Canva is undeniably one of the top design tools out there, and it is known for its accessibility to professional-looking templates and design elements. It's the go-to for many, from casual users to small business owners. However, despite its popularity, I prefer Picsart.

While Canva is great for structured, polished designs, Picsart offers more creative freedom and fun features that make designing more engaging. It might not be as widely recognized as Canva, but for those who value artistic expression in their designs, Picsart is the better option. Here's why.

6 Stickers

Picsart has superior Sticker options

Canva has Stickers (and Graphics), but they're quite boring compared to Picsart's Sticker collection. Stickers have always been a top-selling point of Picsart, and the Picsart community creates them, so the options are simply more extensive and unique.

Looking at the Canva and Picsart Sticker offerings side-by-side, Picsart outdoes itself. When I open a project in Picsart, the Sticker library presents me with a whopping 42 categories, and each of them has hundreds to thousands of options. Canva gives me eight categories, and they're very underwhelming (such as arrows, confetti, and shape stickers).

I can also search for anything I want in the Picsart Sticker section, giving me every option I can think of. About half of them are usually for Picsart Plus members only, but there are still plenty of free options you can use.

5 Grids

Canva's Grids are boring

If you've ever tried creating a photo collage in Canva, you've probably noticed that its Grid options are pretty basic. The layouts are neat and structured, which is great for professional use but lacks creativity. Canva actually doesn't have a single grid with a diagonal or curved line; they're all rectangular.

Picsart, on the other hand, offers more dynamic collage grids using all sorts of shapes and artistic arrangements. There are mosaic-style grids, brick layouts, hearts, and even letters. Picsart also categorizes the grids by number. For example, "2 Grids", "3 Grids", "10 Grids", etc.

So, if you're creating a mood board, aesthetic collage, or scrapbook-style post, Picsart's Grids is a much better option.

4 Shapes

Picsart's Shapes are plentiful and unique

Shapes might not seem like a big deal until you need them for your designs. Canva provides a limited number of basic shapes such as circles, squares, and triangles — the star and cloud are about as artistic as it gets.

Picsart gives you a much broader selection. There's a shape for pretty much every object you can think of, including bubbles, frames, flowers, and even battery icons. There are also line art shapes in one section, but those can only be used by Plus members.

I do appreciate Canva's Corner Rounder feature, which lets you control the sharpness of a shape's corners. But that still doesn't compete with Picsart's sheer variety of shapes.

3 Drawing

Picsart has better brush options for drawing

If you like adding a hand-drawn touch to your designs, Picsart is the clear winner. It offers nine different brush styles, each with up to nine customization settings, including Scatter, Squish, and Jitter. These options are more than enough for the hobbyist artist to create fully fledged drawings.

Canva's drawing options pale in comparison. There are three brushes; the only things you can adjust are size, opacity, and color. Markup on my iPhone has more options than that.

2 Resize

You can resize your design as you edit in Picsart

Canva lets you choose a custom size for your design when you create the project, but you can't change the size of the design once it's created — not for free, at least. To change the size after the fact, you'll need to use Magic Resize, which is a Magic Studio feature available to Canva Pro users. This is quite a frustrating limitation because you're stuck with the dimensions you chose initially.

Picsart lets you resize your design at any time during the editing process, and you don't need a Plus subscription to do it. Granted, some of the preset dimensions might stretch your image or design elements, but you can easily stretch them back to how they were by clicking on them and moving the little white dots.

1 Filters and effects

Canva's filters don't hold a candle to Picsart's

If you want to enhance your photos with effects and filters, Picsart leaves Canva in the dust. While Canva does offer 50 filters and five effects, they're pretty basic — with the Color Pop and Vintage sections being the only interesting ones.

Picsart's filters and effects are one of the reasons it's my favorite photo editor. There are over 600 to choose from, and they're all categorized into sections like Simple, Colors, Artistic, and Cartoon. The Black & White section alone has 16 options. On top of that, every effect comes with its own set of customizations, such as Fade and Blend Mode.

Picsart is more than just a Canva alternative

Canva may be the more popular design tool, but that doesn't mean it's best for everyone. While it excels in ease of use and sleek templates, Picsart outshines it when it comes to creativity and customization. From Stickers and dynamic Grids to better brushes and advanced effects, Picsart provides a much more engaging experience for those who love experimenting with their designs.