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marathongranny212
Known Participant
September 19, 2025
Answered

Full version of PS on Surface Pro 11

  • September 19, 2025
  • 1 reply
  • 569 views

I am a volunteer retoucher for a non profit organization called Now I Lay Me Down To Sleep. 90% of my work is done in PS on my desktop witha Wacom tablet. I bought an iPad M4 as asmaller option to bring on vacation. While I love the Apple Pencil option, I am finding the iOS version of PS is severely lacking in some of the features I need. I was considering a Microsoft Surface Pro 11. Does anyone have experience with using that with PS? Will it run the full version of PS? If you use it, what specs would you recommend? Any reason not to switch from iPad to Surface Pro?

Correct answer Conrad_C

One thing to keep in mind is whether the Surface has an Intel processor or the relatively new ARM Snapdragon processor. The Surface product line includes computers that use one or the other.

 

If it uses an Intel processor, you should be able to run the full Windows version of Photoshop, with no missing features.

 

If it uses an ARM processor, it will run the ARM version of Windows. Although Windows Photoshop does run on it, some features are not available on ARM yet. It will be a lot closer to what you want, it won’t be missing as many features of the iPad version, but for now it won’t have all of the features you would normally get running Photoshop on an Intel-based Windows PC or on an Apple Silicon-based Mac.

 

More info from Adobe about Photoshop on Windows for ARM, with list of missing features and known issues:

https://helpx.adobe.com/photoshop/kb/windows-arm-support.html

 

If nothing in that article is a problem for you, then you could be OK using Photoshop on a Surface Pro with an ARM processor. But if you’re not comfortable with the limitations, you might look for an Intel-based Windows tablet PC whether from Microsoft or another company. (I’m a Mac user, but Apple doesn’t make any tablet Macs.)

 

The iPad version of Photoshop is similar to the version of Photoshop that runs in a web browser.

1 reply

Conrad_C
Community Expert
Conrad_CCommunity ExpertCorrect answer
Community Expert
September 19, 2025

One thing to keep in mind is whether the Surface has an Intel processor or the relatively new ARM Snapdragon processor. The Surface product line includes computers that use one or the other.

 

If it uses an Intel processor, you should be able to run the full Windows version of Photoshop, with no missing features.

 

If it uses an ARM processor, it will run the ARM version of Windows. Although Windows Photoshop does run on it, some features are not available on ARM yet. It will be a lot closer to what you want, it won’t be missing as many features of the iPad version, but for now it won’t have all of the features you would normally get running Photoshop on an Intel-based Windows PC or on an Apple Silicon-based Mac.

 

More info from Adobe about Photoshop on Windows for ARM, with list of missing features and known issues:

https://helpx.adobe.com/photoshop/kb/windows-arm-support.html

 

If nothing in that article is a problem for you, then you could be OK using Photoshop on a Surface Pro with an ARM processor. But if you’re not comfortable with the limitations, you might look for an Intel-based Windows tablet PC whether from Microsoft or another company. (I’m a Mac user, but Apple doesn’t make any tablet Macs.)

 

The iPad version of Photoshop is similar to the version of Photoshop that runs in a web browser.

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