Both Placeit and Smartmockups are popular tools for creating mockups and POD materials.
However, despite their core similarities, they differ, meaning one tool may better suit your business needs than the other.
If you’re unsure which one to pick, we’re here to help you by comparing both tools’ key features, pros and cons, and pricing.
Read on to learn who the Placeit vs. Smartmockups duel winner will be.
Let’s dive in!
Start creating for Free!
Showcase your E-commerce products like big brands, without costing a fortune
Placeit vs. Smartmockups: The Overview Table
Before we explore Placeit and Smartmockups in more detail, let’s briefly overview their main characteristics.
Placeit: Overview
Placeit is an online tool for creating logos, videos, designs, and mockups. Its interface is easy to use, making it beginner-friendly.
One of Placeit’s strongest suits is a vast library of customizable templates and design assets.
Thanks to this versatility, Placeit comes in handy for:
- Branding purposes,
- Creating marketing and advertising materials, and
- Designing product packaging and merchandise.
Placeit: Key Features
1. Templates Library
Placeit has an extensive Template Library that spans 5 main categories:
✨ Mockups,
✨ Designs,
✨ Logos,
✨ Videos, and
✨ Gaming.
Each category has multiple subcategories with further subcategories, resulting in a total of more than 55 thousand ready-to-go templates.
In addition to customizable templates, Placeit offers the option to start designing from scratch and arrange text, pictures, graphics, and backgrounds to meet your needs.
2. Customization Possibilities
- Although customization options may differ depending on the template type, you’ll see a customization menu on the right.
- Again, depending on the template type, you’ll be able to add, change, edit, and re-position the text, change colors, add additional graphic elements, etc.
- On the right, you’ll see Placeit’s suggestions for similar designs you might like.
- Regarding design process, you can upload an image from your device, the recent uploads, or from Placeit’s Library.
- Once you’ve chosen the image, you can crop it, set the background and position it. A good thing is that you can immediately see the applied changes.
- When it comes to colors, you can choose any color from the palette and set the default and custom colors for your design.
- Once you’ve finished, you can save it as a draft in a folder on the plaform or post it directly on social media.
- However, you can’t download your design unless you are a subscriber.
📌 Note:
At this moment, Placeit doesn’t support uploading custom PSD mockups.
3. Tools
Besides the Templates Library, Placeit comes with a thorough Learn section that provides resources on design and marketing, as well as design tools.
3.1. My Placeit
My Placeit represents a folder you can access once you’ve logged in and where you can store and organize your designs.
You can create multiple folders, name them accordingly, and move your designs from one folder to another.
In addition, you can also save your favorite designs and copy them to make slightly different variations later.
3.2. Editing Tools
In the Learn section, you’ll also find image editing tools, such as:
- Background Remover – Removes the background of your uploaded image, which you can then download as a transparent one.
- Image Resizer – Enables you to choose your JPG or PNG image size from a dropdown menu or a custom pixel size.
- Video Cropper – Allows you to trim, crop and resize your MP4 or MOV videos according to pre-defined social media video sizes or your required video size.
- Video to GIF Converter – Lets you upload your file, choose a size from a dropdown menu, or type a custom dimension to convert your video.
- Brand Kit – Provides various branding assets such as logos, colors, and typefaces you can apply to your design to match your brand.
Placeit: Pricing
Placeit has a Freemium Plan with limited access to templates and no possibility to download and sell your designs. In addition, free designs have a watermark.
Subscription starts from $6.67 per month.
Placeit: Pros & Cons
The following are Placeit’s main pros and cons, according to the GetApp users,
Pros:
🟢 Has a rich template gallery.
🟢 Has video templates and editing options.
🟢 Beginner-friendly.
Cons:
🔴 Doesn’t offer a bulk functionality.
🔴 The mockup library could be refreshed more frequently.
🔴 Doesn’t offer a mockup API.
Smartmockups: Overview
Smartmockups is an online tool for creating high-resolution mockups right inside your browser.
As the name suggests, its main focus is mockups for marketing and promotion, making it less versatile than Placeit.
On the other hand, Smartmockup’s Mockups Library is vast, holding more than 12,000 templates.
In addition, the platform is intuitive and beginner-friendly.
Smartmockups: Key Features
1. Mockups Library
The Mockups Library has 6 key categories:
✨ Technology
✨ Packaging
✨ Apparel
✨ Home & living, and
✨ Seasonal.
Each category has multiple subcategories, with the Technology and Print categories being the largest.
When it comes to selecting mockups, you can filter them according to whether they are free or paid, popular, containing photos or isolated 3D renders, etc.
2. Customization Possibilities
- Before you can customize your design, you need to upload your image, and there are 2 ways to do so: from Dropbox or your device or by taking a screenshot from the URL.
- Regarding customization, you can select a color from the palette or the preset colors, which come in solid, light, and dark hues.
- When it comes to image positioning, you have more options than with Placeit.
- Thus, you have multiple alignment options and rotate and flip possibilities. Like with Placeit, you can immediately see the applied changes. You can also choose between Fit, Fill, and Stretch options.
- When you finish your design, you can download it in Medium, High, or Super High image quality.
📌 Note:
There is also an option to create a custom mockup, but it is only available for Smartmockups PRO plan subscription.
Naturally, it allows for more customization and editing options with 3D mesh warp functions, eraser tools, blending modes, etc.
3. Editing Tools
On top of some of the editing tools we’ve already mentioned, Smartmockups offers additional editing tools to further customize your designs:
- Crop Presets – Offers 6 pre-made crop presets, including the Facebook cover, or you can set your own preset.
- Transparent Background – Allows you to change the background with color, gradient, background image, or make the mockup transparent.
- Branding Feature – Lets you add your own logo or icon as a watermark to all your exported mockups.
- Multiply blending mode – Helps the marked printing area become transparent to illuminate highlights and shadows.
- Overlay image – Enables you to add an image topper layer, such as a thumb over the screen, screen glare, etc.
Smartmockups: Pricing
Smartmockups have a Freemium Plan with access to only basic features and limited access to mockup templates.
On the other hand, the Pro Plan costs $14 per month.
Smartmockups: Pros & Cons
The following are Placeit’s main pros and cons, according to the Trustpilot users.
Pros:
🟢 Has a vast mockup gallery.
🟢 Enables you to create interactive mockups.
🟢 Beginner-friendly.
Cons:
🔴 Doesn’t have a text editor.
🔴 Not as versatile as Placeit.
🔴 Could have banners included in the Free Plan.
📌 Note:
In case you haven’t heard, Smartmockups has announced the closure of its stand-alone operations as of September 27, 2024.
After this period, you’ll be able to access Smartmockups’ mockup products in Canva.
Actually, ever since September 30, 2023, Smartmockups hasn’t added any new content or feature developments.
Placeit vs. Smartmockups: Final Verdict
Choosing the right tool depends on multiple factors, such as capabilities and functionalities, pricing, etc.
If you need a more universal tool that allows you to create a variety of marketing material, Placeit can be a go-to solution.
On the other hand, if you are into mockups, Smartmockups might be the right tool for you.
Still, bear in mind that soon, you’ll only be able to access and customize its products on Canva, which might be a deal breaker.
However, neither solution offers the bulk creation, a time-saving and efficient feature when it comes to creating mockups.
But Dynamic Mockups does. 🚀
Why Should You Opt For Dynamic Mockups?
Dynamic Mockups is an automated mockup generator tool for POD businesses that allows you to generate a large number of high-quality mockups.
🔥 Therefore, our stellar feature, Bulk Create, lets you upload multiple designs and color combinations and automatically create all mockup variations.
In other words, you don’t have to create all of them manually. Actually, it takes about 10 seconds for 100 mockup variations.
🔥 Our evergrowing Public Template Library provides various apparel and wall art mockups to help you create real-life ones and increase the purchase possibilities.
🔥 You can customize these mockups further with our set of editing tools, which include smart objects, blending modes, rotation, print layouts, etc.
🔥 Another feature that sets Dynamic Mockups apart is our API, which allows you to easily create and customize Mockups from Photoshop templates at scale.
Thus, you can create your own, find free Photoshop mockups (or buy them), customize them to reflect your brand, and better resonate with your target audience.
Finally, you can upload them to Dynamic Mockups and automate the mockup creation.
🔔 Coming Soon
Soon, you‘ll be able to sync mockups with your eCommerce Storefront, starting with Etsy and Shopify integrations.
In addition, we’re about to add a Design Library to simplify the process of adding designs to Dynamic Mockups without reuploading them.
Besides adding files from your local files, you’ll be able to connect your Google Drive, Dropbox, and OneDrive to transfer designs from external storage to our platform.
Enticed to learn more?
Start with Dynamic Mockups for free to see why we are a Placeit and Smartmockups worthy alternative.
Start creating for Free!
Showcase your E-commerce products like big brands, without costing a fortune
Keep Learning:
We’ve Tried 6 Placeit Alternatives – Here’s Our Feedback
