People leave Topaz Gigapixel because it is sold only as a subscription, because the lower plans carry commercial limits, or because they need a cheaper tool for occasional enlargements. They move to free open source desktop programs, to credit-metered web services where they pay per image, or to editing apps that include an upscaler.
Sebastiaan SmitsFounderShort answer: Upscayl, Aiarty and Real-ESRGAN head the list of Topaz Gigapixel alternatives drawn from our AI image upscalers ranking. Ranking order favours the challenger over the household name, so the best-known vendors begin at place 4 where the category allows it. Upscayl is the one to try if you want a free offline upscaler and can live without vendor support. Every one of the 11 products below comes from Best AI Image Upscalers in 2026, with a note on how it departs from Topaz Gigapixel.
Vendors can pay for more visibility on this website, for example a higher place in a ranking or more room on a page. Commercial relationships can also affect which products we feature and how prominently. Every vendor link is marked the same, whatever the arrangement behind it. How that works.
The Gigapixel page lists Personal and Pro plans billed monthly, annually by the month or prepaid for a year, plus a Studio bundle. Personal shows 29 dollars monthly, 19 dollars a month on a twelve-month term and 149 dollars prepaid; Pro shows 54, 42 and 499. A one-time purchase does not appear.
Personal plans state limited commercial use, defined as personal and commercial use for organisations under 1 million dollars of annual revenue. Full commercial use and seat management come with Pro. A studio above that revenue line, or one with several operators, has to price the dearer tier.
Pricing is by time, not by image. A person who enlarges a handful of pictures a quarter still carries a twelve-month plan or a monthly fee, while services that sell credits or free allowances charge only when files are processed. The page we read mentions no trial.
| Alternative | Headquarters | Free option | Pricing model | Switch if | Our rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Upscayl | Not stated by the vendor | Yes | Published | you want a free offline upscaler and can live without vendor support | #2 |
| Aiarty | Not stated by the vendor | No free tier | See profile | you need desktop processing for files that cannot leave the building | #4 |
| Real-ESRGAN | Not stated by the vendor | No free tier | See profile | you are comfortable running a model yourself and want the source | #7 |
| VanceAI | Not stated by the vendor | No free tier | See profile | you want a lifetime Windows licence instead of a recurring plan | #6 |
| Bigjpg | Not stated by the vendor | Yes | Published | you want to prepay a few months of heavy use and stop | #5 |
| Let's Enhance | Not stated by the vendor | Yes | Published | you want a browser tool where every image costs the same | #3 |
| Upscale.media | Not stated by the vendor | No free tier | Published | you enlarge a few pictures a month and want to pay a cent each | #8 |
| Claid | Not stated by the vendor | No free tier | See profile | you process product images in batches and may later call an API | #9 |
| Pixelcut | United States | Yes | Published | you also edit product photos and want enlargement inside the same app | #10 |
| Clipdrop | Not stated by the vendor | No free tier | Published | you want a quick two-click enlargement with other photo tools nearby | #11 |
| Cutout.pro | Not stated by the vendor | No free tier | Published | your main need is cutouts and portraits, with upscaling occasionally | #12 |
Not stated by the vendor · Published
Upscayl is a desktop program released under the AGPL-3.0 licence, with versions for Linux, macOS and Windows, so enlarging runs offline and costs nothing. A separate Upscayl Cloud option exists, but its amounts did not show on the home page. The footer names AI Corp and states no country, which matters for company purchasing.
Switch from Topaz Gigapixel if you want a free offline upscaler and can live without vendor support.
Not stated by the vendor · See profile
Aiarty is made by Digiarty Software, Inc., which describes it as fully local and offline and supports upscaling up to 32K on Windows and Mac. The suite also covers video enhancement and matting. Licence amounts sit behind a Buy Now link and trial limits are not stated, so confirm both before relying on it.
Switch from Topaz Gigapixel if you need desktop processing for files that cannot leave the building.
Not stated by the vendor · See profile
Real-ESRGAN is a research repository by Xintao Wang, Liangbin Xie, Chao Dong and Ying Shan under the BSD-3-Clause licence, with no account or plan. Portable NCNN programs run on Windows, Linux and macOS but scale by 2, 3 or 4 only, and the Python route needs PyTorch. Several GUI tools, Upscayl among them, build on it.
Switch from Topaz Gigapixel if you are comfortable running a model yourself and want the source.
See the full Real-ESRGAN entry, ranked 7 of 14 among AI image upscalers products →
Not stated by the vendor · See profile
VanceAI sells web tiers monthly or yearly and a Windows desktop licence monthly, yearly or for life on one PC. A 2x enlargement costs 1 credit, 4x costs 2 and 8x costs 3. The web service caps uploads at 10 MB and 34 megapixels, whereas the Windows licence has no upload limit.
Switch from Topaz Gigapixel if you want a lifetime Windows licence instead of a recurring plan.
Not stated by the vendor · Published
Bigjpg sells time rather than credits, in prepaid bundles of two, six or twelve months with 500, 1,000 or 2,000 images each month. The free plan allows 20 images a month at up to 4x. Paid plans raise uploads from 5 MB to 50 MB and enlargement to 16x, and an API exists. Stripe, WeChat Pay and Alipay are accepted.
Switch from Topaz Gigapixel if you want to prepay a few months of heavy use and stop.
Not stated by the vendor · Published
Let's Enhance charges one credit per image and starts with ten signup credits and watermarked output. Maximum output grows from 8 megapixels on the free tier to 512 on Max. Unused credits roll over up to six times the monthly allowance, but cancelling forfeits the rest. Terms mention arbitration in Los Angeles County and no country.
Switch from Topaz Gigapixel if you want a browser tool where every image costs the same.
#3 out of 14 AI image upscalers products: read the Let's Enhance review →
Not stated by the vendor · Published
Upscale.media meters each upscale at one credit, though complex jobs can cost more, and grants three free credits and three downloads a month or one image a day without signing up. Paid use is a yearly subscription at one cent per credit or one-time packs valid for a year. Both are non-refundable, and the footer names Shopsense Retail Technologies Limited.
Switch from Topaz Gigapixel if you enlarge a few pictures a month and want to pay a cent each.
Where Upscale.media stands: place 8 of 14 in the AI image upscalers ranking →
Not stated by the vendor · See profile
Claid counts upscales as operations, 25 on Essentials, 250 on Pro and 1,000 on Business, each costing between 2 and 8 credits. Pro and Business add batch processing, a priority queue and brand kits, and an API starter pack exists. Its copyright line names Let's Enhance, Inc., so it shares an operator with that service.
Switch from Topaz Gigapixel if you process product images in batches and may later call an API.
United States · Published
Pixelcut Inc. of Oakland, California, builds an editing app in which upscaling is one feature. Pro and Business plans make the upscaler unlimited and add monthly AI credit pools and team seats. Exports on the free plan carry no watermark, though its upscaler is described only as limited. Dollar signs appear without a currency code.
Switch from Topaz Gigapixel if you also edit product photos and want enlargement inside the same app.
Where Pixelcut stands: place 10 of 14 in the AI image upscalers ranking →
Not stated by the vendor · Published
Clipdrop upscales by 2x or 4x and says it also removes noise and recovers detail, alongside cleanup and relight tools. Per its page, InitML, founded in 2020, was bought by Stability and then sold to Jasper.ai. Plan terms are on a separate pricing page that the home page does not summarise, and no country is stated.
Switch from Topaz Gigapixel if you want a quick two-click enlargement with other photo tools nearby.
#11 out of 14 AI image upscalers products: read the Clipdrop review →
Not stated by the vendor · Published
Cutout.pro is mainly a background and portrait toolbox, and its enhancer costs 2 credits an image against 1 for background removal. Monthly image subscriptions come in six sizes with credits rolling over to five times the monthly budget, plus one-time packs. A free account gets five credits. The money-back guarantee lasts 14 days and covers 50 downloads.
Switch from Topaz Gigapixel if your main need is cutouts and portraits, with upscaling occasionally.
#12 out of 14 AI image upscalers products: read the Cutout.pro review →
Upscayl: The desktop program is free under AGPL-3.0 and runs on Linux, macOS and Windows.
VanceAI: The Windows desktop plan has a lifetime option for one PC and no upload limit, unlike the web service.
Upscale.media: Three free credits a month, then one cent per credit, with no plan to keep.
Real-ESRGAN: The code is BSD-3-Clause with portable programs for Windows, Linux and macOS.
Bigjpg: Bundles of two, six or twelve months give 500 to 2,000 images a month, up to 16x on paid plans.
Topaz Gigapixel remains the better fit when enlargement is your daily work. Its page lists unlimited local rendering, unlimited cloud image rendering, desktop apps for Mac and Windows that also run as a plugin for Photoshop and Lightroom Classic, and a model menu from Standard and High Fidelity to Redefine and Face Recovery. Local rendering keeps files on your computer, which suits confidential material.
Gigapixel offers named models such as Standard, Low Res, Text & Shapes, Art & CG and Face Recovery. Alternatives have fewer or differently named options, so run the same twenty difficult files through each candidate and compare faces, text and fine textures before switching.
Gigapixel works as a plugin inside Photoshop and Lightroom Classic. Most alternatives are standalone programs or web pages, so plan an export and re-import step, and check batch limits and maximum output size before you promise a print job to a client.
Personal Topaz plans carry limited commercial use. When you move, read each alternative's terms for commercial use, watermarks on free output and refund rules, because credit services often make packs non-refundable.
Its page lists Personal at 29 dollars monthly, 19 dollars a month on a twelve-month term, or 149 dollars prepaid for the year.
Pro shows 54, 42 and 499 dollars on the same basis. A Studio bundle is listed at 69 dollars monthly or 399 dollars a year.
Upscayl is a free desktop program under AGPL-3.0, Real-ESRGAN is open source under BSD-3-Clause, and Bigjpg allows 20 images a month at up to 4x. Let's Enhance and Upscale.media have small free allowances.
Upscayl, Aiarty and the VanceAI Windows licence process on your computer, as does Real-ESRGAN through its portable programs. Web services such as Bigjpg and Upscale.media send files to their servers.
VanceAI lists a lifetime option for its Windows desktop plan on one PC, and Bigjpg sells prepaid bundles of two, six or twelve months. Upscayl and Real-ESRGAN cost nothing to run.
Yes. Its page states that it runs as a standalone app or as a plugin for Photoshop and Lightroom Classic, on Mac and Windows.
Topaz states limited commercial use, meaning personal and commercial use for organisations under 1 million dollars of annual revenue. Full commercial use is listed with the Pro plan.
Founder of The Knowledge Engineers and of 2 Steps Ahead, an AI search visibility agency. Editorially responsible for every page on this site; research and drafting are AI-assisted.
Written, edited and fact-checked by Sebastiaan Smits. Last reviewed 9 November 2026. How we review.
