Purchase and Updates

[RyanUK]

It is great that Affinity products our one off purchases. The simple pricing system has won over many people including me. I am a big fan. However, I was wondering if the purchase price includes all future updates for life. I ask because I don't remember seeing any limitation on updates. I know with some software I have bought in the past it was a one off purchase, but within a year or two of purchase they released version 2, then version 3, that meant version 1 was no longer updated, and you had to pay to upgrade to version 2. 

While I understand software development is probably an expensive business. It would be good to know what the situation is with updates.

Thank you.

[walt.farrell]

A purchase entitles you to all future updates made to version 1 of the application you purchase, on the OS platform you purchased it for.

So, first of all, if you bought on Windows and change to using a Mac computer, you'd need to buy again.

Or, if/when Serif decides to release version 2 of the applications, you'd need to purchase again if you want the new functions in version 2. Or you could continue to use version 1, with the functions and bugs it has at that point.

Basically, this means that if you already own an Affinity application at 1.8.3, you'll get 1.8.4 as a free update when comes out (it's in beta now), and 1.9 (which we know is also coming). We don't know what will happen after 1.9. There will probably be a 1.9.1, maybe a 1.9.2, maybe some more. There may be a 1.10 after 1.9, but none of us knows for sure as Serif has not said.

[RyanUK]

Thanks Walt. I was expecting something like that. Hopefully new versions don't happen too often, and when they do happen I hope they offer a discounted upgrade purchase to existing owners.  I have already purchased all 3 affinity products for the mac and I am about to buy the iPad versions as well. I wanted to make sure before purchasing. 

[walt.farrell]

33 minutes ago, RyanUK said:

Hopefully new versions don't happen too often, and when they do happen I hope they offer a discounted upgrade purchase to existing owners.

There has only been one major version (1) so far, and it has been updated many times over the years since it was introduced. Affinity Photo came out in mid-2015, I think, and Designer was out for some period of time before that. Anyone who purchased then has had free updates since then.

It is unclear that there will be a discount specifically for current owners with version 2 (if/when there is a version 2). For one thing, Serif does not know who all the current owners are, as many sales are via the Mac App Store or the Microsoft Store, and Serif has no information from Apple or Microsoft about those.

It is likely there will be a 20% or so discount initially; Serif often has a sale to coincide with a new point release (1.7, 1.8. 1.9). But even that is not guaranteed. And, of course, we have no idea what the licensing terms for a version 2 might be. Nor even what the application configuration might be.