Adobe is reportedly developing a full-featured version of Photoshop for the iPad, part of a new strategy for increasing subscriber numbers by offering multi-device versions of its most popular software products.
Adobe is said to be planning to debut the new app at October’s Adobe Max event in Los Angeles, with availability set for sometime in 2019. “My aspiration is to get these on the market as soon as possible,” Adobe’s Scott Belsky told Bloomberg.
The Bloomberg report said other Creative Cloud apps will be in line to make the iPad transition, but cited only Illustrator as being in development. Adobe is currently beta-testing Project Rush, a cross-platform mobile/desktop app for editing and sharing video online that incorporates technology from Premiere Pro.
Photoshop for iPad would be a boon for Apple in its rivalry with Microsoft, whose Surface tablets running Windows have been a Photoshop platform since they launched. Adobe has long resisted making powerful versions of its desktop software available for iOS, but competitors like Affinity, maker of the popular Affinity Photo and just-launched Affinity Designer apps, have proven that newer versions of the iPad and iPad Pro are capable of running such an app.
