Popular ibisPaint app bulks up with new features, targets 500m downloads

Aug 29 (Nikkei) - The feature-packed ibisPaint drawing software has become the most-downloaded mobile app from a Japanese company, with further enhancements planned to extend its reach.

ibisPaint has been downloaded about 250 million times since its 2011 launch. Nagoya-based developer Ibis is targeting 500 million by 2025. It boasts brushes whose texture can resemble pencil sketches or paintbrush strokes. There is even a feature to add shadows.

The app offers a wide array of fonts and patterns, plus such special effects as an animated rain filter. The drawing process itself can be captured on video to save. A social media feature enables sharing of this footage.

ibisPaint is now available in 19 languages, including English, French, Chinese and Arabic. Ninety percent of users live outside Japan, and 70% are under age 25.

The app was downloaded 93 million times in 2021 alone, according to Ibis. U.S. analytics firm data.ai, formerly App Annie, says it is the top app from Japan.

To add even more features, Ibis plans to increase its ibisPaint engineers to 50 from the current 20 by the end of 2025. First in the pipeline is artificial-intelligence-assisted art correction. ...continue reading

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