Comparison
Krita vs GIMP: they're not competitors, and that's the whole answer
This argument has been running in forums for fifteen years without resolving, and the reason is that the question is malformed. GIMP is a photo editor. Krita is a painting application. People argue past each other because they're answering from different work. Once you know which job you have, the choice takes ten seconds — and since both are free, the honest answer is often both.
Short answer
Starting from a photo? GIMP. Starting from a blank canvas? Krita. That single distinction resolves almost every version of this question — and because both are free, installing both costs nothing but disk space.
Pick this if you start from a photo or an image
GIMP
Editing, retouching, compositing, resizing, colour correction, batch processing and a deep plugin ecosystem. If your work begins with a file that already exists — a photograph, a screenshot, a scan, a logo someone sent you — this is the one. Version 3.0 brought non-destructive layer effects and 3.2.4 arrived in April 2026.
Download GIMPPick this if you start from a blank canvas
Krita
Brush engines, stabilisers for shaky lines, a canvas you rotate and mirror instinctively, wrap-around mode for seamless textures, and frame-by-frame animation built in. If you're drawing or painting something that doesn't exist yet, this is the one, and it's better at that than Photoshop is.
Download KritaWhy this argument never ends
Search this and you'll find forum threads running to multiple pages, people insisting the answer is obvious and disagreeing completely. That happens because they're not answering the same question.
An illustrator who tried GIMP for painting found the brush engine frustrating and concluded Krita is better. A photographer who tried Krita for retouching found there was barely a retouching workflow and concluded GIMP is better. Both are right about their own work and neither has said anything useful about yours.
The distinction is genuinely this simple: GIMP starts from an image that already exists. Krita starts from an empty canvas. GIMP is a darkroom. Krita is a set of brushes. Asking which is better is like asking whether a screwdriver beats a hammer.
There's a second thing every forum thread misses, and it matters more than the comparison does: this is not an either/or. Both are free, both are GPL, neither costs anything, and they install side by side without conflict. A great many people who do both kinds of work simply have both, and reach for whichever suits the task. If you're agonising over the choice, you are solving a problem that only exists for paid software.
What each one is actually built for
Both are free and GPL-licensed, so price isn't a row. The pattern below is the whole point: they barely overlap.
| GIMP | Krita | |
|---|---|---|
| Photo retouching & healing | YesIts core purpose | NoNot what it's for |
| Brush engines & stabilisers | PartlyWorkable, basic | YesExceptional |
| Batch processing many files | YesScript-Fu, BIMP plugin | No |
| Frame-by-frame animation | No | YesTimeline + onion skinning |
| Canvas rotate, mirror, wrap-around | Partly | YesBuilt for drawing |
| Selections, masks, layers | Yes | Yes |
| Colour correction & curves | Yes | PartlyBasic |
| Seamless texture creation | PartlyPossible, fiddly | YesWrap-around mode |
| Plugin ecosystem | YesLarge, decades old | PartlySmaller, Python |
If both feel like too much program
A fair number of people asking this question don't want either — they want to crop a photo, add some text and get on with their day, and both of these are heavier than that. Two honest answers:
Photopea runs in a browser with nothing to install, has a near-Photoshop interface, and opens PSD files more faithfully than GIMP does. Free, ad-supported. For a one-off edit this is genuinely the fastest route.
Paint.NET is the middle ground on Windows: far simpler than GIMP, far more capable than Microsoft Paint, with layers and a decent plugin scene. One honest caveat, since this site is about open-source software — Paint.NET is freeware, not open source. Its source was closed years ago. It's free from paint.net and there's a $14.99 Microsoft Store version that is the same program, sold as a way to support development and get automatic updates.
Making game art? The top discussion on this question is from game developers, and there the answer really is both. Krita for concept art, character work and hand-painted textures; GIMP for photo-sourced textures, normal-map plugins, and batch-processing a folder of sprites. They cover different halves of the pipeline and cost nothing, so take both.
When the answer is neither
Half the frustration with free graphics software comes from using the wrong category of program. Four cases where neither of these is what you want:
- RAW files from a camera. Neither is a RAW developer. Editing a shoot means darktable or RawTherapee — both free, both built for exactly that, and both with a photo catalogue GIMP doesn't have.
- Logos, icons and anything that must scale. That's vector work, and both of these are pixel editors. Use Inkscape — free, and the standard answer.
- Multi-page documents, brochures, books. Page layout is its own category. Scribus is the free option; using an image editor for this will hurt.
- Commercial print work needing true CMYK. GIMP offers soft-proofing, not a full CMYK editing mode, and Krita's is partial. If a printer needs proper separations from you, this is where paid software still wins.
If your work is editing images or drawing them, though, these two cover it completely between them, for nothing.
Questions people actually ask
Which should a complete beginner learn first?
Whichever matches what you want to make, not whichever is “easier” — they're comparably steep and learning the wrong one wastes far more time than the difficulty difference.
Want to draw? Krita, and you'll be making marks within minutes because the defaults are sensible for drawing. Want to fix up photos? GIMP, and budget an evening for its interface conventions, which are genuinely different from what you may be used to.
If you truly don't know yet, install Krita first. It's more immediately rewarding, and GIMP will still be free next month.
Can I install both?
Yes, and a lot of people do. They're separate programs with no conflict, both free, both GPL. Neither will interfere with the other's file associations in a way you can't change.
This is worth saying plainly because the endless which-is-better arguments make it sound like a commitment. It isn't. There's no licence, no seat, no subscription and no cost — the only thing you spend is disk space.
Which is better for game art and textures?
Both, genuinely, and this is the one case where the answer is unambiguous.
Krita handles concept art, character design and hand-painted textures, and its wrap-around mode makes seamless tiling textures far easier than GIMP does. GIMP handles photo-sourced textures, normal-map generation via plugins, and batch-processing folders of sprites through Script-Fu.
They cover different halves of the same pipeline. Since both are free, take both.
Can Krita edit photos at all?
A little, but you shouldn't rely on it. Krita can open a photo, crop it, adjust levels and paint over it — enough for using a photo as reference or as part of a painting.
What it lacks is the retouching workflow: healing tools, clone-stamping over blemishes, perspective correction, batch processing. If your task is “make this photograph look better”, GIMP will do it faster and better, and it's equally free.
Is Krita free, and is it safe?
Free permanently under the GPL — no trial, no watermark, no account, no feature held back for a paid tier. GIMP is the same under GPL-3.0.
Both are safe from their official sources: krita.org and gimp.org. Krita is also legitimately sold on Steam and the Microsoft Store — identical software, sold as a way to fund development.
The real risk with either is download portals that repackage popular free software with adware attached, and several rank well for these names. Use the official sites.
Is either one a Photoshop replacement?
Between them they cover most of it, but each replaces a different half.
For photo editing, GIMP does nearly everything Photoshop does short of true CMYK, generative fill and smart objects. For painting, Krita is arguably better than Photoshop already.
We've written both of those comparisons out properly — they're linked below.