Graphics software provider Canva has announced the launch of Canva Whiteboards, enabling users to workshop, brainstorm and collaborate with colleagues directly inside the Canva platform.

Customers who want to use the new whiteboarding tool need to first open a new Canva Presentation, right-click on a slide, and click "expand to whiteboard." They can then add and react to ideas with the new Whiteboards panel by using stickies, voting graphics, shapes and lines. Users will also have access to Canva's library of 100 million images, videos, audio tracks, which can be added onto a whiteboard.

If a planning session is time sensitive, Canva's new synced timer feature will show users how long the session has been going on. Special alerts let teams know when they have 10 seconds left in a session, and when the time's up.

The Canva Whiteboards user interface provides a wide variety of templates.

Whiteboards can be shared with teams as a link or downloaded to capture the highlights, by selecting the elements you want to send, right-clicking, and downloading the relevant selection.

Canva also provides users with hundreds of templates to choose from, including flow charts, mind maps, wireframes, kanban boards, seating charts, and org designs.

Sticky notes, advanced shapes and connecting lines help illustrate complex flows while Canva's quick-flow automation allows users to add preconnected shapes and elements.

Canva brings whiteboarding to remote work environments

Charlotte Norman, global head of product at Canva, said that whiteboarding has long been foundational to workplace creativity and as it increasingly moves online as people work in remote or hybrid environments, Canva wanted to help facilitate this creativity among its customers.

After the launch of Canva Presentations, Norman said the company began to see an uptake in the number of customers who were using presentations to conduct brainstorming sessions and decided to develop a better way for Canva users to collaborate without being limited by a fixed canvas.

"At Canva, we enable people to take their ideas and turn them into designs with ease but one thing we have heard from our community is they wanted a better way to ideate as a team inside Canva itself, before they actually start creating," she said.

Alongside the launch of Canva Whiteboards, Canva has also made changes to its subscription tiers. While still providing a free offering, Canva Pro is now for solo users and Canva for Teams is a new plan available for teams of two or more people. Canva Pro and Canva for Teams are priced at$119.99 and$149.90 per year, respectively, and Canva Whiteboards will be available to Canva users around the world via web, desktop, and mobile, and across both the free and paid-for tiers.  Founded 10 years ago, Canva has grown rapidly and now claims to have 75 million monthly users working in 100 languages.