Canva has announced new enhancements to its developer platform, including the addition of premium apps to its Pro subscription, app translation capabilities, better discovery mechanisms, and new API capabilities.
The creative tools company launched its developer program in June 2023 to allow developers to build add-ons that can be used with Canva — think of it as a Chrome extension for Canva — and the company says developers have built more than 300 apps that have been used more than 1 billion times.
For example, Meta built the Meta Design Check app to help users apply the company's best creative practices.
With this new announcement, Canva will be offering some of its premium apps to users who pay for its Pro plan or above. Previously, apps were able to charge a service fee without Canva taking a cut, but this is a new monetization feature that Canva is offering to certain developers.
The company has a $50 million developer innovation fund and apps participating in its monetization program will be paid based on total usage.
Canva is making it easier for users to discover these apps. Previously, these apps were in a separate app tab on the platform. The apps you used were also listed in a separate section. Going forward, these apps will appear in different places, including the Text tab, Elements tab, and Photo Editor. They will also be available within Canva Docs, alongside Canva's own editing tools.
Image credit: Canva
In addition to these changes, the company also plans to launch a translation tool to allow users to translate the app's content into their preferred language.
Image credit: Canva
Canva is also releasing new API features that apps can use. For example, a new Content Query API allows users to ask questions about content within a design. Additionally, apps can read and update text with user consent. A new Design Editing API, released in beta, allows apps to create design elements and layouts based on user prompts. The company also introduced new APIs for authentication via a Canva account and a Tables API for creating tables within a design.
“We’ve taken our time building out our developer platform because we’ve been thoughtful about how we approach sharing data with developers and how much flexibility we should give them. We also wanted to make sure this program is sustainable for the long term, so we’ve looked at different monetization models,” Anwar Hanif, general manager and head of ecosystem at Canva, told TechCrunch in a phone interview.
Canva also offers a Connect API that companies can use to call on Canva's functionality within their own environments for enterprise customers. Last week, the company announced Canva for Salesforce, which turns customer data into presentations. For example, sales teams can use this to create presentations based on account information.
The company also allows developers to apply for the Leonardo.Ai API, a startup that Canva acquired earlier this year, and get credits for building apps.