Beginners can start out with the novice view – an uncluttered, simplified window with easy access to auto fix settings for lighting, colours and enhancements adjustments such as brightness, contrast, colour saturation, sharpen, blur, gamma, and more and deformations such as ripples, spin, wave, zigzag, and underwater. This program gives you a choice of two separate interfaces. Just be careful to download the free program from the website – if you get it from the Windows app store it’s $10.45. It has a range of brushes for you to get creative with, but you can also adjust the sharpness, contrast and brightness of photos, as well as select from pre-made effects such as oil painting, sepia and ink sketch, among others.

Like more advanced programs, you can still make layers, image adjustments and download user-created plugins, but its features are limited enough that you won’t be left wondering where to even begin. is a super-simple alternative to Photoshop. Create a design is useful for professionals, students, event invitations, personal greeting cards or any other polished design work you might need. Create a collage has a large range of collage layouts, a large number of which are free. You can also add beauty effects such as blush, wrinkle remover, teeth whitening and blemish fix.

Edit a photo is a simplified interface with basic editing such as colour adjustments, vignettes, cropping, rotation and more. Fotor is a free web app, though you can pay $58 per year to unlock paid features and get rid of banner ads. The homepage asks you to choose between editing a photo, making a collage or creating a design.

Image editing software free