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Content Creation Tools
Overview
Content creation tools include platforms and tools for discovering, creating, and managing digital content across a host of digital media. These provide non-technical solutions that are accessible to beginners and geared toward creating content for new and emerging digital media channels.
Most of these solutions are free to use with subscription options for premium features, making them more accessible to firms of all sizes. Many of these solutions also leverage AI to automate and streamline the content creation process, allowing more content to be created at scale.
Industry Updates
Use cases
Content creation tools are widely used across IT, consumer services, industrials, financial, and consumer discretionary sectors. They offer firms a range of resources to manage tasks such as writing, visual and video content production, and other multimedia for essential business functions, including sales and marketing, customer onboarding, and website development.
Companies use these tools to simplify content creation with features like image libraries, filters, templates, and animations. This reduces time and costs, streamlines workflows by minimizing manual efforts, and maintains brand consistency, enabling teams to focus on more value-added services that strengthen customer engagement.
Market Mapping
Startups operate across all segments in the Content Creation space, ranging from content generation to marketplaces to workflow management. A handful of these companies receive significant funding—with platforms like Canva dominating visual image content creation and Grammarly focusing on written content—using AI tools to enhance clarity, accuracy, and engagement. Big Tech firms such as Microsoft and Alphabet provide solutions for written and visual media creation and compete alongside a wide range of startups. Other established providers like Adobe offer integrated solutions that cover the entire content lifecycle—from creation to distribution.
Startups are leading in video and multimedia content creation, offering tools for producing and editing interactive, high-quality videos, including features like polls, discussions, and annotations. Other players, like Contentful and Storyblok, provide content management systems (CMS) designed to help businesses manage and localize content to reach audiences in different regions and compete alongside management solutions like Oracle and SAP. Incumbents lead the content marketplace sector, with platforms like Getty Images and Shutterstock offering extensive collections of user-generated images, videos, and curated content available for purchase.
Written media creation
Visual media creation: Image
Visual media creation: Video
Multi-channel & other media creation
Content marketplace
Content & workflow management
Integrated offering
The Disruptors
Startups in the Content Creation space are taking significant strides by making it easier for businesses and individuals to produce high-quality media. These startups provide easy-to-use platforms for designing visuals, generating copy, and automating content creation tasks. Canva allows users to design polished graphics without needing design skills and is the top-funded startup in the image creation space. In written media, Grammarly holds a strong position, while Vidyard and Animoto support quick video creation and editing. Startups are also creating tools for interactive multimedia, such as Typeform, which offers conversational forms, quizzes, surveys, and options for asynchronous video responses.
Content workflow management startups, such as Contentful and Bynder, offer solutions for organizing, storing, and sharing digital assets. However, in the content marketplace space, new funding and innovation are limited, likely because established companies already hold significant control, with Canva being one of the few exceptions.
Funding History
Competitive Analysis
Incumbents
Incumbents largely focus on written and visual content for creative processes. Corel, for example, is a traditional content creation solution that offers adaptable design tools in its CorelDRAW Graphics Suite, equipped with AI features and advanced font capabilities to compete with startups and support firms’ productivity. Other major players, like Alphabet, enhance design and integration features through partnerships with startups like Photoroom. Additionally, these companies are expanding content creation capabilities through acquisitions, as seen with Microsoft’s purchase of Climpchamp, which provides video editing tools and access to royalty-free elements like overlays and filters.
Established players like Getty Images and Shutterstock dominate the content marketplace space, expanding their market share through acquisitions, such as Shutterstock's purchase of major GIF database Giphy. These platforms offer extensive collections of images, videos, vectors, music, and AI-generated content. In content workflow management, major providers like Oracle and SAP deliver internal solutions to help businesses organize, store, and share digital assets, supporting brand messaging efforts. These centralized libraries streamline content organization and retrieval, reducing time spent on managing assets.
Notable Investors
