This is a list of free and open source 2D CAD (computer-aided design) software packages.
- FreeCAD - Draft workbench
- About FreeCAD
The Draft Workbench allows you to draw simple 2D objects, and offers several tools to modify them afterwards. It also provides tools to define a working plane, a grid, and a snapping system to precisely control the position of your geometry.
The created 2D objects can be used for general drafting in a way similar to Inkscape or Autocad. These 2D shapes can also be used as the base components of 3D objects created with other workbenches, for example, the Part and Arch Workbenches.
Bentley 3D CAD and 2D CAD software is used by engineers, architects, owners, and construction professionals across every discipline. See which CAD programs are built for each building discipline. Design with 2D and 3D CAD and BIM applications to document buildings of any type or scale and efficiently coordinate with all engineering. AutoCAD is a commercial 2D, and 3D computer-aided design (CAD) software made that has been available since 1982, while a mobile version was released back in 2010. Users can draft up 2D and 3D.
FreeCAD is primarily a 3D modelling application, and thus its 2D tools aren't as advanced as in other drawing programs.
- LibreCAD
Drafters, designers, engineers, students, educators and hobbyists choose DraftSight Standard as an easy-to-use 2D CAD drafting solution. Create, edit, save, view, print and mark up any kind of DWG file, with a familiar user interface that facilitates a quick transition from comparable CAD applications at an affordable price. Access AutoCAD® in the web browser on any computer. With the AutoCAD web app, you can edit, create, and view CAD drawings and DWG files anytime, anywhere. 2D CAD models including CAD blocks, AutoCAD drawings, dwg models for use in your CAD drawings.
LibreCAD is a free Open Source CAD application for Windows, Apple and Linux. Support and documentation is free from our large, dedicated community of users, contributors and developers.
- Solid edge 2D drafting
With a familiar user interface, easy-to-use tools that comply with the most popular drafting standard capabilities to simplify your experience, Solid Edge 2D Drafting has everything you need to quickly and easily create 2D documentation. Solid Edge 2D Drafting offers simple drawing layout, diagramming, annotation, and dimensioning controls that automatically comply with drafting standards, including the International Standards Organization (ISO), American National Standards Institute (ANSI), and British Standards Institution (BSI), among others.
Start your drawing from scratch, or easily import existing .DWG files. An optional step-by-step wizard allows you to preview the drawing, including each individual layer, and control background color, drawing size, line type, font, and more.
When you're finished, you can save your file as either a Solid Edge or .DWG format, allowing you the flexibility to collaborate with customers, peers, and partners, and to easily open your 2D CAD files in nearly any 3D CAD program.
- NanoCAD
NanoCAD is an easy-to-use 2D CAD application that delivers a great user experience by providing high performance, full capability, a classic interface and native .dwg format support. NanoCAD has been built to deliver design and project documentation for all industries. nanoCAD includes a full suite of basic and advanced tools, for creating industry-standard DWG-compatible CAD files. NanoCAD provides innovative, collaborative and customizable features to enhance your efficiency. nanoCAD includes several APIs, allowing anything from routine task automation to complex CAD application development. All for free.
- QCAD Community edition
QCAD is a free, open source application for computer aided drafting (CAD) in two dimensions (2D). With QCAD you can create technical drawings such as plans for buildings, interiors, mechanical parts or schematics and diagrams. QCAD works on Windows, macOS and Linux. The source code of QCAD is released under the GPL version 3 (GPLv3), a popular Open Source license.
QCAD Application WindowQCAD was designed with modularity, extensibility and portability in mind. But what people notice most often about QCAD is its intuitive user interface. QCAD is an easy to use but powerful 2D CAD system for everyone. You don't need any CAD experience to get started with QCAD immediately.
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SourceForge
Open Source 2D-CAD
LibreCAD is a free Open Source CAD application for Windows, Apple and Linux. Support and documentation are free from our large, dedicated community of users, contributors and developers.
You, too, can also get involved!
How it started
LibreCAD started as a project to build CAM capabilities into the community version of QCad for use with a Mechmate CNC router.
Since QCad CE was built around the outdated Qt3 library, it had to be ported to Qt4 before additional enhancements. This gave rise to CADuntu.
The project was known as CADuntu only for a couple of months before the community decided that the name was inappropriate. After some discussion within the community and research on existing names, CADuntu was renamed to LibreCAD.
Porting the rendering engine to Qt4 proved to be a large task, so LibreCAD initially still depended on the Qt3 support library. The Qt4 porting was completed eventually during the development of 2.0.0 series, thanks to our master developer Rallaz, and LibreCAD has become Qt3 free except in the 1.0.0 series.
Meanwhile, for LibreCAD 2.2.0 series, Qt5 is mandatory.
LibreCAD is a feature-packed and mature 2D-CAD application with some really great advantages:
Completely and Utterly Free
No worries about trials, subscriptions, license costs or annual fees.
Open Source and GPLv2
Developed by an experienced team and supported by an awesome community, LibreCAD is also free to hack and copy.
No Language Barriers
It's available in over 30 languages with cross-platform support for macOS, Windows, and Linux.
macOS
Help is needed for macOS deployment.
from SourceForge
Find latest stable DMG packages there.
from GitHub
Find latest stable DMG packages there.
Windows
from SourceForge
Find latest stable EXE installer there.
Also automated nightly build installer for bleeding-edge versions.
from GitHub
Find latest stable EXE installer there.
Also special prerelease installer for beta testing versions.
Linux
Check your distributions preferred package manager, if LibreCAD is available there. But the version may be a bit older.
For Debian/Ubuntu distributions, you can use our Launchpad PPAs for stable or daily versions.
Build from source
This is an option for all platforms.
If we don't have the binary installer you are looking for, you can try to build LibreCAD from source code.
How this works for each platform can be read in our Wiki .
Source code could be downloaded from GitHub as ZIP archive.
Or you can clone or fork our repository, which is recommended if you plan to contribute.
The LibreCAD team is a small group of dedicated people. Lots of things have been worked out, but plenty of bugs and features are still waiting to be solved. How can you help? We need all the skills in the community as coders, writers, testers or translators.
An open source community is a dynamic thing; people come and go as their private situation drives or stops them contributing. So, it will always help if you have existing resources we can use, know what other projects do in specific areas, or, most importantly, do what you do best and have fun doing it!
You don't have to sign a lifetime contract to contribute. Whether you can help others in the forum, garden the wiki, or apply one or many patches, our broad user base will appreciate your work.
Come join our community, and contribute in any way you like.
Developing
If you are an outstanding developer in C++ or a beginner we can use your help.
With a bit of determination, the IRC channel, Zulip chat and the Libre-CAD-dev mailing list, we can help you get started and make progress.
All you need is linked in download section and top links above.
Documentation
Developers usually make bad documentation for users, so if you like making documentation, great!
There have been extensive GUI changes in 2.1 series which need to be documented.
Translation
Help localize LibreCAD, we currently support over 30 languages.
Our translation server is over here: https://translate.librecad.org/ .
You can complete new languages, or request creating translations for a new language in the forum .
As a non-profit, community driven open source project LibreCAD is dependent on having good relationships with friends and sponsors.
Friends
BRL-CAD
BRL-CAD is a powerful open source cross-platform solid modelling system that includes interactive geometry editing, high-performance ray-tracing for rendering and geometric analysis, a system performance analysis benchmark suite, geometry libraries for application developers, and more than 30 years of active development.
BRL-CAD and LibreCAD collaborate in Google programs. We participate under the umbrella of BRL-CAD in Google Code-in and Google Summer of Code where we mentor school pupils and students in participating in open source projects.
Best Free 2d Drawing Software
Sponsors
JetBrains
Online 2d Cad
JetBrains has generously supplied us with CLion licenses for the development of LibreCAD. This powerful IDE helps you develop in C and C++ on Linux, OS X and Windows, enhancing your productivity with a smart editor, code quality assurance, automated refactoring, and deep integration with CMake build system.
