Canva has unveiled its most ambitious AI update yet, rolling out a Creative Operating System, a design-specific LLM, and new automation tools designed to streamline end-to-end creative workflows.
The launch marks a clear step toward the enterprise market – and has sparked a familiar industry anxiety: if the tools get this powerful, what happens to creative jobs?
According to Canva, the answer is not replacement. It is acceleration. Or as Kristine Segrist, Head of Consumer Marketing at Canva, told Mediaweek, “the more we talk about AI, the more I’m reminded that it’s still people at the heart that makes everything creative, that gives a spark, that becomes the catalyst for great things.”
AI in the driver’s seat, humans still steering
The company – valued at $64 billion and heading toward an eventual IPO – continues to scale fast, with 260 million monthly users, with The Australian reporting its annual recurring revenue projected to hit $4 billion.
Its new tool suite folds in video production, email creation, and Canva Grow for advertising, while Affinity – acquired in 2024 – becomes permanently free.
For agencies nervous about AI automating workflows, Segrist draws a line in the sand.
“We don’t want to interrupt flow. Flow is so critical in the creative process.”
She argues the tools reduce grunt work – not strategic imagination.
“None of it works if you don’t have human imagination and creativity at the heart of it. We believe that it is creativity that will be the edge.”
The platform’s “Ask Canva” assistant and AI-powered collaboration features sit alongside 750 integrations – pushing Canva further into brand, production, and performance workflows.
But Segrist emphasises practicality: “A modern marketing stack doesn’t have the space for that complexity and interruption in workflow, it’s about having that speed to delivery.”
“What we hear most from our community, marketers, and our own team is fragmentation. You might be inspired in one platform, create in another, launch content elsewhere, then jump again to pull insights. A modern marketing stack can’t carry that complexity,” she added.
Doing more, not replacing more
With the feature set edging closer to a full-funnel creative engine, Segrist acknowledged industry pressure to “do more with less,” but framed the platform as an enabler, not a replacement.
“A lot of amazing designers spend tons of time fixing little things, like trimming images. Their talent is better served doing strategic, innovative, breakthrough work.”
And for anyone imagining Canva phasing out professionals entirely, she said that “in a world where there’s so many AI tools, what’s the edge? What is the competitive differentiation? We believe that it is creativity.”
Canva’s approach – free tools for beginners, Pro and Business tiers, and enterprise solutions – is built to keep the platform “very literal about everyone.”
“We still champion small businesses, teachers and parents making invites. People move seamlessly between these parts of their lives. No one is just one thing.”
“We will always have a robust free tier,” she said.
The bottom line
As Canva pushes deeper into agency territory, the message is clear: automation is coming for the admin, not the artistry.
For marketers, the question shifts from “Will AI replace me?” to “Am I using AI to move faster than the person next to me?”
In Segrist’s words, Canva wants to “shorten the bridge between what’s in your mind and your ability to realise it.”
She continued: “We see a shift from a linear workflow to a closed-loop journey, where insights feed directly back into creation, supported by an AI creative partner to move faster. From a product perspective, that is what Canva Grow delivers: inspiration, creation, launch, results, and constant iteration, not a start-to-finish pipeline.”