely accidental, right? The fact that they think of all professions as a bundle is even insulting as it signals the products are mostly toys/hobbyist stuff.
In a feature film production, these would certainly be separate roles. But apart from maybe Logic Pro for composers, Apple's tools are not really relevant at those levels of the entertainment business anymore. Post-pro would be Pro Tools for audio, something like Avid Media Composer for editing etc.
I think Apple has realized they are not playing on that level anymore and target their marketing to where they are still in the game. That's not necessarily a bad move.
But besides, this subscription works with Family Sharing and is only $12, so it looks easy to get your money's worth.
The target market is prosumer, not true professional.
The real difference is that a "true professional" already has the software—purchased at full price by themselves or by their employer—and doesn't need a subscription in the first place.
Are you talking about Adobe here?
So in desperation I read the manual. It was seriously well written and I understood the program, what needed to be done and how to do it.
I tried it out when it was first announced and found it painfully limited --- did I miss something? Has it gotten better?
Like Adobe CC
I love Logic and all but really?
I can’t help but notice Apple in the last decade has kind of been spinning in circles software wise while their hardware division makes breakthroughs with M-series chips.
2026, the year of the Linux Desktop…
I hope I can still use the non subscription version of Pixelmator pro I bought
More seriously, the subscription probably comes out cheaper than buying several (even if not all) of the apps that come in the bundle.
Back in the day I was considered a 'MultiMedia' creative. I don't even know what to call myself these days.
It looks so much better than the grid enforced by Excel.
Not sure why tbh, my other invoices are done in LibreOffice.
Why would someone need to buy them, they only run on macOS and macOS hardware comes with it by default, doesn't it?
The apps themselves are fine IMO.
Ummm ... no, thank you.
> Alternatively, users can also choose to purchase the Mac versions of Final Cut Pro, Pixelmator Pro, Logic Pro, Motion, Compressor, and MainStage individually as a one-time purchase on the Mac App Store.
“Apple offers new option for subscription in addition to existing one-time purchase optinos” might be an alternative though, and reduce the number of cynically inane comments from people that apparently didn’t RTFA before commenting.
EDIT: I know you can still buy the software... but for how long?
I don't want yet another subscription.
I see that they can still be bought (for now) but I wonder how long that will last.
You'll still be able to buy it if you want. All apps are still can be bought. It's in the text.
Apple surprised me nicely there.