Key Highlights:
- The company is reshaping itself into an AI-first design platform.
- It closed 2025 with $4 billion in annual recurring revenue.
- Monthly active users rose 20% to over 265 million.
- LLMs like ChatGPT now drive double-digit referral traffic.
Canva ended 2025 with $4 billion in annual recurring revenue, driven by strong user growth, expanding AI tools, and rising referral traffic from large language models like ChatGPT.
The creative software company now has more than 265 million monthly active users and over 31 million paid subscribers worldwide.
How did Canva reach $4 billion in revenue?
The growth came from both individuals and businesses. Canva’s B2B segment, defined as customers with more than 25 seats, doubled year-over-year and now contributes $500 million in ARR.
According to co-founder and COO Cliff Obrecht, the company continues to see its largest revenue share from North America. However, international markets are expanding steadily. To support that growth, Canva rolled out lower-priced plans in countries including Pakistan, Uruguay, Morocco, and Jamaica.
Why is AI central to Canva’s strategy now?
Canva’s AI push is no longer an add-on. It is becoming the core product. In 2025, the company introduced AI tools that let users build mini apps and websites directly inside Canva. Those tools now have more than 10 million monthly active users.
Obrecht said Canva is shifting from a design platform with AI features to an AI platform built around design. Internally, the goal is to behave like a “design agency in your pocket.”
How important is LLM referral traffic?
LLMs are now a measurable acquisition channel. By October 2025, users had logged over 26 million conversations with the Canva app inside ChatGPT. The company also said Canva ranks among the top 10 referred domains from ChatGPT.
LLM-driven traffic already accounts for double-digit percentages of Canva’s total referrals. Canva is actively investing in both SEO and LLM visibility so its tools surface inside AI search responses.
What competition does Canva face?
The shift comes as competition intensifies. Rivals include Adobe, Freepik, and Apple, which now bundles professional creator apps into a single subscription.
Canva was last valued at $42 billion in a secondary share sale. Obrecht told Bloomberg the company plans to go public within the next couple of years.
As Canva leans deeper into AI and LLM discovery, the company is betting that how people find design tools is changing just as fast as how they use them.
