New ‘Designer’ app spotted in development for Windows 11

Here at Softonic, we get a lot of people looking to get their hands on the Adobe Photoshop design package. The powerful design suite is sought after for its powerful versatility and the sheer breadth of features it offers digital graphic designers. Well, it looks like Microsoft might be working on something that could help all of those Photoshop chasers, as a very interesting new app seems to be in the works.

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Well-known Microsoft informant, WalkingCat, has leaked details of a new web app called Microsoft Designer. In a recent tweet, they shared various screenshots of the secretive new program, taken directly from the web.

What WalkingCat reveals is something that looks like a mix between Photoshop, Microsoft Publisher and Canva. This includes various design templates as well as idea prompts and the ability to both Download and Post your creations, although the Post button looks a lot like a share button.

Interestingly, the WalkingCat screenshots also show a Sign Out button that looks a lot like the Sign Out button seen on other Office 365 apps. This could be nothing, but it could also mean that, as well as the web app there will also be a full Office version of Microsoft Designer in development too.

As previously mentioned, the web app WalkingCat has accessed is available on the web. The only problem is that it isn’t a simple exercise accessing it. The good news is they have given instructions if you want to give it a try:

“First go to https://designer.microsoft.com/?fgToggler=true , will display blank page, then open DevTools > Local Storage, find key “persist:featureGates”, change its value to this: https://pastebin.com/JRCtTypa , then Refresh the page”

Any official details about this new app are thin on the ground so there is still a lot to learn about it. As to whether this will be a Photoshop competitor or not, we are not sure. From the screenshots we can see, it looks like it will be more for lightweight design work rather than the heavy-hitting jobs you can do with Photoshop. If you would like to get your hands on a more fully-featured design suite without having to spend a lot of money, you should check out our favorite free alternatives to Photoshop.

Image via: Twitter