Capture One just royally screwed all their customers with changes in their perpetual licensing. After raising the costs of upgrades year after year, they now pulled a new trick: if you buy a license, let’s say version 24.1 at the moment of buying, you’re forever stuck on that license and don’t get any upgrades (e.g. 24.1.2). They say they will still do bug fixes (but how the hell is that going to work if every customer has a different version… they would have to patch the same bug in every point version ever released). Essentially, they’re forcing any sensible customer to a subscription plan (and they know exactly that they are doing this. This is going to cost them dearly, as I already see people move back to Adobe’s subscription plans since they cost half and you get Lightroom and Photoshop.
Hi ,
Over the past few years many of you have told us you want access to new tools and improvements sooner, rather than have them all in one ‘major’ version of Capture One Pro at the end of each year. That’s why we’ve been investing heavily in our technology to be able release features to you as soon as they are ready. Now we’re ready to fully embrace this approach.
From 2023 we will no longer be tied to an annual cycle for major releases. As a result, there will not be a Capture One 24. Instead, we will continuously release new tools and features on a rolling basis throughout the year.
Alongside this, we will also be making changes to our perpetual licenses from February 1, 2023. Here’s what’s changing:
- New perpetual licenses will include updates with bug fixes until the next version, but new features released after purchase will not be included.
- Upgrade pricing will no longer be available and will be replaced with a new loyalty scheme. More details will be announced on February 1, 2023.
Here’s how it affects you:
Happy with your current version of Capture One Pro? Great, there’s nothing you need to do.If you do want to get our latest version, Capture One Pro 23, our upgrade pricing is open to you until January 31, 2023. By purchasing before this date you will receive all updates including new features until September 30, 2023. You can access this by logging into your account on our website.
You can find more details of the changes and how it affects you on this page.
Thank you as always for being part of the Capture One community. We’re excited to share our new products and features with you over the coming months, and hope you’ll enjoy using them as much as we have creating them!
I find this very concerning, also because DxO has also been steadily increasing the price and limiting the eligibility for upgrades. So let this be a warning shot for DxO.
My suggestion? Be good and customers will flock to you. Your competitors are screwing themselves. Instead of milking your customers, go for volume/scale by doing right, being royal with upgrades and camera updates and also focus on fixing bugs in current software versus only in new versions.
Another suggestion I have is to offer a rent-to-own plan (in addition to the perpetual purchase option). Offer the full suite in 24 monthly payments after which your customer owns the software (the version that is out after the 24th payment). Splice is doing this in the music space for a number of DAWs and plug-ins and I think it’s a great idea that offers a middle road between subscriptions and perpetual software.
Your thoughts?