--- title: "Adobe opens Photoshop and Premiere files to ChatGPT, Gemini and Claude agents as net-new ARR falls 37% to 38%" description: "Coworker is free, and the Google deals carry no price, date or term. With Adobe's new subscription sales falling sharply, December's report will show whether open files and a free agent defend Adobe's licenses or hand the agent layer to its rivals." publisher: "The Inference" section: "Applications" published: 2026-11-12T16:42:43.455Z modified: 2026-11-12T16:42:43.455Z canonical: https://theinference.org/article/adobe-opens-photoshop-and-premiere-files-to-chatgpt-gemini-and-claude-agents-as-net-new-arr-falls-37-to-38 language: en keywords: "Adobe, AI Agents, Anthropic, Google, Enterprise Software" --- # Adobe opens Photoshop and Premiere files to ChatGPT, Gemini and Claude agents as net-new ARR falls 37% to 38% > Coworker is free, and the Google deals carry no price, date or term. With Adobe's new subscription sales falling sharply, December's report will show whether open files and a free agent defend Adobe's licenses or hand the agent layer to its rivals. [Adobe](https://theinference.org/markets/companies/adobe) opened the native project files of Photoshop, Illustrator, Premiere and After Effects to outside AI agents at its MAX conference on November 10 [1][2]. It also gave CX Enterprise Coworker, its marketing agent, free to every licensee of GenStudio, the enterprise marketing platform Adobe sells under license [3]. [The two Google partnership documents](https://www.googlecloudpresscorner.com/2026-11-10-Adobe-and-Google-Deepen-Partnership-to-Bring-Leading-AI-Models-and-Integrated-Workflows-to-Creatives-and-Enterprises) published that day carry no price, no launch date, no term and no exclusivity [4]. Adobe is betting its file formats are worth more open than closed, and it made the bet in a quarter when net-new ARR, the new annual recurring revenue added in the period, fell between 37 and 38 percent [5]. Coworker's zero price is not in Adobe's announcements; it is on the record only because [The Next Web](https://thenextweb.com/news/adobe-mcp-integrations-photoshop-premiere-ai-agents) asked [3][5]. The multi-year Disney alliance Adobe announced the day before carried the same shape: no disclosed financial terms [2][4]. ## The project files were the moat, and Adobe opened the gate The enabler is the Model Context Protocol, or MCP, the open standard that lets AI agents use other software [1]. From a private beta in early 2027, agents from [OpenAI](https://theinference.org/markets/companies/openai), Google and [Anthropic](https://theinference.org/markets/companies/anthropic) will edit projects on the user's own computer, with layers and sequences left editable so a person can take over at any point [1][6]. ## Nine minutes to nine artboards, and no Google timeline In Adobe's demo ChatGPT turned one party poster into nine finished, still-editable artboards. The run took about nine minutes [1]. [Google DeepMind](https://theinference.org/markets/companies/google-deepmind) is separately exploring a near-real-time image model for Photoshop, with no timeline attached [7][4]. Agents were going to do this work somewhere; closed files would have forced them to build around Adobe. The same logic had already put Coworker inside ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini and Copilot on November 4 [3][4]. ## The numbers say the giveaway is about defending licenses Adobe's AI-first ending ARR, the yearly value of subscriptions from its AI products including GenStudio, passed $650 million in the fiscal quarter that ended in August [8][9]. It is still small next to Adobe's $27.5 billion of total annual recurring revenue [9]. Carbon Finance, the research firm whose [quarterly review of Adobe](https://businessofgtm.com/articles/adobe-coworker-genstudio-free-photoshop-agents) supplies the growth figures charted below, says the AI growth has yet to show up meaningfully in recurring revenue [5]. In that setting a free agent does not add revenue; it defends the licenses already sold. *Chart: **AI-first ARR grows fast while the net-new line shrinks** Bars comparing three Adobe ARR lines in fiscal Q3 2026: GenStudio ending ARR up more than 20 percent, AI-first products ARR up more than 150 percent, and net-new ARR down about 38 percent.* *Year-over-year change in each Adobe ARR line, fiscal Q3 2026 (ended August 28, 2026), as reported. Ending-ARR growth for GenStudio and AI-first are floors ('more than 20%' and 'more than 150%'); the net-new decline was reported at 'about 37 to 38%'. AI-first ARR includes GenStudio. Sources: Business of GTM citing Carbon Finance; TechTimes; Trefis via Yahoo Finance. [5][8][9]* [Adobe's own quarterly filings](https://www.sec.gov/cgi-bin/browse-edgar?action=getcompany&CIK=0000796343) show the same story on the top line [10]. *Chart: **Adobe's revenue growth has stayed between 10% and 13% for three years** Line chart of Adobe's year-over-year revenue growth by fiscal quarter from Q4 2023 to Q3 2026, staying between 10.2 and 12.9 percent.* *Year-over-year change in Adobe revenue by fiscal quarter, Q4 2023 to Q3 2026, as reported in its SEC filings; percent. Source: Adobe quarterly figures from its SEC filings, retrieved November 12, 2026. [10]* Xfinity, [Comcast](https://theinference.org/markets/companies/comcast)'s broadband brand, is already bringing Coworker into how it runs campaigns, with human reviewers keeping the final call [3]. Customers are getting real capability at no extra charge; the question sits on Adobe's income statement. ## Anthropic shipped the alternative the same day While Adobe was opening its files, Anthropic, the company behind the Claude assistant, unveiled Claude Sheets, Claude Whiteboards and Claude Meetings in San Francisco [11]. It is a workspace that plans, tracks and meets with no Adobe file anywhere in it. Claude can now open full partner applications inside its own interface, with Adobe among the first, the handshake [we covered on November 11](https://theinference.org/article/anthropic-s-claude-hosts-adobe-apps-and-sells-a-figjam-rival-while-figma-s-connector-is-still-in-development) [11]. Adobe has handed its file layer to every agent on the market; its rivals are competing to own the place where work starts. ## December's report is the first test of the free-agent bet Adobe reports fiscal fourth-quarter results in December, the first print under incoming chief executive [Anil Chakravarthy](https://theinference.org/markets/people/anil-chakravarthy), who takes over from [Shantanu Narayen](https://theinference.org/markets/people/shantanu-narayen) on December 1 [8][9]. The company's own target is about 10 percent growth in total annual recurring revenue [8][9]. If GenStudio holds its growth while net-new ARR keeps shrinking, the free agent is defending the license base; if GenStudio slows too, distribution alone is not defense [5]. ![Portrait of Anil Chakravarthy, Adobe's president and incoming chief executive](https://storage.googleapis.com/theinference-public/img/e9ded30c8315de7e.webp) *Anil Chakravarthy, Adobe's president, becomes chief executive on December 1, 2026, and will preside over the fiscal fourth-quarter report in December. (Courtesy of Adobe)* The shares trade near 14 times earnings, well below the market median [9]. The announcements give the people who use Adobe's software more capability, and they carry no disclosed revenue for Adobe. Whether they defend the license base is what December's print shows. ## Takeaway Adobe opened its project files and made its marketing agent free because new subscription sales are shrinking. December's report shows whether that defends the licenses Adobe already sells or hands the agent layer to Anthropic, Google and OpenAI. ## Sources 1. [The Next Web, Adobe will let outside AI agents edit Photoshop and Premiere files, 11 November 2026](https://thenextweb.com/news/adobe-mcp-integrations-photoshop-premiere-ai-agents) 2. [Business Wire via Yahoo Finance, Adobe Powers a New Era of Creativity, Bringing Agents and Tools to Creatives Wherever and However They Create, 10 November 2026](https://finance.yahoo.com/technology/ai/articles/adobe-powers-era-creativity-bringing-140000660.html) 3. [The Next Web, Adobe puts its Coworker AI agent in GenStudio, free for existing customers, 10 November 2026](https://thenextweb.com/news/adobe-cx-enterprise-coworker-genstudio-brand-intelligence) 4. [PPC Land, Google will put Adobe Acrobat in Gmail and Drive file previews, 12 November 2026](https://ppc.land/google-will-put-adobe-acrobat-in-gmail-and-drive-file-previews/) 5. [Business of GTM, Adobe Makes Coworker Free in GenStudio and Previews Outside Agents in Photoshop, 10 November 2026](https://businessofgtm.com/articles/adobe-coworker-genstudio-free-photoshop-agents) 6. [The Verge, Adobe is going all in on agentic AI, 11 November 2026](https://www.theverge.com/tech/1030593/adobe-max-ai-agents-mcp-firefly-assistant-updates) 7. [Google Cloud Press Corner, Adobe and Google Deepen Partnership to Bring Leading AI Models and Integrated Workflows to Creatives and Enterprises, 10 November 2026](https://www.googlecloudpresscorner.com/2026-11-10-Adobe-and-Google-Deepen-Partnership-to-Bring-Leading-AI-Models-and-Integrated-Workflows-to-Creatives-and-Enterprises) 8. [TechTimes, Adobe Hits 1B Users and Record Revenue: Stock Still Falls on Freemium Bet, 11 September 2026](https://www.techtimes.com/articles/327366/20260911/adobe-hits-1b-users-record-revenue-stock-still-falls-freemium-bet.htm) 9. [Trefis via Yahoo Finance, What Is Going On With Adobe Stock?, 3 November 2026](https://finance.yahoo.com/markets/stocks/articles/going-adobe-stock-131804993.html) 10. [Adobe, quarterly figures from its SEC filings, retrieved 12 November 2026](https://www.sec.gov/cgi-bin/browse-edgar?action=getcompany&CIK=0000796343) 11. [Benzinga via Yahoo Tech, Anthropic Expands Claude's Workplace Arsenal to Rival Google and Microsoft, 12 November 2026](https://tech.yahoo.com/ai/claude/articles/anthropic-expands-claudes-workplace-arsenal-133007151.html) --- Adobe opens Photoshop and Premiere files to ChatGPT, Gemini and Claude agents as net-new ARR falls 37% to 38% — The Inference. Canonical: https://theinference.org/article/adobe-opens-photoshop-and-premiere-files-to-chatgpt-gemini-and-claude-agents-as-net-new-arr-falls-37-to-38