Draw tools overview

Last updated on Sep 12, 2025

Explore the drawing tools to create paths, shapes, symbols, and graphs.

Draw tools

Draw tools help you to create, and edit objects and paths and create perspective. You can also add symbols and graphs to your artwork.

Play this animation to see some of the drawing tools in action.

Tool	Function
Pen tool	The Pen tool (P) lets you draw connected lines and curves using anchor points and direction handles.
Pencil tool	The Pencil tool (N) lets you draw freehand paths, like sketching with a pencil on paper..
Add Anchor Point tool	The Add Anchor Point tool (+)lets you add anchor points on paths.
Delete Anchor Point tool	The Delete Anchor Point tool (-) lets you remove anchor points from paths.
Anchor Point tool	The Anchor Point tool (Shift+C) lets you convert corner points to smooth anchor points and adjust the direction handles.
Curvature tool	The Curvature tool (Shift-~) lets you easily draw and edit connected lines and curves using anchor points.

Additional draw tools

Tool	Function
Line Segment tool	The Line Segment tool (\) lets you draw line segments.
Arc tool	The Arc tool lets you draw arcs.
Spiral tool	The Spiral tool lets you draw spirals and rotate them to adjust the size.
Rectangular Grid tool	The Rectangular Grid tool lets you add rectangular grids.
Polar grid tool	The Polar Grid tool lets you add polar grids containing concentric circles and radial divisions.
Rectangle tool	The Rectangle tool (M)lets you draw rectangles and squares.
Rounded Rectangle tool	The Rounded Rectangle tool lets you draw rectangles with rounded corners.
Ellipse tool	The Ellipse tool (L) lets you draw ellipses and circles.
Polygon tool	The Polygon tool lets you draw polygons of up to 1000 sides.
Star tool	The Star tool lets you draw stars of up to 1000 arms.
Flare tool	The Flare tool lets you add flare objects with a bright center, a halo, rays, and rings.
Paintbrush tool	The Paintbrush tool (B)lets you apply brush strokes freehand.
Blob Brush tool	The Blob Brush tool (Shift + B)lets you draw filled shapes freehand.
Smooth tool	The Smooth tool lets you draw over an existing path to smooth it.
Path Eraser tool	The Path Eraser tool lets you erase parts of a path segment by drawing over the path.
Join tool	The Join tool lets you join two paths to create a single path.
Shaper tool	The Shaper tool (Shift-N) lets you sketch rough freehand shapes and converts them into crisp vector shapes.
Symbol Sprayer tool	The Symbol Sprayer tool (Shift-S) lets you create multiple instances of a symbol picked from the Symbols panel.
Symbol Shifter tool	The Symbol Shifter tool lets you rearrange symbol instances in a symbol set.
Symbol Scruncher tool	The Symbol Scruncher tool lets you adjust the spacing between symbol instances in a symbol set.
Symbol Sizer tool	The Symbol Sizer tool lets you resize symbol instances.
Symbol Spinner tool	The Symbol Spinner tool lets you rotate symbol instances.
Symbol Stainer tool	The Symbol Stainer tool lets you gradually change the hue of symbol instances.
Symbol Screener tool	The Symbol Screener tool lets you adjust transparency of symbol instances.
Symbol Styler tool	The Symbol Styler tool lets you apply a style from the Graphic Styles panel to symbol instances.
Column Graph tool	The Column Graph tool (J) lets you create bar graphs with vertical coloums.
Stacked Column Graph tool	The Stacked Column Graph tool lets you create a column graph with partitions that correspond to components of the whole.
Bar Graph tool	The Bar Graph tool lets you create a graph with data presented as horizontal bars.
Stacked Bar Graph tool	The Stacked Bar Graph tool lets you create a bar graph with partitions that correspond to components of the whole.
Line Graph tool	The Line Graph tool lets you create a graph with lines connecting individual data points, showing the data trend.
Area Graph tool	The Area Graph tool lets you create a graph with lines connecting individual data points and fills the area under the line with a solid color.
Scatter Graph tool	The Scatter Graph tool lets you create a graph using x-axis and y-axis values.
Pie Graph tool	The Pie Graph tool lets you create a circular graph with slices corresponding to the proportions of data components.
Radar Graph tool	The Radar Graph tool lets you create a circular graph with axes that grow outward from the center. Each axis represents a variable.
Slice tool	The Slice tool (Shift-K) lets you divide the artboard into different areas and save them as separate images.
Slice Selection tool	The Slice Selection tool lets you select, move, or transform a slice.
Perspective Grid tool	The Perspective Grid tool (Shift-P) lets you show, move, and adjust the perspective grid..
Perspective Selection tool	The Perspective Selection tool (Shift-V) lets you select, move, scale, and duplicate objects that are in perspective, or bring an existing object into perspective.

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