Adobe Fresco and Procreate are two popular tools with people who want to create art on the go, but which is better?

More artists are flocking to creating art on the go with apps for their phones or tablets. With so much choice, how can you decide which apps to use? Both Adobe Fresco and Procreate have options for the iPad, along with other ways to use the tools.

We’ll show you what else each program can offer and answer the question: which is better, Adobe Fresco or Procreate?

Procreate and Fresco are known mostly as tablet drawing apps, but there are other available platforms. They are largely competing with each other, but each has individual options that the other doesn't offer.

Procreate is an iPad-only drawing app. It isn’t available for other tablets, which means it harnesses a lot of abilities from the iPad’s technological advances—including the Valkaryie engine power.

Procreate will work on iPads running iPadOS 14.4 or later, and you can use either the 1st Generation Apple Pencil or the 2nd Generation Apple Pencil, depending on which your iPad is compatible with.

Procreate also offers Procreate Pocket designed for iPhones. Procreate Pocket is slightly different from Procreate due to screen real estate space, but it largely boasts most of the same features. Procreate Pocket cannot be used with an Apple Pencil since the pencil is not yet compatible with the iPhone.

If you own an Android, there are some great alternatives to Procreate for Android that you can check out.

Adobe Fresco is a drawing app available for iPad and iPhones running iOS14 or later, Microsoft Surface Pro, as well as Windows desktops running Windows 11 version 22000 or later or Windows 10 version 1903 or later.

You can also use the Apple Pencil with Fresco on the iPad app or use another stylus with the Microsoft Surface Pro. And although you can download Fresco for Windows desktops, you cannot download it on Apple computers.

Unfortunately, Fresco isn’t available for Android or other types of tablets. But you can use Adobe Fresco with some Wacom drawing tablets, such as Wacom Intuis and Wacom MobileStudio Pro, alongside your Windows desktop.

Both apps are affordable, but they each offer different options within their prices. They may be similar in what they offer, but their price ranges start at different amounts.

You can purchase Procreate’s iPad app for a one-time cost of $9.99. There are no premium upgrades and no subscription options.

Procreate Pocket is, again, available as a one-time purchase for just $4.99.

There is, unfortunately, no free trial for either Procreate app. However, the app offers a lot for a very reasonable price.

Download: Procreate Pocket for iOS ($4.99)

You can download and use Adobe Fresco for free from the App Store or directly from Adobe. Alongside the free version of Fresco, there is also a premium version available.

Adobe Fresco premium costs $9.99 per month and offers 100GB storage, a larger brush library, and increased font options. Fresco Premium also entitles you to Photoshop for the iPad within the same purchase.

If you have an all apps Creative Cloud account, Adobe Design Mobile Bundle plan, or an Adobe Photoshop Single Plan, Adobe Fresco premium is included with it. If you download Fresco for Windows, the Creative Cloud app will also be downloaded automatically, even if you only get the free version.

Download: Adobe Fresco for iOS or iPadOS (Free, subscription for $9.99/month, 30-day free trial available)

Download: Adobe Fresco for Windows (Free, subscription for $9.99/month, 30-day free trial available)

Both Procreate and Fresco offer a great option for creating digital art, including drawing and animation. You can access brushes and adjustment tools in both. Which one is best for what you need to do in it?

Procreate exists as a drawing tool; however, due to its myriad brushes and its 3D features, there are many more options than just drawing.

You can sketch using a variety of sketching tools, and by building layers and using heavier brushes and colors, you can easily go from an initial sketch to a beautifully-finished digital painting.

Using the Animation Assist option, you can create animations in Procreate. You can also create time-lapse video playback of your drawing from start to finish.

Procreate also offers 3D assets and the ability to edit and adapt them with paint and texture. You can import 3D assets from other platforms, although you can’t yet create in 3D using Procreate itself.

Adobe Fresco is not a replacement for Photoshop, Illustrator, or any specific Adobe programs. Instead, it includes many aspects of everything in one easy-to-use app. Primarily, it is a drawing and painting app with the power of Photoshop and knowledge of Adobe’s creative history. We wrote a beginner's guide to Fresco, so you can see more of what it offers.

You can use your drawings to create animations with Fresco using motion paths and frame-by-frame techniques. Fresco allows you to experiment in the app and save large animation files in the cloud, so your local storage doesn’t get overwhelmed.

Fresco’s vector brushes allow for easy scaling and editing without compromising quality, but it also offers pixel-based brushes to allow for textures like watercolor paint and smudge tools.

Cloud storage is popular, but not every app offers internal cloud storage. Find out which app is best for storage, or which helps mitigate the risk of losing your artwork.

When you get the Procreate app, there is no account for you to save your files or history. Procreate automatically saves anything you’ve opened or created within the app onto its homepage, which appears when you open the app. So, it's easy to reopen a file.

Unfortunately, the storage levels are only as large as your iPad’s available storage. And if you delete the app, you will lose any work in the library, as the files are only saved while the app is downloaded. Procreate does not offer external cloud storage.

Fresco uses Adobe’s Creative Cloud for cloud storage. When you download the free Adobe Fresco app, you are entitled to 3GB of cloud storage for your art. If you purchase Adobe Fresco Premium, your storage amount expands to 100GB of cloud storage, supplied by Creative Cloud.

Due to using external cloud storage, it’s hard to lose any work. This means you can delete the app or access your account from other devices, and your work is still available and saved safely in the cloud. You can easily find your Fresco files under the Your Files tab or through the cloud.

You can download and create brushes to use in both Procreate and Fresco. Fresco brings all the creativity from Adobe, but Procreate has some great customization options for brushes.

Procreate’s brush library boasts over 200 brushes. It is easy to adapt existing brushes if you just want to tweak a small aspect.

You can also easily create brushes in Procreate. But if you don't want to create them yourself, there are plenty of externally available brushes—and it's easy to download and import Procreate brushes.

Procreate’s standard brushes offer countless textures and materials, from HD pencils for initial sketches to calligraphy paint brushes and even textures like halftone or polka dot for decoration.

Adobe’s creative power has combined in the best way to offer many types of brushes in Adobe Fresco. You can have raster-based brushes like those in Photoshop and vector-based brushes similar to Illustrator. You don’t have to decide between them, as they are both offered in Fresco.

The raster brushes can be layered and combined easily with other brushes, including their textures and colors to make realistic paint strokes. Fresco also offers live brushes that react in the same way as the texture would in traditional art, such as adding water mixing to watercolor brushes or smudging colors with oil paints. You’ll forget you’re even using a digital app when painting in Fresco.

Fresco holds a large brush library, even for the free version. If you subscribe to premium Fresco, you’ll have access to thousands more brushes. You can also import brushes from Creative Cloud assets or download them from brush libraries online.

Adobe Fresco and Procreate give you the tools to create great digital art on the go. Both have similar interfaces and purposes; while Fresco can offer more platform options,

Procreate has more of a focused Apple compatibility. But if you don't like its pricing, Fresco is your best option as its free version still packs a punch. And of course, you'd need to use Fresco if you don't have an iPad.

Ruby is a writer in MUO’s Creative category, focusing on writing about design software. Having worked as a designer, illustrator, and photographer, Ruby also has a BA in Graphic Communication and an MA in English with Creative Writing.

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