User Guide Cancel

Draw and edit shapes

Last updated on

Illustrator User Guide
Get to know Illustrator
1. Introduction to Illustrator
2. Workspace
3. Tools in Illustrator
  1. Tools at a glance
  2. Select tools
  3. Navigate tools
    1. Hand
    2. Rotate View
    3. Zoom
  4. Paint tools
  5. Text tools
  6. Draw tools
    1. Pen
    2. Add Anchor Point
    3. Delete Anchor Point
    4. Anchor Point
    5. Curvature
    6. Line Segment
    7. Rectangle
    8. Rounded Rectangle
    9. Ellipse
    10. Polygon
    11. Star
    12. Paintbrush
    13. Blob Brush
    14. Pencil
    15. Shaper
    16. Slice
  7. Modify tools
    1. Rotate
    2. Reflect
    3. Scale
    4. Shear
    5. Width
    6. Free Transform
    7. Eyedropper
    8. Blend
    9. Eraser
    10. Scissors
4. Quick actions
Illustrator on the iPad
1. Introduction to Illustrator on the iPad
2. Workspace
3. Documents
  1. Work with documents in Illustrator on the iPad
  2. Import Photoshop and Fresco documents
4. Select and arrange objects
  1. Create repeat objects
  2. Blend objects
5. Drawing
  1. Draw and edit paths
  2. Draw and edit shapes
6. Type
7. Work with images
  1. Vectorize raster images
8. Color
  1. Apply colors and gradients
Cloud documents
1. Basics
2. Troubleshooting
  1. Troubleshoot create or save issues for Illustrator cloud documents
  2. Troubleshoot Illustrator cloud documents issues
Add and edit content
Import, export, and save
1. Import
2. Creative Cloud Libraries in Illustrator
  1. Creative Cloud Libraries in Illustrator
3. Save
  1. Save artwork
4. Export
Printing
1. Prepare for printing
2. Printing
Automate tasks
Troubleshooting

Learn how to create shapes using Shape tool and how to edit shapes using Combine shapes panel in Illustrator on the iPad.

You can create various primitive shapes using Shape tools and build complex shapes using the Combine shapes panel in Illustrator on the iPad.

Create basic shapes

Rectangle	Tap Rectangle tool in the toolbar. Drag on the canvas to draw a rectangle.
Circle	Double-tap or long press the Shape tool group and then tap the Circle tool. Drag on the canvas to draw an ellipse.
Triangle	Double-tap or long press the Rectangle tool and then tap the Triangle tool. Drag on the canvas to draw a live triangle. To create a polygon, drag to change the number of sides using on-canvas controls.
Star	Double-tap or long press the Rectangle tool and then tap the Star tool. Drag on the canvas to draw a star object.
Line	Double-tap or long press the Rectangle tool and then tap the Line tool. Drag on the canvas to draw a line.

Note:

You can also use the primary touch shortcut or use Smart Guides to create a perfect circle from the Ellipse tool, a square from the Rectangle tool, and an equilateral triangle from the Triangle tool.

Edit shapes

When you select a rectangle or a triangle (polygon), a corner point is displayed on the selected shape. You can drag this corner point to create smooth and curved corners for the selected shape.

To edit the shape, select the shape with Direct Selection tool and then edit the paths.

Combine shapes

With the Combine Shapes panel, you can easily create complex shapes by merging and overlapping regions of paths. It works on simple and compound paths.

Illustrator intuitively highlights edges and regions of the selected art, which can be merged to form new shapes. An edge is the section of a path that does not intersect any other path of the selected objects. A region is a closed area bounded by edges.

To open the Combine shapes panel, tap in the taskbar and choose one of the following options:

Shape Builder to intuitively produce shape combinations from overlapping paths by using natural gestures like scribble and drag to delete and merge.
See also: Build new shapes with Shaper and Shape Builder tools in Illustrator on the desktop.

Combine shape options to combine paths. You can change from one option to the other without affecting the paths involved. To convert the results to native paths, tap the Convert to path option.

Combine all: Tap to combine two or more shapes to form a single shape.
Minus front: Tap to remove the overlapped region of the front shape from the shape below.
Intersect: Tap to retain only the intersected part of the two or more overlapped shapes.
Exclude overlap: Tap to exclude the intersected region of two overlapped shapes and retain the other regions.
Divide all: Divide the shapes that you combined into individual shapes.
Convert to path: Convert the shape into a path object for further editing.

If you want to modify similar curves or lines of complex shapes without having to edit each anchor point one at a time, use the Shape aware transform tool.

Transform shapes

With the Shape transform tool , you can analyze and modify the geometric structure of complex shapes without manually adjusting each path and anchor point.

Transform shapes using Shape transform tool

Select the object using the Selection tool .
Tap the Direct selection tool to enable the Shape aware transform tool.
Select the Shape aware transform tool to view the geometric construct of the object.
Tap the path you want to modify.
Press and hold the center of the touch shortcut icon and tap the path to select or deselect a path.
Drag the path to modify the shape of the object.

Got a question or an idea?

If you have a question to ask or an idea to share, come and participate in Adobe Illustrator Community. We'd love to hear from you.