Procreate — A digital painting app for iPad and iPhone sold as a one-time purchase ($12.99 for iPad, $5.99 for the iPhone version Procreate Pocket) with no subscription and free lifetime updates.
By Noahlast updated pricing verified
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Procreate in 20 seconds
Best for: digital artists on iPad who want professional brush and layer tools without a recurring software subscription
Pricing: $12.99 one-time purchase for iPad (Procreate Pocket for iPhone is $5.99, Procreate Dreams for animation is $19.99, each sold separately); no subscription, no free tier.
- Procreate for iPad costs $12.99 as a one-time purchase with no subscription and free lifetime updates.
- Procreate Pocket (iPhone) costs $5.99 and Procreate Dreams (animation) costs $19.99, each sold as a separate one-time purchase.
- Procreate holds a 4.8/5 rating from 130 reviews on Capterra and roughly 4.4/5 across about 50,000 App Store ratings.
- Procreate runs only on iPadOS 16.3+ and iOS; there is no Windows, macOS, Android, or web version.
- Procreate has been the top-selling paid iPad app on the App Store for multiple consecutive years and has won multiple Apple Design Awards.
Limitations: iPad and iPhone only — no Windows, macOS, Android, or web version.; No built-in cloud sync or real-time multi-user collaboration.; Pocket and Dreams are separate purchases, not unlocked by owning the main app.
Top alternatives: Adobe Fresco, Clip Studio Paint, Autodesk Sketchbook, Krita, Infinite Painter — full list
What is Procreate?
Procreate is a digital painting and illustration app built specifically for iPad (and, as a separate app, iPhone), offering a physically-simulated brush engine, layers, and touch/Apple Pencil gestures aimed at replicating a traditional sketchbook-to-canvas workflow. Unlike most modern creative software, Procreate is sold as a single $12.99 purchase with no subscription: buying it once includes all future updates. The company, Savage Interactive, extends the same one-time-purchase model to its other apps — Procreate Pocket ($5.99) brings a scaled-down version to iPhone, and Procreate Dreams ($19.99) is a separate animation tool for frame-by-frame and procedural motion work — but none of the three purchases unlock the others. Procreate has won multiple Apple Design Awards and is positioned as the default choice for iPad-based digital artists who want professional brush and layer tools without Adobe's subscription pricing; its tradeoff is a hard dependency on Apple hardware, since there is no Windows, Android, or web version.
Procreate is a raster-based digital painting and illustration app made by the Australian studio Savage Interactive, sold exclusively on Apple's App Store for $12.99 as a single purchase with no subscription and no in-app purchases. The app has been the top-selling paid iPad app on the App Store for multiple years running, and holds a 4.4/5 rating across roughly 50,000 App Store ratings and 4.8/5 from 130 reviews on Capterra. Savage Interactive also sells Procreate Pocket for iPhone at $5.99 and Procreate Dreams, a separate animation app, at $19.99, each as its own one-time purchase rather than an upgrade bundled with the main app. Procreate runs only on iPadOS and iOS — there is no Windows, macOS, Android, or web version — which locks users into Apple hardware but avoids the recurring subscription fees charged by Adobe's iPad apps.
Standout feature: A $12.99 one-time purchase that includes every future update with no subscription, paired with a physically-simulated brush engine and over 200 customizable brushes.
Biggest weakness: Procreate runs only on iPad and iPhone; there is no Windows, macOS, Android, or web version, and the app has no built-in cloud sync or real-time multi-user collaboration.
Pros
- One-time $12.99 purchase with no subscription and free lifetime updates.
- Deep, physically-simulated brush engine with over 200 customizable brushes.
- Consistently rated the top-selling paid iPad app on the App Store for multiple years running.
- 4.8/5 rating from 130 Capterra reviews and roughly 4.4/5 across 50,000 App Store ratings.
Cons
- iPad and iPhone only — no Windows, macOS, Android, or web version.
- No built-in cloud sync or real-time collaboration; sharing files relies on manual export.
- Procreate Pocket (iPhone) and Procreate Dreams (animation) are separate paid apps, not included with the main purchase.
- No desktop tablet support, so artists without an iPad cannot use the software at all.
Procreate pricing
From $5.99 one-time · verified from the vendor's pricing page
| Plan | Price | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Procreate (iPad) | $12.99 once | One-time purchase, all future updates included; requires iPadOS 16.3 or later. |
| Procreate Pocket (iPhone) | $5.99 once | Separate one-time purchase for the iPhone version; not included with the iPad app. |
| Procreate Dreams | $19.99 once | Separate animation app for frame-by-frame and procedural motion, sold independently of Procreate and Procreate Pocket. |
What reviewers say
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