Melanie Perkins, Cliff Obrecht, and Cameron Adams founded Canva in Australia in 2013.
The company developed an online graphic-design platform intended to make visual design accessible to people without specialist software training. Perkins and Obrecht had previously created Fusion Books, an online school-yearbook business, while Adams brought engineering and product experience from the technology sector.
Canva grew by offering browser-based templates, drag-and-drop editing, and collaborative tools for presentations, social-media graphics, documents, and other visual content. It is sometimes confused with Figma because both are web-based design companies, but their core products and histories differ. Canva's Australian origin is an important part of its entrepreneurship story.