Canva slows AI rollout as inference costs bite, Figma absorbs expenses for new tools

The AI gold rush has a bill, and design software companies are starting to open the envelope. Canva, the Australian design platform valued at roughly $42 billion, is deliberately pumping the brakes on its AI feature rollout to keep costs from spiraling. Meanwhile, Figma has taken a different but equally revealing approach: absorbing the full inference costs of its new AI tools rather than passing them along to users. Canva’s growth forecast takes a hit Canva’s annual revenue growth forecast has reportedly been revised downward from around 30% to roughly 20%. The company posted Q2 revenue of $921.9 million, which represents a 25.2% year-over-year increase but still fell short of earlier expectations. Canva has reportedly achieved close to a 90% reduction in average AI task costs through architectural improvements. But even with those gains, leadership apparently concluded that the pace of AI deployment needed to slow down to match economic reality. CEO Melanie Perkins has framed the deceleration as a strategic choice rather than a retreat, positioning it as a way to make critical technical advancements that set up sustainable AI scaling for the long term. Figma’s absorb-now, monetiz...