Selecting objects

Selection is how you tell the editor what to act on. Everything else, moving, styling, grouping, and exporting, starts with selecting one or more objects.

Quick overview

1. Click an object to select it.
2. Shift-click to add or remove objects from the selection.
3. Drag an empty area to draw a marquee and select everything inside it.
4. Select all with Ctrl or Cmd and A.
5. Click empty canvas, or press Escape, to deselect.
6. Double-click a group to select objects inside it. See Grouping and layers.

Detailed reference

Single selection

Clicking an object selects it and shows resize handles, a rotation handle, and a dashed selection outline. A floating toolbar also appears just below the selection with quick actions: duplicate, rotate 90 degrees, lock, and delete, plus dropdowns for stacking order and page alignment. Image, text, and shape selections add their own buttons to that toolbar, such as crop, text formatting, and remove background.

Multiple selection

Method	Behavior
Shift + click	Toggles individual objects in and out of the current selection
Marquee drag	Click empty canvas and drag a rectangle; every object whose bounding box intersects it is selected
Ctrl/Cmd + A	Selects every selectable object on the current part

A multi-object selection shows one combined bounding box around every selected object, and moving, resizing, or restyling it applies to all of them at once.

Deselecting

Action	Result
Click empty canvas	Clears the selection
Press Esc	Clears the selection, and also exits some tool modes

Selecting inside groups

Double-click a group to enter it, then click to select an object inside without ungrouping it. Double-clicking a text object inside a group starts typing directly into it; double-clicking any other object selects it so you can edit its properties. Press Escape to step back out of the group.

Selecting from the layers list

When objects overlap or are hard to click, open the layers panel with Ctrl or Cmd and Shift and L and click a row to select the matching object. Rows are listed front to back, and groups, frames, and grid cells expand to show what is nested inside. Selecting a row this way works even on an object that can't be clicked on the canvas, so it is the reliable way to reach a locked object. See Grouping and layers for everything the layers panel can do.

Locked objects

Locking an object with Ctrl or Cmd and L takes it out of normal click selection:

State	Can be clicked on canvas	Can be selected from the layers list	Shows a lock indicator
Unlocked	Yes	Yes	No
Locked	No	Yes	Yes

The lock button in each layers-panel row does exactly the same thing. The Lock in the right-click menu and on the floating toolbar is milder: it freezes the object's position, size, and rotation but leaves it clickable, so a marquee and Select All still pick it up. See the Troubleshooting section below for when this difference bites.

See Move, resize, and transform for everything else locking affects.

Right-click menu

Right-clicking a selected object opens a context menu with actions that depend on what you selected:

Action	Description
Copy / Paste	Copies to the clipboard, and pastes at a small offset from the original position
Duplicate	Copy and paste in a single step
Group / Ungroup	Combine the selection into one unit, or split a group back apart
Lock / Unlock	Freeze the object's position, size, and rotation, or unfreeze it. Unlike Ctrl or Cmd and L, this leaves the object clickable.
Bring forward / Send backward	Move one level up or down in stacking order
Bring to front / Send to back	Move to the very top or bottom of the stack
Edit outline	Opens vertex editing on a frame or path outline. See Image editing.
Crop	Opens the crop tool on an image. See Image editing.
Convert to frame	Turns a shape into a maskable frame. See Selection tools.
Convert to shape	Turns a frame back into a plain, editable shape
Save to My shapes	Saves the object to your personal library. See My shapes.
Delete	Removes the object from the canvas

Step by step

Gather scattered objects and center them on the page

1. Click an empty part of the canvas, then drag a marquee around the objects you want, or Shift-click each one to build the selection by hand.
2. With the multi-object selection active, open the align dropdown on the floating toolbar (the one with left, center, right, top, middle, and bottom options).
3. Choose Center and Middle to place the whole cluster in the middle of the page.

Aligning a multi-object selection moves the selection as one block: its combined bounding box snaps to the page edge or center, and the objects keep their positions relative to each other. It does not space the objects evenly between themselves. If you want them to stay aligned on every later move, group them first (see Grouping and layers).

Select an object buried under others

1. Press Ctrl or Cmd and Shift and L to open the layers panel.
2. Every object on the current part is listed top (frontmost) to bottom (backmost), so scan for the row you need. Groups, frames, and grid cells expand to show what is nested inside them.
3. Click the row. The matching object becomes the active selection on the canvas, even if it sits completely behind other objects and can't be clicked directly.

Lock a background so it stops getting in the way

1. Select the background object, an image or shape you have finished with.
2. Press Ctrl or Cmd and L, or click the lock button in its layers-panel row. The object can no longer be clicked or caught by a marquee, so you can work freely on everything in front of it.
3. To edit it again later, open the layers panel and click its row to select it (this still works on a locked object), then press Ctrl or Cmd and L again, or click the same lock button, to unlock it.

Common tasks

I want to...	Do this
Select everything on the part	Ctrl or Cmd and A. Objects locked with Ctrl or Cmd and L are skipped.
Add one more object to a selection	Shift-click it. Shift-click again to drop it back out.
Select an object hidden behind others	Open the layers panel (Ctrl or Cmd and Shift and L) and click its row.
Select one item inside a group	Double-click the group to enter group edit mode, then click the item. See Grouping and layers.
Clip an image into a shape	Select exactly one image and one shape, then right-click and choose Clip Image into Shape, or press Ctrl or Cmd and M. See Image editing.
Clear the selection	Click empty canvas or press Esc.

Keyboard shortcuts

Shortcut	Action
Ctrl/Cmd + A	Select all
Ctrl/Cmd + C	Copy
Ctrl/Cmd + V	Paste
Ctrl/Cmd + D	Duplicate
Delete	Delete the selection
Esc	Deselect, close an open menu or modal, or exit the current tool mode
Ctrl/Cmd + L	Lock or unlock
Ctrl/Cmd + Shift + L	Toggle the layers panel

Tips

Marquee only needs a touch

A marquee selects an object as soon as its bounding box overlaps the drag rectangle, even partially. You don't need to fully enclose an object to catch it.

The mask and cutout tools

The selection and pen tools create a masked region called a frame instead of a normal selection. See Selection tools for cutting a subject out of an image.

Troubleshooting

A click keeps selecting the whole group

A group is a single object, so one click selects the entire group. To reach an item inside it, double-click the group first to enter group edit mode, then click the item. See Grouping and layers.

A locked object won't select or move

Ctrl or Cmd and L, and the lock button in the layers panel, make an object unselectable: clicks and marquees pass right through it, and Select All skips it. Reselect it from the layers panel, then unlock it. The Lock in the right-click menu and on the floating toolbar is different: it freezes the object's position and size but leaves it clickable.

A marquee won't start on top of an object

A drag that begins on an object moves that object instead of drawing a marquee. Start the drag on empty canvas. Once you are dragging, an object is caught as soon as the marquee touches its bounding box, so you do not need to enclose it fully.

Right-click always targets what you clicked

Right-clicking an object selects it before opening the menu, so the menu's actions apply to that object even if something else was selected a moment earlier.

Related

• Move, resize, and transform for what to do once something is selected
• Grouping and layers to combine objects and manage stacking order
• Properties panel to see and edit the selection's settings
• Selection tools for masking images and shapes into frames