Best Desktop Drawing Software Free

Top 12 Best Free Drawing Softwares

Are your looking for the best free drawing software to create amazing paintings on your PC with a stylus, mouse, or touchscreen? Choose one of the following digital art softwares to do a realistic simulation of grunge effect, watercolors, oils, pastels, charcoal, etc.

1. Clip Studio Paint

Ideal for rendering and inking

Editors' Rating (5/5)
Mac / Win

Pros+

• Brushes can be customized
• Excellent vector tools
• Great coloring options
• User base and community are large
• Many assets for free downloading

This is one of the most popular professional drawing apps for PC. The program was designed to create illustrations, animations, manga, and comics. Currently, over 4 million people use this app.

Many professional artists and illustrators prefer Clip Studio Paint as it provides superior flexibility and freedom. When creating manga or comics, you can do the same things as on paper. However, you have more advantages thanks to digital technology. The program has a huge selection of great drawing tools. The updated version also includes animation features, which makes her one of the best free art programs.

This program can be considered a worthy competitor to classic Photoshop. Now, many artists opt for Clip Studio Paint since it is more universal in many aspects.

2. Paint.NET

Updated version of standard Windows Paint for drawing

Pros+

• Convenient and simple to use
• Lots of functions and effects
• The interface is well-organized
• Online support and useful tutorials

Cons-

• Brushwork is limited
• Burn&Dodge isn't available
• You can't correct text after applying other effects

As well as the name, the program's interface resembles a standard drawing tool integrated into the operating system. But in terms of functionality, Paint.NET is far ahead. This free digital art software perfectly copes with the task of drawing volumetric models, moving objects, and transparent structures.

Because of its simplicity, Paint.NET is perfect for aspiring artists. Besides, it can work quickly even on low-powered devices. Paint.NET supports layers and has a large number of effects. There are tools for blurring, styling, sharpening, and noise reduction. If you wish, the program features can be expanded using plug-ins. Additionally, this free paint program allows you to get images from the scanner and enhance it.

3. GIMP

Top-quality open source drawing software with free plug-ins

Pros+

• Graphics Tablet Support
• Individual file storage format ".xcf" to store texts, textures, layers
• Ability to open PSD files
• Create plug-ins

Cons-

• GIMP is a bit difficult
• The UI is not well-organized
• There are fewer features compared to paid analogs

This is a powerful, flexible, customizable open-source raster picture editor.

This free painting software has a large number of tools that are available in Photoshop: layers, masks, color grading, smart selection, brushes, filters, and tons of other features. The other tools can be added by using third-party extensions. However, the interface and hotkeys are peculiar here. If you're used to Photoshop, you'll have to relearn.

• Check out the best Wacom tablet.

Initially, this product was created as a free alternative to Photoshop. However, the functionality of the application allows you to create drawings from scratch. This best free drawing software includes different "soft" and "hard" brushes with variable features, the possibility of layer-by-layer drawing processing, smoothing and other effects, as well as a large number of additional tools.

4. Corel Painter

Completely free drawing software for professional digital drawing

Editors' Rating (4.8/5)
Mac / Win

Pros+

• Constant updates
• Dozens of tools that imitate real drawing
• User-friendly interface

Cons-

• An upgrade is a bit expensive
• Difficult to understand

Corel Painter is a program originally created for painting. Its functionality does not provide the solution of a wide range of problems, and this is not a universal program at all. However, for digital drawing needs, Corel Painter is well-developed. This drawing software will provide you with an impressive array of professional artist tools. Brushes, oil palettes, watercolor palettes, various paper textures are available for you.

The digital drawing software imitates not only the result of applying a particular tool, but also the process of working with it. When using a pencil, the line thickness will directly depend on the angle of the stylus towards the screen of your tablet. A brush that has just been dipped in the paint will leave a wider and more saturated mark than a brush that has been painting for some time.

5. Krita

Pros+

• Up-to-date UI with a nice layout
• Improved OpenGL
• Many brushes
• Layers are available
• HDR is supported

Cons-

• Lacks image retouching tools
• After updating you may have lags
• Inconvenient text tool

Many professionals prefer this program. The application doesn't limit the size of the virtual canvas. It depends on the performance of your PC. Krita imitates real canvases, emulates various drawing tools, and the effects container includes many artistic effects. Therefore, the process of creating digital drawings is as realistic as possible. Besides, this free digital art software works smoothly with layers, contains tools for drawing post-processing and provides a high level of detail.

• Read more how to fix Wacom tablet lagging.

It is interesting that initially Krita was developed as a drawing tool, but now the program can boast of many additional functions for editing ready-made digital pictures and can be considered as a competitor of Adobe Photoshop.

6. Mischief

Editors' Rating (4.5/5)
Mac / Win

Pros+

• Free version was updated
• The price of the paid version is lower now
• Unlimited canvas
• Decent interface
• Many brushes

Cons-

• Lacks nice standard brushes

The new version of the application for drawing has unlimited canvas and cool brushes that can be scaled. The UI is now panel-based and its elements are located across the screen. Because of a smaller large number of tools, this free painting software provides you with a larger canvas.

One of the advantages of this program is the ability to get an image with broadly sketched parts and, at the same time, well-detailed other areas.

In general, the new version of this free paint program is a worthy continuation of the previous ones. You can stretch the canvas to the desired size. You can also zoom in. Among the new features, I would mention multi-touch support, extra docks for brushes, trackpad support for Macs, and two new custom swatch color palettes.

7. MyPaint

Editors' Rating (4/5)
Mac / Win / Linux

Pros+

• Works on all platforms
• Many special features
• A great free option for manga and anime artists

Cons-

• The undo feature could be faster
• Some problems with the GUI when choosing brushes
• Sharp Lines are not smooth enough

The graphic editor is focused on beginning artists. This is one of the best free drawing programs that has a simple interface along with unlimited canvas sizes. This software allows you to immerse in the process of painting, removing all additional panels and settings from the program's desktop. The application offers the chance to select brushes. All of them are divided into three sections: "Classic", "Experimental", and "Favorite". In addition, MyPaint contains an interesting tool called "Notepad". This is a kind of draft where you can try how different brushes paint.

8. Microsoft Paint 3D

Editors' Rating (2.5/5)
Windows 10

Pros+

• 3D image creation and editing is very easy
• It is possible to share 3D images online
• The creation process can be played back

Cons-

• 2D objects can't be extruded
• No 3D captures mobile app
• Lacks standard picture editing tools

If you use Windows 10, Paint 3D is built into your system by default. If this is not your case, you can download Paint 3D from the Microsoft app store for free following this link. Using this free art software, you can accomplish three main tasks: create your own three-dimensional object, place it in the composition and make it animated. Creating and working with primitive three-dimensional objects in Paint 3D is very simple. Select the desired object on the list on the right side of the screen, for example, a cone. Left-clicking on the canvas, you create this shape. As soon as you release the left mouse button, a box consisting of four adjustment rings will appear around the object. Three of them will direct the cone in space. The fourth, located in the upper left corner, will move the object closer or further away from you.

9. Artweaver Free

Editors' Rating (3/5)
Windows 7, Windows 8 or Windows 10

Pros+

• Many creative brushes
• You can automate the work using scripts
• Small installation file size (less than 20MB)
• Creative painting tools

Cons-

• Poor work with text
• Problematic drawing with the stamp tool

Some users call this free paint program as an analog of Corel Painter, while others claim that Artweaver is close in functionality to the fifth version of Photoshop. Anyway, Artweaver allows you to perform most standard photo-editing operations efficiently. It far surpasses the built-in editors of graphic viewers.

A user is offered a rich set of various brushes (chalk, charcoal, pencil, acrylic fibers, sponge, oil). There is the ability to work with layers, import and export graphics in various formats. Artweaver also has all kinds of filters that can be used while editing drawings (wind effect, blur, waves, granulation, oil effect, etc.). Moreover, this best free drawing software has the feature to draw textures. Artweaver also has Plugins Pack that contains many additional filters.

10. PixBuilder Studio

Editors' Rating (3/5)
Windows 7, Windows 8 or Windows 10

Pros+

• Primitives are available
• Text can be corrected
• Multi-layer select
• Layers can be grouped

Cons-

• You can't edit text in-place
• Lack of color swatches
• It's impossible to delete outlines from primitive

PixBuilderStudio is painting software for Windows that allows you to perform all the basic operations including correction, processing, and creating images. We can't compare the program with full-fledged commercial editors, but it competes on equal terms with popular Paint.net and StylePix.

The program interface is clear and convenient. It fully complies with the requirements for programs of this kind. It has a large selection of tools for work with colors, manipulating layers, applying various effects. By the way, this paint software supports plug-ins for Photoshop. Perhaps not all, but most plug-ins should work in the program.

11. Gravit

Editors' Rating (3/5)
Win / Mac / Linux / Chrome OS

Pros+

• Easy and understandable interface
• It is possible to re-use the same element several times
• Sketch files are supported

Cons-

• Sometimes lags
• The overall functionality is rough around the edges
• The Sketch import works poorly

Gravit is a graphics editor that has both an online version and desktop applications for all major platforms. This digital painting software has a complete set of tools necessary for work with vector graphics. The application supports curves, layers, geometric shapes, various selection and transformation tools, texts and many other functions for manipulating objects.

Gravit can also be used as a raster graphics editor. There are such functions as cropping, masks, blending, resizing, and adding filters. It is very useful when designing interfaces, creating layouts for web pages and printing products. In addition, the program has access to a huge library of vector objects that can be used in your work for free.

12. MediBang Paint Pro

Editors' Rating (3/5)
Win / Mac

Pros+

• Very simple interface
• Many patterns and brushes
• Supports various input modes

Cons-

• Some annoying advertising when you open the program

This is a specialized tool that will appeal to those, who create comics, anime, and manga. The application is very simple, fast and at the same time absolutely free. MediBang Paint Pro library has over 800 pre-installed backgrounds and anime-themed templates. Besides, there are about 50 brushes and a big choice of free fonts. I like that there is a built-in cloud where you can upload your works for free and not litter the space on your computer. MediBang also works great with .PSD files, which is non-typical for free paint programs.

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Ann Young

Hi there, I'm Ann Young - a professional blogger, read more

Best Desktop Drawing Software Free

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