Adobe Photoshop was created in 1988 by Thomas and John Knoll. Since then, it has become the de facto industry standard in raster graphics editing, such that the terms "photoshopping" and "photoshop contest" are born. Photoshop CS3 through CS6 were also distributed in two different editions: Standard and Extended. It can edit and compose raster images in multiple layers and supports masks, alpha compositing and several color models including RGB, CMYK, Lab color space (with capital L), spot color and duotone. Photoshop's naming scheme was initially based on version numbers. However, on October 2003, following the introduction ofCreative Suite branding, each new version of Photoshop was designated with "CS" plus a number; e.g. the eighth major version of Photoshop was Photoshop CS and the ninth major version was Photoshop CS2.

Photoshop has vast support for graphic file formats but also uses its own PSDand PSB file formats which support all the aforementioned features. In June 2013, with the introduction of Creative Cloudbranding, Photoshop's licensing scheme was changed to that of software as a service and the "CS" suffixes were replaced with "CC". Historically, Photoshop was bundled with additional software such as Adobe ImageReady, Adobe Fireworks, Adobe Bridge, Adobe Device Central and Adobe Camera RAW. In addition to raster graphics, it has limited abilities to edit or render text, vector graphics (especially through clipping path), 3D graphics and video. Photoshop's featureset can be expanded by Photoshop plug-ins, programs developed and distributed independently of Photoshop that can run inside it and offer new or enhanced features.