Canva company profile: valuation, funding & revenue

This Canva company profile covers the company's valuation, revenue, funding rounds, investors and history. Canva works in design software, with a focus on visual communication platform. It was founded in 2013 and is headquartered in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. Its latest valuation on record is About US$34.9 billion (investor markdown; US$42 billion in 2025 share sale) (August 2026). Every figure links to a public source, and anything the company hasn't disclosed is marked as such.

Revenue

US$3.3 billion in annualised revenue — Annualised revenue (stated by co-founder Cliff Obrecht), as of August 2025. Source: Startup Daily.

Funding history

Canva timeline

Key dates from the sources on this page, oldest first. Metric snapshots are listed after the funding events.

• 2013 — Canva is founded in Sydney by Melanie Perkins (CEO), Cliff Obrecht and Cameron Adams.
• Apr 2024 — Secondary sale: About US$1.6B, valuing the company at US$26B.
• Late 2024 — Investor transactions: Not disclosed, valuing the company at US$32B.
• Aug 2025 — Employee share sale: Employees could sell up to US$3M of stock each, valuing the company at About US$42B.
• 2025 — Monthly users: More than 240 million people designing each month.
• Late 2024 — Earlier valuation: US$32 billion after investor transactions, up from US$26 billion.

Investors

Overview

Canva is an online design platform that lets almost anyone create presentations, social media graphics, documents, videos, websites and printed materials using templates and simple drag-and-drop tools. It started as a way to make design accessible to people without professional skills, and has grown into a full workplace platform used by individuals, schools, small businesses and large companies. More than 240 million people use it each month.

Melanie Perkins, Cliff Obrecht and Cameron Adams founded Canva in Sydney in 2013. Perkins, the CEO, first had the idea while teaching design software to university students in Perth, and earlier built a yearbook design business with Obrecht. Canva is Australia's most valuable private technology company and one of the most valuable globally.

How Canva makes money

Canva uses a "freemium" model. The core product is free, which drives enormous user numbers. Revenue comes from:

• Canva Pro: paid subscriptions for individuals with premium templates, assets and features.
• Canva Teams: subscriptions for groups and companies with collaboration and brand management.
• Canva Enterprise: larger contracts with security, admin controls and integrations for big organisations.
• Printing and other services: physical prints of designs and add-ons.

Canva for Education is free for schools and teachers, which builds familiarity with the product among future workers. Its growth increasingly comes from businesses adopting Canva across teams, which pay more per user than individuals.

Revenue and growth

Canva has shared revenue milestones publicly. In August 2025, co-founder Cliff Obrecht said the company had US$3.3 billion in annualised revenue. Earlier reports cited about US$2.5 billion in annualised revenue in late 2024. That's strong growth for a company of its size, driven by business adoption and AI features. Canva has also said it has been profitable for years, which is unusual for a company growing this fast.

Valuation history

Canva's valuation has been set mainly through secondary transactions, where investors buy shares from existing holders, including employees:

• April 2024: about a US$1.6 billion secondary sale at a US$26 billion valuation.
• Late 2024: investor transactions at a US$32 billion valuation.
• August 2025: an employee share sale that valued Canva at about US$42 billion (reported as A$65 billion), with eligible current and former employees able to sell up to US$3 million of stock each.

Its valuation in 2021 had been higher, before falling during the 2022 tech downturn, so the recent figures represent a recovery. Regular secondary sales give employees liquidity without the company going public. See our guide to selling startup shares before an IPO.

AI and product strategy

Canva has invested heavily in AI features, including text-to-image generation, writing assistance and tools that resize and adapt designs automatically. It has also acquired companies to strengthen its offering, including professional design software. The goal is to serve everyone from casual users to professional designers and large marketing teams on one platform. AI is both an opportunity and a threat: it makes creating designs easier inside Canva, but also lowers the barrier for new competitors.

Competitive landscape

Canva competes with professional design suites, presentation and document software from big technology companies, video editing tools and a growing number of AI-native design products. Its advantages are its huge user base, ease of use, large template library and strong brand. Its main challenges are competition from much larger technology companies bundling design tools into their products, and keeping a simple experience while adding enterprise features.

The IPO question

Canva is frequently mentioned as one of the largest potential technology IPOs, with both Australian and US listings discussed in the media. The company has been in no rush, using regular secondary sales to provide liquidity. Profitability and strong growth give it the flexibility to choose its timing.

What to watch next

Watch annualised revenue milestones, enterprise adoption, AI product launches, acquisitions and IPO plans. The next secondary sale or funding event will update its valuation marker.

Key facts at a glance

Canva is a Sydney design platform founded in 2013 by Melanie Perkins, Cliff Obrecht and Cameron Adams. It had US$3.3 billion in annualised revenue in August 2025, according to its co-founder, and more than 240 million monthly users. Secondary sales valued it at US$26 billion in April 2024, US$32 billion in late 2024 and about US$42 billion in an August 2025 employee share sale.

Why Canva's freemium model works

Many software companies offer free plans, but few convert them into billions of dollars of revenue. Canva's approach works for a few reasons. The free product is genuinely useful, so people return repeatedly and recommend it to others. Designs are easy to share, which spreads the product inside schools and workplaces. And once a team relies on Canva for presentations, social posts and marketing materials, paying for shared brand kits, templates and collaboration features is an easy decision. Education users, who get Canva free, often bring it into their first jobs.

The result is a funnel with an enormous top: hundreds of millions of free users, a smaller share paying as individuals, and a growing number of teams and enterprises paying much more. Every improvement in conversion at any stage has a large effect on revenue because of the size of the base.

Australia's tech ecosystem

Canva is Australia's best-known startup success, alongside companies like Airwallex. Its rise has drawn international investors to the country and inspired a generation of Australian founders. It's also notable for its founders' public commitment to giving away much of their wealth.

That mix of commercial scale and stated philanthropy has made Canva a widely discussed example in conversations about how founders can use startup wealth.

What this means if you're…

A marketing or communications team: compare design platforms on brand controls, collaboration, AI features and integrations with your other tools.

A SaaS founder: Canva shows how a free product with a huge user base can turn into a large business when teams and companies adopt it.

An investor: Canva's secondary sales provide rare valuation data points for a large private company; compare them with its disclosed revenue for implied multiples.

Latest developments (October 2026)

Canva's valuation was marked down in August 2026. Its two largest Australian backers, Blackbird and AirTree, had external valuers cut the value of their stakes by 17%, implying about US$34.9 billion, down from the US$42 billion set in the 2025 employee share sale, and Canva's own employee-share valuation fell from US$38.9 billion to about US$31 billion, according to The Next Web and Startup Daily. Coverage linked the cut to a lower revenue growth forecast after Canva slowed some AI rollouts because of model costs. Revenue still rose about 25% in the June quarter, to US$921.9 million. Commentators now see an IPO as more likely in 2027.

Sources

Every figure on this page comes from the public sources below. Where sources disagreed, we used the company's own announcement or a primary news report. Private-company data changes; check the date beside each figure.

1. The Next Web
2. Startup Daily
3. Forbes Australia