> ## Content Index > Fetch the complete content index at: https://efreedirectory.com/llms.txt > Use this file to discover other available public pages before exploring further. # Photopea Is Free Because Ads Pay For It. That Is the Whole Limit. - URL: https://efreedirectory.com/photopea-free-plan-limits/ - Published: 2026-10-20T04:12:00.000Z - Updated: 2026-10-20T06:58:04.000Z - Description: Almost every free tier in design takes something away. Photopea takes nothing and shows you an advert instead, which is a different kind of price. - Author: Alpesh Gevariya - Tags: tool, Design & Graphics **Photopea's free tier includes every editing feature with no watermark, no account and no export restriction. It opens and saves PSD files with layers, masks and smart objects intact, across more than 40 formats. What the free plan costs you is three things nobody lists as features: side-panel ads, 0.5 GB of PeaDrive storage, and roughly one AI action per day.**[1](#sources) This is the rarest shape of free tier in design software. Canva withholds transparent PNG. Figma withholds Dev Mode. Adobe Express withholds the brand kit. Photopea withholds nothing you need to do the work. Premium is $5 a month and it does not add a single editing capability. That is the clearest possible description of what the free plan actually is. ## What free includes, which is everything | | Free | Premium, $5/month | | -------------------------------- | ----------------------- | ----------------- | | Layers, masks, blend modes | Yes | Yes | | Smart objects, adjustment layers | Yes | Yes | | PSD open and save | Yes, layers intact | Yes | | File formats | 40 or more | Same | | RAW support | Yes | Same | | Vector editing | Yes | Same | | Exports | Unlimited, no watermark | Same | | Account required | No | Yes | | Ads | Yes, beside the canvas | None | | Undo history | Shorter | Doubled | | PeaDrive storage | 0.5 GB | 5 GB | | AI actions | About one a day | Credits included | ## The three things the free plan does limit **Ads.** A panel sits beside the canvas. It is fine for a ten-minute job and wearing across a two-hour retouch, and it takes screen space you would rather give to a large image. Photopea reports that ads occupy a meaningful share of the window. **Half a gigabyte of PeaDrive.** This is Photopea's own cloud storage, and it is small. It is also entirely avoidable: work from local files, or connect Google Drive, Dropbox or OneDrive, and the limit never applies. **About one AI action a day.** This is the one genuine functional limit, and it matters because the AI background remover lives here. The free answer to Canva's paywalled background remover is itself rationed to roughly a daily use. ## The ad blocker problem Photopea detects ad blockers and restricts access when one is found. That is unusual and worth knowing before you install one and assume the ads are solved. The honest framing is that the ads are the payment. Photopea has been free for over a decade on this model, and the $5 tier exists to remove them rather than to sell you capability. ## Where the practical ceiling actually sits Not in the plan. In the browser. A very large PSD pushes against available memory, and a 2 GB file is genuinely better handled by a native application than by a tab. On a modern machine with a moderate file, that never comes up. On a low-spec laptop with a layered print file, it will. Photopea also cannot be self-hosted, so the browser dependency is permanent rather than a plan restriction you can pay past. ## Free versus $5, decided honestly If the editor is open two hours a day, $5 to reclaim the sidebar is easy arithmetic. If you open it twice a month to fix a client's PSD, the free tier costs nothing but patience. There is no middle tier and no enterprise quote, which makes this one of the few pricing pages you can read in ten seconds. ## How it compares to the alternatives [Canva Free](https://efreedirectory.com/canva-free-plan-limits/) is better at producing something quickly and worse at letting you keep it, since transparent PNG, SVG and CMYK export all require Pro. Photopea is the reverse: slower to start, and everything exports. [Figma Starter](https://efreedirectory.com/figma-starter-free-plan-limits/) is for interface work and collaboration, not raster editing. It limits you to three files and thirty days of history, which is a different constraint entirely. For opening a Photoshop file that someone sent you, on a machine that has no Photoshop, nothing else on this list is close. ## Frequently asked questions **Is Photopea really free?** Yes. Every editing feature is free with no watermark, no account and no export limit. The free tier is funded by ads. **Can Photopea open PSD files for free?** Yes, with layers, masks, blend modes and smart objects intact. It also opens Sketch, XD, XCF and RAW files. **What does Photopea Premium add?** Ad removal, doubled undo history, 5 GB of PeaDrive and AI credits. It adds no editing features, because none are locked. **Is there a watermark on free exports?** No. Exports are clean on the free tier. **Can I use an ad blocker with Photopea?** No. Photopea detects ad blockers and restricts access. The $5 tier is the supported way to remove ads. *Free-tier limits verified against photopea.com and third-party testing on 20 October 2026\. Photopea does not publish a standalone pricing page; Premium is offered inside the app under Account.* ## Sources 1. Photopea: [www.photopea.com](https://www.photopea.com/?ref=efreedirectory.com). Used for: Free browser editor and the ad-supported model. *All sources are the vendor's own plan or documentation pages, checked on 20 October 2026\. Plan terms change without notice, so confirm current limits before you rely on them.*