Draw with characters. Then redraw the characters.

A free ASCII art and animation editor: layers, frames, a timeline, any color you want, and a font you can edit while you draw.

Try it in your browser Download for Windows

The Asciitect editor: the pencil is chosen, then a glyph and a color, and a wavy line is drawn in the sky of a sunset made of characters. — Pick a tool, choose a glyph, change the color, draw. This is the editor itself, recorded as it runs.▶ GIF · LOOPS

Windows today, Linux soon
Runs in your browser too
Projects are plain text
Free, no account

01 — LIVE GLYPHS

Change one glyph.
Every cell follows.

In most ASCII editors the font is a given. Here it is part of the drawing: open a character, flip a few pixels, and every cell that uses it changes as you click.

A dungeon map drawn in characters, its walls made of number signs. — **Before:** the walls use the stock number sign.

The same dungeon map, its walls now drawn as bricks. — **After:** one glyph redrawn as bricks. Nothing else was touched.

02 — TIMELAPSE

Watch a drawing come to life.
From an empty canvas.

A koi pond, from the first drop of water to the last petal. Every glyph is picked from the sheet, every color from the palette, every cell painted with the pointer.

The Asciitect editor painting a koi pond from an empty canvas: the water and its depth, ripples, lily pads and a lotus in bloom, then two koi, one white with red patches, one gold with orange, and a few drifting petals. — The editor itself, sped up: water, depth, ripples, lily pads, then the fish. Recorded as it runs.▶ GIF · LOOPS

03 — GALLERY

Made in Asciitect.
Frame by frame.

Each piece is an Asciitect project, turned into a GIF by the program’s own export. Shown here pixel for pixel.

An aquarium drawn in characters: a big fish patrols back and forth, a school of small fish crosses, a jellyfish pulses, bubbles rise from a chest and the weed sways. — 01 · Aquarium48 frames

A lighthouse on its rock at night, drawn in characters: its beam sweeps from side to side and flashes, the sea rolls under the moon, a sailboat rocks and the surf breaks. — 02 · Lighthouse40 frames

A ringed planet turning in space, shaded only by the density of its characters, its night side lit by cities, a moon passing in front of it and then behind. — 03 · Planet48 frames

04 — ANIMATION

Layers and frames.
Like a sprite editor.

Build a pose, duplicate it, nudge it. The preview plays the real pixels while you work.

The Asciitect timeline: the frames of a bouncing slime one by one, the onion skin, then the animation playing. — The timeline in the editor: each frame in turn, the onion skin, then playback. Recorded as it runs.▶ GIF · LOOPS

A green slime made of characters bouncing on the floor, squashed and stretched. — Three layers (floor, slime, face), six frames.

Layers that stack by cellThe glyph on top replaces the one below. Hide, lock, rename and reorder them.
A duration per frameHold a pose longer without duplicating it.
Onion skinSee the neighboring frames while you draw, and what changed between them.

05 — GLYPH SHEET

Eight characters.
That is the feature list.

U+0044

Draw

Pencil, eraser, line, rectangle, fill, eyedropper, selection and text. Undo, redo, zoom.

U+0023

Live glyphs

Edit a character and every cell that uses it updates as you click.

U+0046

Frames

A timeline with a duration per frame, loop playback and onion skin.

U+004C

Layers

Stacked by cell. Hide, lock, rename and reorder them.

U+0025

Free color

Any color, one palette per drawing. Edit an entry and the drawing recolors.

U+0054

Your own fonts

Start from the built-in library, or import a TrueType font turned into pixels.

U+0047

Lossless GIF

An animated preview and the final file size before you save. PNG and plain text too.

U+007B

Readable files

A project is one plain-text file, its palette and its font included.

06 — ONLINE

No install.
Open it in your browser.

ALL OF ITThe whole editor, not a demo.
PRIVATEYour drawing never leaves the tab.
YOUR FILESOpen and download real .asciitect files.

Try it in your browser

The Asciitect editor running in a browser, with a sunset campfire drawing open.

Free. No account.
Start drawing.

Windows

Windows 10 and 11, 64-bit

Download installer

Version 0.1.0 · 4.8 MB
SHA-256 55919357e29fae348a4bd603641d1c4b408443ba80b96c3d6de7686942e76d0a

Linux — coming soon

Until then, the online version runs in your browser.

SHA256.txt Rather not install anything? Try it in your browser →

QUESTIONS

Before you
start drawing.

Windows says it protected my PC

The installer isn’t digitally signed yet, so Windows SmartScreen doesn’t know it and shows “Windows protected your PC”. Click More info, then Run anyway. To be sure the file is the one published here, compare its SHA-256 with the one above and in SHA256.txt: in PowerShell, Get-FileHash .\Asciitect-Setup-*.exe prints it.

Is it really free?

Yes. Asciitect is free, with no account and no ads, under the MIT licence.

What does the online version not have?

It is the same editor, minus what a browser tab cannot do: there is no recovery copy if the tab closes before you save, no list of the fonts installed on your computer, and no opening a drawing by double-clicking it. Ctrl+N and Ctrl+Shift+S belong to the browser: use the New button, and Save, which asks for a file name every time.

Which files can it read and write?

Projects are .asciitect files, plain text that holds the drawing, its palette and its font. Asciitect exports PNG, lossless GIF and plain text (the characters only), and imports TrueType (TTF) fonts.