Photoshop and Figma are general-purpose design tools. They can do everything, including App Store screenshots. But App Store screenshots are a narrow design surface with very specific constraints (exact dimensions per device class, repetitive layouts across panels, batch-export per locale, device-frame rendering) that general-purpose tools handle awkwardly.
Browser-native screenshot tools — Screenshotify being one, but the category includes AppLaunchpad, Previewed, AppMockUp, MockUPhone, and a few others — are purpose-built for this narrow surface. They're faster for the specific job. The trade-off is they don't handle adjacent jobs (general graphic design, photo editing).
Photoshop for App Store screenshots usually involves: setting up an artboard at the right dimensions, importing a device-frame asset (usually downloaded from Apple's Design Resources or a free PSD pack), positioning the screenshot inside the frame, masking corners, adding text layers, adjusting Smart Object scaling. Multiply by every device class.
Browser tools handle this as a tap: pick a device, drop a screenshot, the frame renders. Save per-locale variants without re-running the setup. The setup time goes from an hour to about thirty seconds.
Figma can solve the repetition problem via components, variants, and auto-layout. The setup cost is real — a properly-componentized App Store screenshot system in Figma takes a day or two to build the first time. After that it's fast, but the trade-off is that any non-trivial change to the system (new device class, new locale, new aspect ratio) requires rebuilding components.
For an in-house design team shipping screenshots quarterly, the Figma investment pays off. For an indie dev shipping screenshots twice a year, it doesn't.
Manual export per device × per locale in Photoshop or Figma means clicking through hundreds of export operations for a multi-locale submission. Browser tools generate the entire ZIP in one click. This is where the time savings stack up — every additional locale you ship in is roughly free.
If your screenshot involves photo backgrounds with non-trivial retouching (color grading a real photo, removing distracting elements, fixing skin tones in lifestyle shots), Photoshop still does it best. Browser tools can apply CSS-style filters (blur, brightness, contrast, saturation) but not selective retouching.
For most App Store screenshots — which use either solid gradients or relatively simple device screenshots, not retouched photos — this isn't a real limitation.
Multiply, overlay, screen, color-dodge — the full Photoshop blend-mode set is rarely available in browser tools. Most App Store screenshots use straight opacity and shadow effects, not creative blend modes. If your design depends on a specific multiply-blended texture overlay, Photoshop wins.
App Preview videos (30-second auto-play clips on the App Store page) need video editing. After Effects, Premiere, Final Cut, or similar. Browser tools handle screenshots but not video compositing, so for the video side of the App Store page you still need a separate tool.
Many indie teams settle on a hybrid: