The grid drawing tool trusted by 170,000+ artists. Upload a reference photo, set the grid to match your paper, and export it as PNG or PDF.
Image was generated with AIUpload a reference photo, then set the cell size in real centimetres or inches.
Drag and drop an image here
or click to browse
From photo to gridded reference in under a minute
Drop in a photo, a painting, or a screenshot. JPG, PNG and WebP up to 20MB work — straight from your phone camera too.
Choose the cell size in centimeters or inches, pick a line color that stays visible on your photo, and drag the grid until the lines sit where they help you.
Print the PDF or open the PNG on a tablet. Draw the matching grid on your paper and work through it cell by cell.
Built for how artists actually work with grids
In Grid on Image mode the grid lies directly on your photo and follows its real dimensions — right for working from a printed reference.
In Grid on Canvas mode you define the physical canvas first — DIN A0–A5, US Letter, Legal or a custom size in cm or inches — and the photo is fitted inside it. The grid belongs to the canvas, so it matches the paper in front of you.
Change grid size, columns or rows and the other two values recompute automatically, fractional values included.
Set the cell size in centimeters or inches, from 0.1 to 100 — not just a number of squares.
Drag the grid with the mouse or a finger, or nudge it with the arrow keys, until the lines sit between the eyes instead of across them.
Coordinate labels give every cell an address like B4 — columns run A to Z, rows are numbered. Useful for tutorials and classrooms.
In fullscreen, focus mode dims everything except the cells you select, so you draw one square at a time.
Nine overlays: rule of thirds, golden ratio, golden spiral, root-2 and root-3 rectangles, Loomis horizon, center cross, bilateral and radial symmetry.
The golden spiral can be detached from the canvas, dragged onto any feature, scaled from 25 to 250 percent and rotated freely.
Color, line width and opacity are adjustable so the overlay stays visible on any photo.
One slider controls the outline strength — thresholds, blur and noise cleanup are set automatically behind it.
The engine picks a soft or hard edge algorithm based on your photo’s measured contrast.
Processing runs in a web worker in your browser. The photo never leaves your device.
Export as PNG for digital use or as a single-page PDF sized for A4, A3, Letter or Legal.
Poster print slices your reference across multiple sheets — A0 down to A5, Letter, Legal or Tabloid — with cut lines, glue strips and assembly guides. Wall-sized references from a home printer.
A true-to-size check confirms that grid squares print at exactly the configured size, and a DPI readout warns about low-resolution sources before you waste paper.
Upload your drawing next to the reference and check it with nine modes: side by side, mirror, squint blur, difference, a neon heatmap, multiply, screen, outline and a split wipe.
Up to 20 draggable ruler lines mark alignments across both images.
One click sends the comparison result back into the grid maker — no re-upload.
Open the compare tool →The grid method is a drawing technique in which you place a grid over a reference image and copy what you see one cell at a time. Instead of judging a whole face or landscape at once, you compare short lines and simple shapes inside each square — which is far easier for your eye to measure. Artists have worked this way for centuries: Albrecht Dürer published instructions for grid devices in 1525, and the method is still taught in art schools today.
It is not tracing. You draw every line yourself; the grid only gives you fixed reference points to check your proportions against. Most beginners see a clear difference in their first gridded drawing.
Purpose-built pages for specific jobs
What a drawing grid does, which cell size fits your subject, and how to transfer it to paper.
The artist workflow: real cm/inch cells, canvas presets from A5 to A0, and a grid you can drag onto the features.
Add a grid to any photo — with edge detection and in-browser processing, so your photo never leaves your device.
Exact cell sizes, fractional columns and rows, and full control over every grid line.
How photorealist portraits and murals are built cell by cell — and how to start your own piece.
The fastest route: upload, set the cells, download — processed in your browser.
Overlay your drawing on the reference photo to spot proportion errors while you can still fix them.
High-resolution grid paper as PDF — for drawing on paper without a screen nearby.
Techniques, tips and tutorials
Image was generated with AIGrid drawing for beginners: put the same number of squares on your reference and your paper, then copy one square at a time to keep proportions true.
Image was generated with AIGrid drawing for beginners: how to set up matching grids, which pencils to use, how to copy square by square, and how to fix a drawing that drifts.
Image was generated with AIGraphite portraits with a grid: how many divisions across the head, the proportion checks that fix likeness, and a four-pencil shading order.
Set the grid to match your paper and start drawing.
