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If you are a graphic designer or a photo editor, there is no chance that you haven’t heard of Paint.Net. Over time, this tool has secured a place in the top few professional editing tools.
For users with hands-on experience with this tool, it’s hard to switch to another tool in the market. But unfortunately, if you decide to upgrade your device and move to the macOS system, you have to give up on this tool as it’s not available for use on Mac.
But don’t worry, this is nothing to worry about as multiple other editing tools in the market are equally efficient as Paint.NET, along with some additional perks.
We have put together this write-up for you elaborating on some of the best Paint.NET alternatives for Mac in the market. You will also find a list of pros and cons with each tool we will list here. So, pay heed to all these options and choose the one that best suits your needs.
What is Paint.NET?
If you have been hearing about Paint.NET a lot lately but aren’t really sure what it is and what’s the purpose of this expression, we have you covered.
As evident from the introductory paragraphs, it’s an editing tool but what you don’t know is that it is one of the most user-friendly and convenient image editing tools in the market with an easily interpretable interface.
Using this tool, you can edit your images and designs promptly without going into the details. As far as the interface is concerned, Paint.Net greatly resembles Adobe Photoshop. If you have heard of Paint, Paint.Net won’t be too alien to you.
This tool was first developed based on the Paint tool that comes in the Windows OS, but the Microsoft.Net framework was used. Being an open-source tool, it keeps on getting updated by many developers.
Though it originally developed as a replacement for Paint, it gradually became more dependable and, in no time, secured its place as the most trustworthy editor in the market. Despite all these incredible features, you won’t be able to use this tool if you own a Mac computer running on macOS.
Keeping your concerns in mind, we have picked out some of the top-class Paint.NET alternatives for you from the market for Mac.
4 Best Paint.NET Alternatives for Mac
Undoubtedly, Paint.NET is one of a kind for being a convenient and user-friendly editing tool in the market. Though we made up our minds to come up with some reliable Paint.NET alternatives for Mac in the market, it wasn’t a piece of cake.
It took us a lot of sleepless nights and multiple hours of extensive research to finally come up with these alternatives.
1. Luminar 4
The first Paint.NET alternative for Mac on our list is Luminar 4. This editing tool is known for the AI features it comes equipped with. Using this tool, you will realize and notice the magic of automation and post-processing.
The AI features on Luminar 4 allow you to do sky replacement and photo manipulation depending on the extent of editing you want. In addition to AI, the basic editing features lying at the core of this tool are no less.
These easy-to-use and simple tools make the process of editing destruction free. The editing tools are categorized as Essentials, Creative, Portrait, and Professional. This division into four categories makes it easier for users to decide on the tools they want to use depending on their expertise.
It also simplifies the learning curve as you can gradually move from the first level, i.e., Essentials, to the last, i.e., Professional. You can also adjust different filters and settings on this tool and save them as your default settings under the “Look” category.
Once you have added a “Look” to your tool, you can quickly apply all the pre-determined changes to any image by tapping on the Look feature.
With this tool, there is a considerable margin of making mistakes as the Undo feature can take you back, and you can even start from scratch if needed.
With Luminar 4, you can also create distinct image layers and apply filters and changes to the targeted parts of the images. This also provides you with the control of determining the order in which you want the filters to be applied, along with the blending modes.
Using the Lumiar 4 tool, you can save up a lot of time as it comes with the feature of batch processing. This feature allows you to apply a single set of edits and changes to multiple image files at once. Once you are satisfied with the result, you can export these images at once.
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Final Verdict
Luminar 4 is overall an impressive editing tool and has all the features that make it an excellent replacement for Paint.NET in Windows Operating System. With this tool, you can easily escape the subscription hassle accompanying many editing tools in the market.
Over time, the makers of this tool have also worked on the speed optimization of this tool, and it indeed brought fruitful results.
2. GIMP
GIMP is another excellent photo editing tool that comes with some high-quality editing features making it the first choice of most photographers and graphic designers. Being a free tool, it is available to a large number of users across the globe.
In this tool, you can find both easy and straightforward tools for beginners as well as high-quality professional tools for experts and professionals. It isn’t just used to give final touches to your images and artwork; you can easily create your artwork and masterpieces from scratch on this interface.
Some of the features this tool comes equipped with include customizable brushes for different strokes and designs, image layers for working at particular sections of the image at once, image enhancement tools to improve the overall quality of the image or the artwork, and an extensive range of plugins.
As far as these plugins are concerned, some of them are present in the tool by default, i.e., they come pre-installed with the downloaded tool. However, in addition to these in-built plugins, you can get your hands on a large variety of free plugins available for download.
Being an open-source tool, you won’t ever face issues with the interface and editing features of GIMP getting outdated. Thanks to this tool’s wide range of active community members, it keeps getting constant updates, and all the bugs and malware intruding on its interface are fixed instantly.
In addition to being rich in editing tools and features, the interface of this tool is all set to alleviate the editing experience for users. Though it is a free tool, the interface and features it comes packed with are enough to give fierce competition to Adobe Photoshop and Paint.NET.
You get a wide range of montage and selection features on the tool, including multiple instant tools for retouching the images, cropping the sides, reducing noises from videos and GIFS, adjusting the color palettes of the pictures, customizing brushes based on their size and stroke type, altering gradients and a lot more.
You can customize the interface according to your editing needs and use the wide range of plugins it comes with to customize. Even if you are a beginner and have never heard of this tool, the tutorials and guides available on their official page would be enough for you to understand its usage in detail.
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Final Verdict
GIMP is not just an editing tool but has all the features you want from an app where you can create your artwork from scratch. The fact that this tool doesn’t need any subscription and is completely free makes it unbelievable to see its features and tools.
Despite being free, its interface is top-notch, and you can find all the tools you get on other expensive editing tools like Adobe Photoshop and higher-range tools like Paint.NET here.
3. FireAlpaca
If, after knowing that you won’t be able to use the Paint.NET tool on your Mac device, you have been looking for a painting tool that can make the process of creating art and editing it easier for you, you don’t need to search any longer.
FireAlpaca, a digital art tool compatible with both Windows and Mac operating systems, is a powerful application that is available free of cost. This software’s simple features and illustration tools make the art of drawing and illustration a lot easier.
Unlike other editing tools in the market that show different efficiency and speed on different devices, this tool is equally efficient and speedy, even if your computer is old. Though it’s the most efficient on Mac, which is what you have wanted all along, the speed of this tool on Windows is also pretty good.
Some basic editing tools on FireAlpaca include hand tools, move tools, selection tools, pencils, erasers, different brushes, and eyedroppers, among many others. Using the gradient tool on this software, you can easily select the color gradient you want your artwork to be placed on.
Similarly, the shapes and symmetry of the art piece can also be easily adjusted using the shape tool on this software. Though you get a wide range of tools and editing options on this software, none of these tools are too tricky for a beginner. This is an added feather to its hat, as beginners and professionals can easily use it.
Out of the many exceptional benefits you get on this platform, the best one is its availability in 10 languages. Generally, free tools are made available in a maximum of two to three languages, making them inaccessible to most users.
Fortunately, due to the availability of this tool in 10 languages, a large number of users all across the globe can use this tool and avail the excellent editing features it comes with even on their Mac computers.
The makers have kept its interface completely straightforward to make the platform even more beneficial for beginners and first-time users. The navigation tabs on this platform are straightforward, including filter tabs, file tabs, layer tabs, and editing tabs.
The flexibility of windows on this software tool is another feature that attracts users’ attention. On this platform, you can quickly move the windows and tabs around from left to right and vice versa. You can customize the interface for yourself by adding and removing the tabs and changing the overall appearance of the tool.
You can also get your hands on multiple perspective tools on FireAlpaca, including perspective views and line cancellation features. Using the 3D perspective feature on this tool, you can easily move the 3D objects around. This feature is beneficial for comic book curators.
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Final Verdict
FireAlpaca is everything you want from your photo editing and graphic designing tools. From free built-in templates to page layouts, it has numerous freebies for you that can add value to your created art pieces.
If you manage to get your hands on this free tool, its high-quality features and extensive range of editing tools will make it impossible for you to believe that you get it all for free.
4. Aurora HDR
As the name suggests, this tool is mainly concerned with the process of HDR composting, but unlike other complex editing tools in the market, this process gets a lot easier on Aurora HD. Paint.NET, being a comprehensive editing tool, does all this work in simple steps. Aurora HD handles one aspect of its functionality in detail, along with handling others.
Unlike most of the HDR software tools in the market that are either too complex to be used or produce terrible results, Aurora HD makes the whole process entirely hassle-free for users with its high-quality editing tools.
Even for new users, the workflow of this platform won’t be hard to interpret. Its interface is made to keep the users’ interests in mind, including both professionals and beginners. At first glance of this tool, you will understand why we are saying this about its interface.
The whole process of composting, which is generally considered too complex, can be done with this tool in a few clicks. Once you have selected the series of images, this tool with automate the rest of the process and sorts them out based on their EVs, i.e., exposure values.
In addition to working with bracketed photos and changing their alignment, backgrounds, etc., you can easily edit and improve single files on this file, which is what you expect from Paint.NET alternatives.
On Aurora HDR, you get a wide range of presets that you can use to alter your images to extreme extents. You get a lot of preset options to choose from, and a simple slider lies within the app for modifying the Look of the tool. Batch Processing is another exciting feature you get on this tool.
This tool is specially designed by the Luminar developers (the tool that secured the first place in our list of best Paint.NET alternatives for Mac) to increase the contrast ratio of images, improve their tones and shadows, and adjust the lighting overall.
The interface of this tool resembles that of Adobe Photoshop to a great extent, except that it is majorly focused on HDR adjustment of the images and art pieces.
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Final Verdict
Overall, Aurora HDR is an impressive Paint.NET alternative compatible with both Windows and Mac operating systems. The fact that this tool makes the whole editing process automatic makes it even more likable.
Due to the vast range of editing tools it comes with; including Details Boost, Clarity, etc., this tool won’t disappoint you.
How We Made This List?
As mentioned earlier, deciding on the best Paint.NET alternatives for Mac wasn’t an easy task. This is why we made a list of all the features we wanted in the options we picked out for you. It didn’t only make the whole process of choosing the best tools easier for us, but we also got a mind map to follow.
To give you a little peek into our research process, let us share with you the factors we paid heed to while shortlisting the best Paint.NET alternatives for you.
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User Experience
We understand that editing tools are used to reduce the burden of editing pictures manually, as these tools do most of the manual work. But sadly, specific editing tools in the market make the process of making changes in the images a lot more arduous than manual editing.
Keeping this in mind, we tried all the options we have listed above on our own and included only those simple tools that make the whole editing process highly uncomplicated for the users.
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Cost
Editing isn’t an easy job, so most of the editing tools in the market are too expensive. Though finding Paint.NET alternatives for Mac was arduous, we went a step ahead and picked out the tools that are entirely free of cost.
Fortunately, we managed to get our hands on many free editing tools in the market, but most failed to match our expectations. After digging deep into the market, we finally landed on free tools that have features comparable to Adobe Photoshop and Paint.NET.
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Interface
Most of the editing tools in the market come with complex editing features and tools. Most of these complex tools could hardly be interpreted by the editors, making the editing process even more complicated.
While making our list of the best Paint.NET alternatives for Mac, we picked out only tools equipped with editing features, but all of those tools are simple enough to be interpreted.
Final Thoughts – Paint.NET Alternatives for Mac!
In this guide, we have included some of the best Paint.NET alternatives for Mac in the market based on their cost, user experience, editing tools, interface, and image quality. We have also included a list of all the features we kept in mind while making our list of the best Paint.NET alternatives for you.
Undoubtedly, Paint.NET is an exceptional editing tool, and it’s hard to replace it with some other tool in the market, but being a Mac user, that’s the only option you are left with.
But don’t worry; we have put our sweat and blood into making this list and are hopeful that you will be able to find your next favorite editing tool from this list. Don’t forget to share your experience with these tools with us in the comments section below.
Also, before making any final decision, we recommend you check out all these apps, consider your requirements and needs and finalize one at the end. We hope you find the best fit for you.
Thanks for staying tuned till the end.