Adobe Photoshop barely needs an introduction – its become so popular and so ubiquitous, its name has become synonymous with graphics editing in the same way Google has become a generic term for searching the web.
But as well as allowing you to manually create and edit stunning images, Adobe Photoshop has also embraced artificial intelligence, serving up a host of features that make using it so much faster and easier.
Functions that would take a while to learn and master are just a click or prompt away so let’s take a look at what it’s capable of.
This article was correct as of March 2025. AI tools are updated regularly and it is possible that some features have changed since this article was written. Some features may also only be available in certain countries.
What is Adobe Photoshop?
Adobe Photoshop is a raster image editor that first saw the light of day in 1990. When it was released, it surpassed or replaced the likes of PixelPaint and Deluxe Paint as an artists’ favorite app and, by the mid-2000s, it had become a household name – today pretty much everyone knows what it means “to photoshop” an image.
Over the years, it has evolved greatly and, while rivals still threaten its position as the best photo editor, it has managed to stay ahead of the curve. Adobe Firefly, a generative machine learning text-to-image model was released in 2023 and it’s been integrated into Photoshop. Trained on images from its own stock image site as well as openly licensed and public domain content, it makes light work of key tasks.
It’s also possible to produce voice agents which are capable of understanding, interpreting and responding to real humans. The AI agents are capable of having conversations with real people and carry out tasks or answer questions.
With the ability to clone voices – both your own and those of others – this opens up a whole range of possibilities but not all of them are particularly wholesome.
What can you use Adobe Photoshop for?
There are lots of generative AI features within Adobe Photoshop and chief among them is Generative Fill which allows content to be added and removed from images using text prompts. You simply select an area you wish to alter, access Generative Fill and type a description of what you want before choosing from the variations. You can upload an image as well to aid the prompt process.
AI will also take elements of an image and use it to expand a photo – adding more road to a photo, for instance. It can also be used to remove or swap out backgrounds and remove clutter such as wires, unwanted people, litter and so on. Rather than spend time creating assets from scratch, you can ask for them to be created by AI in a desired style.
It’s also great at smoothing skin, adding color to black-and-white images, changing the sky, resizing images without altering the details, matching fonts and so much more. You don’t need to be an expert user of Photoshop to edit like a pro.
What can’t you use Adobe Photoshop for?
The AI features are not designed to create entire images from a prompt. It’s geared more towards making alterations to existing images and enabling you to edit your creations. You can’t go over the top with the addition of elements either because, when adding more assets, you can find consistency takes a hit. In short, you can’t just expect Adobe Photoshop to do all of the work for you.
How much does Adobe Photoshop cost?
Adobe Photoshop costs $22.99 / £21.98 / AU$53.99 a month if you take out an annual subscription, and this includes Photoshop, Adobe Fresco, Photoshop Express, Adobe Express and Adobe Firefly as well as cloud storage, access to libraries, generative credits and tutorials.
If you’re paying month-by-month with the ability to cancel at any time, it will cost you $34.49 / £32.98 / AU$35.99 a month and if you pay for a year upfront, that’ll set you back $263.88 / £262.51 / AU$419.89. It’s worth learning more about plans and pricing because there are other packages including Creative Cloud, which includes all Adobe apps.
Where can you use Adobe Photoshop?
You can use Adobe Photoshop as a desktop app for Windows and macOS. It’s also available for the iPad and iPhone and on Android devices – although these don’t offer the full desktop experience and the smartphone options are more limited.
The web version of Photoshop is reasonably comprehensive, however, and it lets you use AI features. It means you can edit your creations on any computer.
Is Adobe Photoshop any good?
Adobe Photoshop is a superb graphics editing app and it continues to add new AI features. TechRadar has found the AI to be seriously impressive when fixing old photos, allowing fixes and colorization with a single click. We’ve also long said that the AI improvements offered by Adobe’s Firefly Image Model 3 cement Photoshop’s grip on the top slot.
The generated images are realistic and you have enhanced control over detail and composition and while some textures are smudged and it can struggle with reflections, you have to look very close before you can tell that AI has been involved. There is great consistency within images.
Use Adobe Photoshop if…
You want to power-up your editing skills or don’t really have much experience editing images.
You want to use AI to help create perfect images while also benefiting from the tools of a powerful package.
You have some old photos that you want to restore – it’ll do so like magic.
Don’t use Adobe Photoshop if…
You only have limited or specific photo editing needs and feel Photoshop could easily overwhelm.
You want to produce entire images from scratch and have AI handle everything.
You want to create AI-generated videos. This is about producing images.
Also consider
Canva is an online AI image editor that is great for making complex edits simple.
Ideogram offers a simple way to produce images that works particularly well with text.