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Comparison

Penpot vs Adobe

Penpot and Adobe both land on Depends.

Penpot

penpot.app

Depends
Confidence: Medium

Buy if you want a free or self-hosted design tool and can accept rougher edges than Figma.

Read the full report

Adobe

adobe.com

Depends
Confidence: Medium

Buy it if you're a professional creative, enterprise marketer, or docs-heavy team that needs the industry standard daily . the cost is the price of doing business.

Read the full report

Penpot versus Adobe
ComparePenpotAdobe
VerdictDependsDepends
Best forStartups dodging per-seat design billsProfessional designers and photographers
Who it's not forTeams already fluent in FigmaCasual users who edit a few files a month
PrivacyActive 2026 CVE record . including a critical MCP remote code execution . though the vendor publishes a security whitepaper and supports self-hosting.10Actively targeted: 2026 Acrobat zero-day exploited in the wild (now patched); 2013 breach exposed 153M accounts; 2026 BPO breach reportedly exposed 13M records.
Support qualityNo support evidence foundComplaints about cancellation friction and slow responses
Public sentimentUsers praise the free open-source model, but many say Penpot still trails Figma on polish.⁵Sentiment splits: professionals rate Adobe 4.5/5 on G2 and rely on it daily, while Reddit threads hammer pricing, cancellation, and AI quality.13
Biggest gotchaCommunity openly asks how long the free tier stays free; pricing may shiftFTC alleges hidden fees and early-termination charges trap subscribers into plans14

Pick Penpot when

  • Startups dodging per-seat design bills
  • Teams needing self-hosting or data control
  • Design-dev duos wanting open standards
  • Open-source-first orgs

When Penpot is not a fit

  • Teams already fluent in Figma
  • Anyone wanting Figma-level polish and plugin breadth
  • Security-sensitive orgs without staff to patch or self-host
  • Buyers wanting turnkey enterprise support

Pick Adobe when

  • Professional designers and photographers
  • Video and creative production teams
  • Enterprise marketing and analytics teams
  • Docs/PDF-heavy businesses

When Adobe is not a fit

  • Casual users who edit a few files a month
  • Anyone on a tight budget
  • Buyers who want perpetual licenses, not subscriptions
  • Teams that value an easy exit or migration

Sources

  1. Penpot review | TechRadartechradar.com
    review
  2. Penpot Reviews 2026 | G2g2.com
    review
  3. Penpot Reviews | SoftwareAdvicesoftwareadvice.com
    review
  4. Experience using Penpot | Redditreddit.com
    review
  5. I stopped using Figma and switched to Penpot | XDAxda-developers.com
    review
  6. Should you ditch Figma for open-source? | LogRocketblog.logrocket.com
    review
  7. Penpot Pricing | officialpenpot.app
    official
  8. Penpot draws up $12M | TechCrunchtechcrunch.com
    news
  9. Penpot Raises $8M Series A | BusinessWirebusinesswire.com
    news
  10. CVE-2026-45805 Penpot MCP RCE | SentinelOnesentinelone.com
    security
  11. CVE-2026-26202 | NVDnvd.nist.gov
    security
  12. Penpot MCP AI workflows | Smashing Magazinesmashingmagazine.com
    news
  13. Adobe Products | G2 Reviewsg2.com
    review
  14. FTC Takes Action Against Adobeftc.gov
    news
  15. Adobe fixes PDF zero-day exploited for months . TechCrunchtechcrunch.com
    security
  16. Adobe Data Breach . Have I Been Pwnedhaveibeenpwned.com
    security