Apple to acquire Pixelmator, creators of popular image editing software

Apple has agreed to acquire Pixelmator, the creators of popular professional image editing apps Pixelmator Pro and photo editing software Photomator.

In a blog post, the Pixelmator team announced its sale (subject to regulatory approval), and assured its customers that, “There will be no material changes to the Pixelmator Pro, Pixelmator for iOS, and Photomator apps at this time.” Of course, that was followed by, “Stay tuned for exciting updates to come,” so we can obviously expect some changes once the deal goes through and Apple has something specific to announce.

Pixelmator Pro is a popular professional image editing app that is often spoken of as an alternative to Photoshop, especially for those on a tighter budget (Pixelmator Pro is a one-time purchase of $49.99 in the App Store). It has only been available for the Mac and uses a lot of Mac-specific technologies to improve performance. There is also an iOS companion app.

It is unclear what Apple will do with the acquisition. If we had to guess, we would say that Apple will continue to develop the app, offering it as a third pro-level software offering alongside Logic Pro and Final Cut Pro. Pixelmator’s photo-editing app, Photomator, may find some of its features wrapped up into the editing interface for the Photos app, but Apple seemingly has little need for a separate consumer photo editing app of that nature.