SketchWow vs Canva

We get this question a lot. SketchWow versus Canva? Is SketchWow a Canva alternative? It really depends on your needs. We have many customers who use both. Canva is great and has its use case.

How is SketchWow different than Canva?

• "Canva does it all". True. Canva gives you a million choices (this can be overwhelming at times)

  Not an issue with SW as we focus on doing a few things extremely well and don't clutter our software with features you'll rarely (if ever) use, like creating birthday invitations, parade banners, chore charts, business cards, full websites, etc.

• "Canva gives me so many choices". Maybe too many at times? This is like a buffet (lots of choices) versus a nice steakhouse (limited menu, but easy to get exactly what you want). All the icons/graphics and templates in Canva are a mish-mash of everything — 5000 designers who create 1000 different styles, look/feel, themes, color schemes. This can make it difficult to match when you want to customize a template and find one simple "cat" icon. Not 53 in neon colors.

  SketchWow provides a specific set of consistent (hand drawn style) graphic elements and templates that makes it easy to customize anything. Also, you can copy/paste between designs and everything still looks great and well put together.

  
  

• Speed: Need to slice bread? You wouldn't use a chainsaw, right? Sometimes a feature-heavy app like Canva is the wrong tool for a simple job. Example: Need to whip up a quick animated workflow, mindmap or visual? Canva is not designed to rapidly map out your thoughts, solution or process into a simple diagram.

  SketchWow is all about simplicity. It's easy to create straight-forward, highly-engaging visuals, workflows or interesting graphics to use in your presentation, blog, website and more

  
  

• Canva is used by 110 million people. As a result, nothing you create is really that unique. Nor does it cut-through-the-clutter like a hot-knife-through-butter. SketchWow designs do! They are engaging by nature due to the hand drawn appeal.

  
  

• What about using AI? Last we checked, Canva AI requires a ChatGPT Plus subscription ($240/year. ouch). Boo.

  SketchWow AI does not require any monthly subscriptions at all. Also, SketchWow makes amazing AI-powered mindmaps and workflows too! Not only AI visuals and infographics.

"But... Canva is free"

Everyone knows that all the best icons, images, templates and features are locked behind a pay-wall. Nothing is really "free" these days. There's always a catch.

Why Choose SketchWow?

We're all about simplicity. We let those other guys focus on making "perfect" looking designs. We focus on helping you create designs and animated content with added personality — using a unique, hand-drawn look and feel. These design really stand out amongst a sea of similar Canva designs that you see everywhere. That's what our customers tell us.

Here's an animated visual (all created using SketchWow of course) to illustrate this...

Another example of a quick animated visual using the Pan-Zom-Wow feature included in SketchWow...

Here at SketchWow, we take a more minimalist approach... so you can create clear, casual visuals without drowning in too many options. Plus, SketchWow visuals really POP using a nifty "sketchy" look that adds personality and pizzaz (not pizzas. We wish!) to your visuals.

Hand drawn style visuals (and animated visuals like you see above) is where SketchWow really shines. Canva is not specifically designed to create designs with a hand drawn look or sketch effect.

If you like the look of these hand drawn style visuals, then you should give SketchWow a try.

Bonus: You can copy/paste any of your snazzy SketchWow designs right into Canva if you want to.

Hope this helps!