6 Free Vector Graphic Editors

There are many graphic designer jobs that require the use of graphic design editors to create and edit vector graphics. Some of these jobs are logo designers, website designers, graphic illustrators, UX designers, UI designers, motion graphic designers, package designers and more.

Web designers sometimes need to create and edit vector graphics. These vector graphics can include logos, icons, wireframes, page elements, banners, infographics and much more. Vector graphic design editors let you do this.

There are free and paid vector graphic editors, but this article lists ones that are free to use, a free trial version or a free version.

What Are Vector Graphics?

You may ask yourself, what are vector graphics? To keep it simple, vector graphics are images  made on a computer that are created by vector graphic software. As a graphic designer, you use vector graphic software to create these vector graphics. The key to vector graphics, is that these vector graphic software tools use mathematical equations to create these vector graphics. This means that these vector graphics can be scaled up or down to any size without losing resolution, compared to raster graphics, which start to lose resolution as they are scaled up or down in size.

So, whether you are looking for a vector graphic editor to create vector graphics for fun, or to become a graphic designer or looking for a job in graphic design, this article will help you find a good graphic design editor for your situation.

1. Lunacy Editor

Lunacy is a free vector graphics editor provided by icons8.com. It has everything that all of the similar paid graphics editors have.

Lunacy lets work with other users that are on other platforms on the same design in real-time.

You can use Lunacy’s built-in icons, photos and illustrations that are pulled from its website. If you can link to icons8.com in your final work, you can use their content for free. You can also decide to go with one of their paid subscription plans and not have to link.

Some of the tools that Luncay provides are the Background Remover tool, Image Upscaler tool, Avatar Generator tool and the Text Generator tool.

You can use Lunacy without needing to be connected to the internet. You need to download it to your computer.

You can work on Lunacy locally on your computer, and can also collaborate with other users over the internet. Lunacy allows up to 10 users to collaborate.

You can also save your documents to your computer and what you save to your computer is not automatically uploaded to the Cloud. It stays on your computer.

Learning how to use Lunacy is similar to using Sketch and Figma, so if you have experience using either of those then learning to use Lunacy will be very easy. Even if you have not used either of those programs, learning to use Lunacy is very easy.

Lunacy works with the .sketch file format and Lunacy lets you import .sketch files to Figma or XD.

Lunacy works on Windows, Macs and Linux computers.

2. InkScape

InkScape is a free and open-source graphics software tool that is almost as good as any paid vector graphics editor. You can do almost anything that you can do in a paid vector graphics editor like Illustrator.

It is mainly used to create and edit vector graphics, but is also compatible with the following type of files: JPG, PNG, PostScript, EPS, BMP and TIP.

InkScape’s tool set includes the Select and Transform tool, Edith Paths, Tweak Objects, Zoom, Measurement, Squares and Rectangles, 3D Boxes, Circles, Ellipses, and Arcs, Stars and Polygons, Spirals, Draw Freehand Lines, Bezier Pen, Draw Calligraphic or Brush Strokes, Text Objects, Spray Objects, Erase Existing Paths, Fill Bounded Areas, Create and Edit Gradients, Meshes, Pick Colors From Image and Diagram Connectors.

InkScape has more than just these tools to create vector shapes such as rectangles, ellipses, polygons, arcs, spirals, stars and 3D boxes as well as text.

InkScape is available on Windows, Linus and Macs.

3. Vectr

Vectr is a free graphic software that is used to create vector graphics. It let’s you create and edit vector graphics. It is good for creating logos and icons.

Vectr is very easy to learn and the tools are intuitive. It lets you share a real time view of your work on Vectr with anyone that is using it so that they can see what you are doing on the desktop version.

The tools include the Text tool, Pencil tool, Pen tool, Arrange Elements tool, Shape tools, Align Elements tool, Gradients tool, Pathfinders tool and the Fills and Strokes too.

You have to sign up in order to be able to save your files. You can export your design in three different file formats: PNG, JPG, and SVG

Vectr has an online version and a cross-platform desktop version and also has a Chrome extension.

4. SketchPad

SketchPad is a browser based graphic design editor that let’s you create and edit vector graphics.

The set of tools that SketchPad has includes: the Select tool, the Crop & Resize tool, the Line tool, Brush tools,  Shape tool, Fill tool, Clip Art tool, Text tool and the Vector Fill tool.

You can create your designs and save them to the following file formats: .JPG, .PNG, .PDF, .SVG and .sketchpad.

Sketchpad also lets you connect to your Google Drive.

SketchPad is free to use.

5. Adobe Illustrator

Adobe Illustrator is one of the best vector graphic design editors out there for creating vector graphics that are meant for the internet such as logos, icons, flyers, infographics, UI page elements and more.

It has a great toolset that includes: the Pen tool, the Paint Brush tool, the Shape tool, the Type tool, the Selection tool, the Direct Selection tool, the Pen tool, the Curvature tool, the Rotate tool, the Eraser, the Scissors tool, the Shape Builder tool, the Gradient tool, the Mesh tool, the Eyedropper tool, the Width tool, the Blend tool, the ArtBoard tool, the Zoom tool and more.

Adobe has a suite of design software and using Illustrator allows you to seamlessly go from software to another, for example, you can go to and from Illustrator and Photoshop, then take those Illustrator files and import them into InDesign.

Abode Illustrator is available for MacOS, Windows as well as iPads.

Illustrator offers a free 7 day trial and is available as a stand alone product for $20.99 or as part of the Adobe Creative suite for $54.99 per month on a yearly subscription.

6. Figma

Figma is a powerful wireframing and prototyping software that is a browser based software so it is available to anyone who has an internet connection. Compared to most other powerful graphic design software which requires you to download its software to your computer or laptop.

Figma is meant to be used by UX and UI designers to create wireframes, prototypes and web interfaces, but can also be used to create logos, icons and other graphics.

Figma is free to use for personal use. You have to pay if you want to share your work with other designers.

Figma’s free Starter plan lets you work with 3 Figam files and 3 FigJam files.

Figma lets you store three active projects at a time. This is good enough to give it a try and to work on small projects. If you want to use it professionally, you will want to get on one of their paid plans.

Figma has two paid options. Figma’s Professional plan is $12 per month for each user and billed annually or you can pay $15 month to month. Figma’s Organization plan is $45 per month per user and billed annually.

Conclusion

If you’re a graphic designer, you most likely want to have a portfolio website. To do that, you will need web hosting, and it doesn’t have to be expensive. Most portfolio websites can get by just fine with cheap web hosting.

So whether you are looking for a free vector graphic editor for personal use, are looking to learn graphic design to get a graphic design job or currently work as a graphic designer, this list of vector graphic editors should give you a good idea of what’s available.