5 Free Draw On Desktop Screen Software for Windows 10

Here are 5 free draw on desktop screen software for Windows 10. These are helpful when you have shared your screen with someone and you want to demonstrate something. I have covered some really good free software to draw on Windows 10 desktop screen. Each software in this list lets you draw with different colors, tools, and also save the output as an image file.

Apart from this, you can also take the benefit of unique feature(s) provided by these software. You can save the drawing as PDF, set background for drawing, undo changes, and more.

Let’s check the first draw on desktop screen software for Windows 10 available in this list.

Epic Pen

Epic Pen is a popular and one of the best draw on desktop screen software for Windows 10. The feature that I like the most is you can hide the drawing and bring it back anytime you want. Thus, you can stop drawing temporarily without saving it and then continue drawing on the desktop screen. Apart from this fantastic feature, you can also open applications, launch programs, folders, etc., in between the drawing mode. Thus, it doesn’t freeze the desktop screen. You have the option to hold the drawing, open the applications, and resume the drawing mode. When the drawing is complete, you can save it as PNG image on your PC.

It provides highlighter, pen, and eraser tools. You can also set the brush width and use a color palette to switch to some other color. The color choice is limited here, but still, you will be able to create a beautiful drawing on the desktop screen. If something is drawn by mistake, then you can also ‘undo‘ or use Eraser to remove that part from drawing. All its tools can also be used using the preset or custom hotkeys. So, pretty good features are available in this software and therefore it can be a perfect software for drawing on Windows 10 desktop screen.

Ardesia

Ardesia is another interesting draw on desktop screen software for Windows 10. One unique feature that you will like is that you can save your drawing as PDF document. Apart from that, it gives you three options to set the drawing background: original desktop, an image, or a solid color. This is quite an interesting feature as you can choose the type of background for drawing. Another useful feature is that you can pause drawing and then open any folder or application and continue with your drawing.

You can use Arrow, Text, Pencil, Highlighter, and Eraser tools for drawing. Also, you can choose any of your favorite colors for drawing, and brush width can also be adjusted easily. All these tools are available in a toolbar which remains on the right side of the desktop screen.

When your drawing is completed, you can use Add to PDF or Screenshot button to save your drawing.

Note: This software also comes with a great feature “Record”. However, this feature didn’t work for me. Whenever I clicked this button, the software crashed.

Paint on Whiteboard Desktop

Paint on Whiteboard Desktop (or powd) is a very simple draw on desktop screen software for Windows 10. It is available as a portable Jar file and provides free hand draw, line, and arrow tools for drawing. You can also use a color palette to change the colors for drawing and also set the brush width and transparency. Your drawing can be saved as PNG image which is a good feature. All these options are available in a sidebar that will remain available on the left side of the desktop screen.

This software also comes with an eraser tool but instead of clearing a particular part, it erases all the drawing. So, you should be careful before using this tool. Also, once you are in the drawing mode, you can’t use other applications, open folders, etc. You need to exit the drawing mode for that. So, there are a few limitations, but overall this software works well to draw on the desktop screen on Windows 10.

Click here to read its full review.

Grease Pencil

Grease Pencil doesn’t come with multiple tools for drawing. However, you can choose different colors, set brush width and show drawing on front or back of any application. Another good feature is that you can deactivate the pen so that you can open folders and other programs and then continue the drawing on the desktop screen. This way, it won’t interrupt you from accessing desktop and items.

You can also clear the drawing using the hotkey. The Eraser tool is also available, which you can access using Ctrl+E hotkey. After that, you can erase a specific part of the drawing. If you need a very simple solution to draw on the desktop screen, then it is useful. After activating this software, you can right-click to access color and brush width and press Ctrl+L hotkey to view the options supported by this software.

Note: Adobe AIR is needed to run and use this software.

Sketch It!

Sketch It! is another simple draw on desktop screen software for Windows 10. It has four main options: draw using free hand tool (with Ctrl+Shift+Left mouse), use Eraser (by Ctrl+Shift+Right mouse button), clear the screen (Ctrl+Shift+Alt), and open the main menu (Ctrl+Shift+Z). These are the preset hotkeys and you can’t change them.

Its Menu has options to select the Pen color and width and save the drawing to PC as an image file. To save the drawing as an image file, it supports BMP, JPEG, PNG, TIFF, and GIF. This is a very good and unique feature because other software support only PNG image format, but this software lets you save drawing in any of the 5 supported image formats.

To learn more, you can read its full review.

The Verdict:

Epic Pen is my favorite software in this entire list. It lets you access folders and other applications, pause, and resume drawing, move its toolbar and other features. Based on all these features, it is ranked at 1st position. Other software are also good no doubt to draw on the desktop screen, but if I have to select the best one, then it is Epic Pen definitely.

Best free software to draw on screen in Windows 10 PC

This post covers some of the best free software that allow you to draw on the screen on your PC. An overlay is created to help you draw over any running software, opened window, application, etc., on the desktop screen. You can use a highlighter or pen to draw, write something on the screen, or mark areas. It can come in handy during presentations, online meetings, video conferences, and more.

There exist many free drawing software, but the feature to draw directly on the desktop screen is not present there. Therefore, we created this post to help you serve this purpose.

Draw on desktop screen in Windows 10

This post includes 5 free software to draw on Windows 10 screen, Windows Ink Screen Sketch has already been covered elsewhere on this site.

1. gInk
2. Epic Pen
3. Paint on Whiteboard Desktop
4. LiveDraw
5. ZoomIt.

1] gInk

gInk is one of the best on-screen annotation software for Windows 10. It has three features that catch the attention. You can move annotations or drawings that you drew from one area to another. The feature to show/hide all the annotations is also there. Also, you can enable the mouse pointer to use desktop and other applications without losing the annotations. Later, you can use annotation tools again to begin from your left off. It has 10 different pens for on-screen drawing. By default, only 5 pens are visible on its toolbar, but you can access Settings to show more pens on its toolbar.

You can download this open-source software from GitHub. After running this software, you can click its system tray icon to access the available tools. You will see different color pens, an eraser tool to delete an annotation, an eye icon to show/hide annotations, a Pan tool to move annotations, screenshot capture to take a full-screen snapshot, or a specific area, undo tool, etc.

You can also access Settings of this software by right-clicking on its system tray icon and using Options. There, you will be able to set hotkeys for different pens, tick mark on pens and tools that you want to show in the toolbar, change the path to store screenshots, etc.

2] Epic Pen

Epic Pen is a popular screen annotation software. It comes with pen and highlighter tools to draw on the desktop screen. There are 16 different colors available for drawing. It also lets you pause/resume desktop drawing with a single click. There is also a screenshot capture tool using which you can capture the full screen along with your desktop drawing or take a screenshot of a specific area in PNG format.

When the software is running, its floating icon is visible on the desktop screen which you can place anywhere you want. Use the ink icon and then you can explore all the available tools. Just select any of the available colors and start drawing. It also lets you undo the actions or use Eraser. Pen or Highlighter size/width can also be adjusted using the tools menu.

If you want, you can also access Settings of this software using the menu icon in the tools menu and then set hotkeys to use a tool, toggle visibility, etc. Apart from this, it also provides whiteboard, blackboard, line, arrow, rectangle, and other tools but those are available in its paid plan. Still, the free plan is pretty good to draw on the desktop screen.

3] Paint on Whiteboard Desktop

Paint on Whiteboard Desktop is another good software to draw on Windows 10 screen. You can use the freehand tool and select any of your favorite colors for drawing. This software has an advantage over Epic Pen software as it lets you use line and arrow tools for free. Also, you can set opacity level and thickness for drawing tools.

You can grab this software here. It is a portable software and Java is needed to use this software. When you will launch the software, you will see its Toolbar on the left side. There you can use freehand, arrow, line tools, set width n opacity for drawing. Also, you can clear or wipe the entire screen using the available tool. It doesn’t come with undo or eraser tools so you must be careful while drawing.

A screen capture tool is also there to save the full desktop screen along with your drawing. All its features are good, but you can’t pause and resume desktop drawing when the software is active. So, you should first open the desire software or application and then launch this software.

4] LiveDraw

LiveDraw is an open-source and one of the best screen annotation software. It has 12 different colors to draw on the desktop screen. You can also minimize this software to open other applications and hide annotated areas and then again start drawing on the desktop screen with pre-added annotations.

The most interesting and unique feature is you can save all the annotations or on-screen drawings with transparent background as a PNG image.

You can grab the portable EXE of this on-screen annotator software from GitHub. After launching this software, you will see 12 different color pens. You can use toggle more option using the given icon and then access other options like undo and redo actions, use the Eraser tool, clear screen, save ink or drawing as a transparent PNG image, show/hide ink or annotation, etc.

5] ZoomIt

ZoomIt is actually a screen zoom and annotation software, but you can also use it to draw on your Windows 10 desktop screen. You can use its freehand tool and text tool to draw or write something on desktop screen. It provides only a red color for drawing but it successfully serves the purpose of drawing on the screen. In addition to that, it also comes with a basic break reminder software that you can use with custom time to take a break from work.

After downloading its zip file, you can run this portable tool. Now, use Ctrl+2 hotkey to activate its drawing tool. To use the text tool while drawing, you can press ‘t’ and then add a custom text. You can skip from drawing and text tools using Esc key.

If you want to use zoom-in feature, then press Ctrl+1 hotkey. Or else, you can also set custom hotkeys by accessing Options window of this tool. Simply right-click on the system tray icon of this software and click on Options to open that window and change hotkeys.

These are some helpful options to draw on Windows 10 desktop screen. gInk is definitely a bit better than other on-screen drawing software because of its unique features. But, other software are also good.

Drawing on my Windows 10 Desktop

Does anyone know of a lightweight tool built into Windows (or otherwise) than I can use to highlight something (e.g. draw a red circle around certain text) on my screen. I would use this to emphasise certain text to a colleague.

Thanks in advance.

Replies (6) 

It depends, what file or format is that text on, is that in a test document, or an image of text, or is that on a web page, what application are you looking at that text in?

Power to the Developer!

MSI GV72 — 17.3″, i7-8750H (Hex Core), 32GB DDR4, 4GB GeForce GTX 1050 Ti, 256GB NVMe M2, 2TB HDD

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It’s really just a drawing tool to hightloght anything that appears on my Windows desktop. Could be a web browser, a photo, news item pretty much anything that would appear on a windows desktop.

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Because you are using multiple applications, then the only tool that would work would be the Snip and Sketch tool, that is already built into Windows

Click your Start Button, then without doing anything else, just type sketch and press Enter

That app will allow you to take a screenshot of what you are looking at and then use the pen tools to add notes, highlight text . . . etc.

Power to the Developer!

MSI GV72 — 17.3″, i7-8750H (Hex Core), 32GB DDR4, 4GB GeForce GTX 1050 Ti, 256GB NVMe M2, 2TB HDD

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