This week, Microsoft announced new Surface and Surface Pro laptops, which are powered by Snapdragon X2 processors. These ultra-thin, ultra-light laptops promise more performance for the average user, and part of that pitch is shipping them all with Affinity.

Microsoft says that the partnership with Canva Affinity is more than just a pre-install. It built haptic feedback into the touchpad and Slim Pen that ties in directly with the editing application.

“A good interface gives back more than you put in. Across the touchpad on the new Surface Laptop and Slim Pen with Surface Pro, feel subtle haptic feedback across Windows and the apps you use every day. Snap a window into place. Scrub through a video. Create in Affinity. Every move lands,” Brett Ostrum, Corporate Vice President at Surface, writes in a blog post on Microsoft’s website.

“This isn’t a feature for the spec sheet. It’s clarity, so actions feel certain. Inclusion, so feedback reaches past what you can see and hear.”

Beyond that, Microsoft says Affinity is meant to be there for users from the very beginning, so the application is specifically pinned to the Start menu at launch, “ready the moment you sign in with professional-grade design, photo and publishing tools, tuned to take full advantage of Surface hardware for a smooth and responsive experience.”

This is, of course, a big win for Affinity, which came out of the gates with a bang at the end of last year when it re-launched as a free-to-use application.

“It’s a huge endorsement of Affinity and the Canva professional design suite at the highest level and reinforces our belief that the best design tools should be easily accessible,” John Atkin, Head of Pro Designer Communications at Canva, says of the inclusion with Microsoft Surface devices.

Less than one week after its relaunch, Affinity reported that it had added a million users. A month later, that number had jumped to three million downloads.

“We’re blown away by the response to the new Affinity and the number of people choosing creative freedom in such a short space of time,” Ash Hewson, Affinity CEO, told PetaPixel at the time. “It reaffirms our core belief that the industry is desperate for a change in the status quo and represents an incredible start to a movement which we believe will change professional design forever.”

Affinity shipped its first free update in March, which added new features and expanded camera RAW support.

Getting bundled with Surface devices will undoubtedly help the company increase its install base further, and its tie-in with Canva — which is already enormously popular among entry-level to mid-level designers at the amateur and pro levels — should help convince new users to give it a shot. When the most well-known alternative is Adobe, free is also a lot more appealing of an entry-level price than what Adobe asks.

On that note, it’s an interesting development for Adobe, which sacrificed its once excellent relationship with Apple (the one that led to the closing of Aperture) to pursue the larger PC space. Now, as a thank you, Microsoft is featuring one of Adobe’s biggest competitors in new hardware. Et tu, Brute?

Image credits: Microsoft, Affinity