Adobe has retired the Creative Suite series; CS6 is the final version. There will be no CS7. Adobe has replaced the CS series with the Creative Cloud. Adobe will support and sell CS6 for the foreseeable future but no updates will be released.
Creative Cloud apps and their latest upgrades
Creative Cloud Market
Creative Cloud subscribers now have access to a collection of high-quality, curated assets for creatives by creatives — vector graphics, icons, patterns, UI Kits, for-placement images, wireframes, charts, backgrounds, brushes and more from your Creative Cloud Desktop app—all part of your subscription to Creative Cloud.
Creative Cloud Market Details – getting started (help page)
Online, free tutorials
Get started learning the Creative Cloud apps with these free online tutorials that create a quick, entry-level project.
All new versions of CS programs – and other apps not in the CS series (such as Lightroom, Muse, Edge and others) are available in the Creative Cloud. The most obvious difference between CS and CC is that the Creative Suite had a new release roughly every 18 months, which meant customers had to invest a significant amount of money to buy (or possibly upgrade). The Creative Cloud is subscription based – there is a monthly payment (some promotional discounts may require a yearly payment initially).
Overview/advantages of Creative Cloud:
- instead of waiting roughly 18 months for the release of new features (the CS development cycle), new features are released as they are ready. Advantage: more frequent updates and fewer changes at one time – less to learn
- CC members can download the desired apps (Photoshop, Illustrator, Dreamweaver, Lightroom, Premier Pro, etc.) to 2 computers (same as CS)… and one can be a PC and the other can be a Mac.
- CC subscriptions include
- 20 GB of cloud storage – easy to share and sync files from home and work or with team members, even if they aren’t CC subscribers
- access to Behance – collaborate and get feedback with your Behance group or the Behance community, create your portfolio and more
- internet connection required to download apps and then occasionally to verify the license
- subscribe to the full suite, just one app or as needed (if you only have occasional need for the apps)
- with full suite subscription, can learn to use new apps and increase your skills and marketability
- business owners: instead of amortizing software purchase over 3 years, the subscription is a monthly business expense
- if you cancel you still have your documents; features new to CC are not editable in older CS versions of apps
Attention Photographers:
Photographers who stay with Creative Suite version of Photoshop be aware: eventually new cameras will have new versions of Adobe Camera Raw software that the older CS Photoshop may not be able to open or edit.
Adobe Creative Cloud Home Page
- New features in Creative Cloud apps
- New features in Photoshop (Photoshop Help)
- New features in Illustrator (Illustrator Help)
- New features in Dreamweaver (Dreamweaver help)
- New features in InDesign (InDesign help)
- New features in Audition (Audition help)
- New features in Muse (Muse help)
- New features in Flash Professional (Flash help)
- New features in Prelude (Prelude help)
- New features in Speedgrade (Speedgrade help)
