Luminar AI Discontinued - A Standard-setting Game Changer

From October 3rd, 2022, Luminar AI is discontinued. And this is hardly surprising, given that Luminar Neo has surpassed Luminar AI in every way.

Nevertheless, Luminar AI was a game changer. While many of its features could be found earlier in Luminar 4, Luminar AI perfected these features enabling anyone to produce an expertly processed photo.

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Luminar AI – the first Professional Photo Editor for Beginners

Luminar AI’s biggest trick was to enable those with no photo editing experience to edit photos expertly. Obscurely named tools such as Tone Curves, Split Tone, and White Balance were pushed to the back, making way for Sky Enhance, Golden Hour Glow, and Foliage Enhancer.

Luminar AI edit tab and film strip — Replacing Skies with Luminar AI

As a result, you never needed to know how to create an effect in Luminar AI – only which effect you wanted to apply.

Expert Photo Processing for everyone

Then there are Templates. If nudging an effects slider felt too much like hard work; you could apply a Template and process your photo to perfection with just a few clicks.

Unlike traditional Presets, which blindly apply a series of set adjustments to your image, Templates assess and work with your picture for vastly superior results.

Box Office Effects

But most people were drawn to Luminar AI’s box of AI tricks. It was only in Luminar AI where the Sky Replacement matured, offering superior scene relighting and reflections. And Portrait Bokeh AI-enabled you to add a thousand-dollars worth of background blur to any photo you have ever taken.

Of course, I have to mention Augmented Sky AI, the only feature Luminar Neo is waiting on and one of the preciously few ways to insert a Flock of Birds, a Planet, or a Giraffe into your photo. (C’mon Skylum!)

agumented sky ai in luminar neo — Birds added with Augmented Sky AI

The Peoples Photo Editor

For all the reasons above, Luminar AI was almost everything to everyone. It was supremely easy for beginners while offering experts some fancy-fun new tricks and a quicker route to a finished image.

What now?

At first, Luminar Neo had enough rough edges and missing features to justify Luminar AI’s existence. But today, Luminar Neo has everything Luminar AI has (except Augmented Sky AI!) and much more besides.

Applying a Luminar Neo Preset — Read Luminar Neo Review

Furthermore, Luminar Neo is a little faster and benefits from premium features such as HDR Merge and Noiseless AI via the Luminar Neo Extension Pack. Read Luminar Neo Extension Pack Review.

So, if you can buy a copy of Luminar AI before its discontinued, I recommend that you don’t. If you are still using Luminar AI and considering an upgrade, I think you should. But first, check out my Luminar Neo vs Lumiar AI comparison and Luminar Neo Review. I own both, and Luminar Neo is just better.

Final word

I love Luminar AI, and it remains installed on PC to this day – right next to Luminar Neo. I think Luminar AI defined what a modern mainstream photo editor should be, and its influence on other products such as Lightroom, ACDSee Ultimate 2023, and ON1 Photo Raw 2023 is plain to see.