Canvas basics

The canvas is the surface you design on. It shows one part of your project at a time, a page, a scene frame, a slide, a video, or a board, and the same navigation and history controls work the same way on all of them.

Quick overview

1. Pan by holding Space and dragging, or with the middle mouse button.
2. Zoom with the on-screen zoom pill, or by scrolling the mouse wheel over the canvas.
3. Reset the view to the default zoom and position with Ctrl or Cmd and 0.
4. Add objects from the left panel: text, shapes, images, icons, and more.
5. Select an object by clicking it, then edit it from the properties panel.
6. Set the part's size and background from the properties panel when nothing is selected.
7. Undo or redo with Ctrl or Cmd and Z, or Ctrl or Cmd and Y.

Detailed reference

Zoom

Action	Method	Notes
Zoom in	Scroll the wheel up over the canvas, or Ctrl/Cmd + Plus, or the + button in the zoom pill	Zoom steps are centered on the artboard, not the cursor
Zoom out	Scroll the wheel down over the canvas, or Ctrl/Cmd + Minus, or the − button in the zoom pill	Same centered behavior
Reset the view	Ctrl/Cmd + 0, or the ⟳ button in the zoom pill	Returns to the default 75% zoom and clears any pan

The scroll wheel changes zoom in 6% steps; the pill buttons and Ctrl/Cmd + Plus / Minus change it in 10% steps. The zoom pill (near the page tabs, below the canvas) shows the current percentage, but it is a read-only label, so there is no field for typing an exact value. Zoom is clamped to a range of 25% to 250%, and the editor opens at 75%.

Pan

Method	How
Hold and drag	Hold Space and drag anywhere on the canvas
Middle mouse button	Hold the middle button and drag
Hand tool	Boards and infinite-canvas scenes have a dedicated Hand tool in their toolbar that pans without holding Space (scenes also bind it to H)

The scroll wheel is mapped to zoom on a page, so it does not pan. Use Space and drag, or the middle mouse button, to move around instead.

Undo and redo

Shortcut	Action
Ctrl/Cmd + Z	Undo the last action
Ctrl/Cmd + Y	Redo the last undone action

Every change you make, adding, deleting, moving, transforming, or restyling, pushes a snapshot of the part onto a history stack. The stack holds up to 60 steps, and it also has a total-memory cap: when the stored snapshots grow past roughly 48 MB (heavy pages with embedded images or video posters reach that quickly), the oldest steps are dropped, though the five most recent are always kept. Snapshots are captured a fraction of a second after you stop editing, so a rapid burst of small changes collapses into one step. Undoing walks back through the stack, and making a new change after an undo discards whatever redo steps were ahead of it. Video pages keep their own separate undo history.

Selection appearance

Selecting an object draws handles so you can see and grab it:

Element	Description
Border	A dashed outline traces the selection bounds
Corner handles	Circular handles about 10 px across, at each corner and edge midpoint
Rotation handle	A round handle above the selection (the left of the two icons on top), separate from the resize handles
Move handle	A second round icon beside the rotation handle, above the selection, for dragging the object without grabbing its body
Marquee fill	Dragging an empty area to multi-select shows a faint tinted rectangle while you drag

Canvas size and background

With nothing selected, the properties panel switches from object controls to part-level controls:

Control	Description
Size	Pick a preset or enter a custom width and height, and switch units. See Artboard sizes.
Background	Solid color, gradient, or image. See Backgrounds, patterns, and gradients.

Adding objects

The left panel groups everything you can add to the canvas: shapes, text, images, icons, charts, QR codes, and more. Click an item to add it at a default size and position, or drag it onto the canvas to place it exactly where you want. See Shapes, Text and typography, and Icons for what each category offers.

One part at a time

The canvas only ever loads the part you are currently viewing, so a project with many pages, frames, slides, and boards stays responsive. Switch parts from the page tabs at the bottom of the window. See Page tabs and groups.

Step by step

Zoom into a corner of a busy design and pan around it

1. Point the mouse at the canvas and scroll the wheel up to zoom in, or press Ctrl/Cmd + Plus, or click + in the zoom pill below the canvas. Each scroll notch is a 6% step, each button press is 10%.
2. Because zoom is centered on the artboard, the corner you want may end up off-screen. Hold Space so the cursor becomes a grab hand, then drag to slide that corner into the middle of the viewport. The middle mouse button drags the same way without holding Space.
3. Keep zooming and panning until the area fills the viewport. Zoom stops at 250%.
4. When you are done, press Ctrl/Cmd + 0 to jump back to the default 75% view.

Reset a design that is zoomed or panned oddly

1. Press Ctrl/Cmd + 0, or click the ⟳ button in the zoom pill.
2. The view returns to 75% zoom with the pan cleared, so the part sits centered again. This is a fixed default, not a fit-to-content zoom, so a very large artboard may still extend past the viewport edges: from there, zoom out with the − button until the whole part is visible.

Set a part's size and background

1. Click an empty area of the canvas, or press Escape, so nothing is selected. The properties panel on the right switches from object controls to part-level controls.
2. In the Size control, pick a preset or type a custom width and height, and switch units if you need to. See Artboard sizes.
3. In the Background control, choose a solid color, a gradient, or an image. See Backgrounds, patterns, and gradients.

Add an object and place it

1. Open a category from the left icon rail: shapes, text, images, icons, and more.
2. Click an item to drop it onto the canvas at a default size and position, or drag it from the panel and release it to place it exactly where you want.
3. With the new object selected, refine its position and size from the properties panel. See Move, resize, and transform.

Undo a mistake and redo it

1. Press Ctrl/Cmd + Z to step back one change, or click the undo button in the top bar.
2. Press it again to keep stepping back. Each press moves one entry down the history stack.
3. To restore a step you just undid, press Ctrl/Cmd + Y. Note that making any new edit after undoing clears the steps ahead, so redo is no longer available for them.

Common tasks

• Zoom to a round number: the pill buttons and Ctrl/Cmd + Plus / Minus move in 10% steps, so click to land neatly on 100%, 110%, and so on. The scroll wheel moves in finer 6% steps.
• Move the view, not an object: hold Space and drag, or hold the middle mouse button and drag. This never changes your design, only which part of it you are looking at.
• Switch to another page, frame, slide, or board: use the page tabs below the canvas. Only the part you open is loaded, so switching stays fast even in a huge project. See Page tabs and groups.
• Drop a new object exactly where you want it: drag it from the left panel straight onto the canvas instead of clicking, which places it at the drop point rather than a default position.
• Get back to the part-level controls: press Escape or click an empty area of the canvas to deselect. With nothing selected, the properties panel shows the part's Size and Background instead of object controls.

Keyboard shortcuts

Shortcut	Action
Scroll wheel	Zoom in or out (centered on the artboard)
Ctrl/Cmd + Plus / Ctrl/Cmd + Minus	Zoom in or out by a 10% step
Ctrl/Cmd + 0	Reset zoom and pan to the default view
Space + drag	Pan
Middle mouse + drag	Pan
Ctrl/Cmd + Z	Undo
Ctrl/Cmd + Y	Redo

Tips

Only one part is loaded at a time

Switching pages, frames, slides, or boards from the page tabs keeps even large projects fast, since the canvas never has to hold more than one part in memory.

Zoom centers on the artboard

Zooming steps in on the middle of the part, not on your cursor. To inspect a corner of a busy design, zoom in first, then hold Space and drag to pan that corner into view.

History has a limit

The undo stack holds up to 60 steps, and it is trimmed earlier if the snapshots grow past roughly 48 MB on a heavy page. On a long or image-heavy session, the earliest actions eventually fall off the back of the stack and can no longer be undone.

Troubleshooting

• Scrolling zooms instead of scrolling the page. The wheel is captured over the canvas and mapped to zoom, so nothing else scrolls there. To move around the canvas, hold Space and drag, or use the middle mouse button.
• Zoom will not go past 250% or below 25%. Both ends are clamped. If you need finer detail than 250% allows, work at 250% and pan around.
• Ctrl/Cmd + 0 does not fit the whole part. Reset is a fixed 75% zoom with pan cleared, not a fit-to-window calculation, so a large part can still overflow. Zoom out manually until it all fits.
• Undo stops part way back. The history stack keeps at most 60 steps and is trimmed earlier on heavy pages (past roughly 48 MB of snapshots), always keeping the five most recent. On a long or image-heavy session the oldest steps are gone for good.
• Undo or redo does nothing on a video page. Video pages route undo and redo to their own timeline history, which is separate from the page history described here.
• Panning feels different on a board. Boards and infinite-canvas scenes run their own zoom and pan, so the zoom pill and Space-drag behavior described here apply to page-style parts. On a board or scene, use its Hand tool to pan.
• The properties panel shows Size and Background, not object controls. That means nothing is selected. Click an object to bring its controls back, or leave it as is to edit the part's size and background.

Related

• Selecting objects to choose what you are working on
• Move, resize, and transform to position objects precisely
• Properties panel for the full set of per-object controls
• Artboard sizes for presets, custom sizes, and units
• Backgrounds, patterns, and gradients for the part background