PNG to SVG for Cricut.

A cut file Design Space takes the first time. Flat colours, closed paths, and nothing inside it for Cricut to throw away.

Convert a picture for your Cricut

Free to try. You see the whole result before you decide anything.

Why a file gets refused — or comes out wrong

All four are the same thing underneath: the file holds something a cutting machine cannot cut.

Unsupported SVG: non-embedded image elements

There is a photograph hiding inside the file instead of shapes — sometimes only a link to one, kept somewhere else entirely. A blade has nothing to follow, so the whole upload is turned away.

Parts of the design go missing

Gradients, shadows, pattern fills and clipping masks are all removed as the file comes in. It looked complete where it was made; what arrives has pieces taken out of it.

The holes in letters fill in solid

The hole in an a is only a hole if it was drawn the opposite way round from the outline holding it. Drawn the same way, software disagrees about it — and the one that matters fills it in.

It cuts blurry, jagged or stepped

The picture was never really converted. It was flattened to a couple of colours and traced around, so the blade follows a staircase of square pixels instead of a curve.

What Hector sends instead

Flat colour, every time

Ask for a cutting file and nothing goes into it that a machine cannot cut. There is no gradient to strip, so nothing goes missing on the way in.

Real shapes, not a picture in a wrapper

Every piece is a closed path in its own colour — the thing Design Space puts on its own layer and the blade follows.

Holes that stay holes

Counters stay open and eyes stay open, whichever rule the software applies to them. We check the file both ways before it is ever offered.

Curves, not staircases

Edges come out as curves, so they stay smooth however large you scale them — and the blade stops chattering along a stepped edge.

What it is good for — and where to take care

Print Then CutIdeal. Stickers, planner art, printable labels. The number of colours does not matter, because the design is printed and only the outline is cut.

LaserIdeal. Clean outlines to follow, and smooth curves instead of a stepped edge.

Layered vinylBest from simple artwork — a logo, lettering, a bold illustration. A detailed photograph honestly becomes a lot of colours, and every colour is another sheet and another weeding job.

Layering vinyl? Start from artwork that already has a handful of flat colours in it.

Questions

Will it open in Cricut Design Space?

That is what the cutting setting is for. The file holds flat-coloured closed paths and nothing else — no gradients, no masks, no picture hidden inside — which is the list Design Space refuses or strips.

Will my letters fill in?

They should not. We render the file under both of the rules software uses to decide what is a hole, and only offer it when they agree.

Can I cut an actual photograph?

You can convert one, and for Print Then Cut it works well. For layered vinyl a photograph is rarely practical — not because of the file, but because a photograph is made of a great many colours and each one is a sheet.

Does it work for Silhouette, Glowforge or embroidery?

Yes. It is an ordinary SVG built the careful way, so anything that reads SVG reads this. Design Space is simply the fussiest about it.

Do I have to pay to see whether it worked?

No. Converting and looking are free, as close in as you like. You only need a plan to take the file away.

What can I send it?

A PNG, JPG or WEBP. Anything enormous is resized on the way, so a photograph straight off a phone is fine.

Try it with the file that would not upload.

Convert a picture for your Cricut See what it costs

Cricut, Design Space, Silhouette and Glowforge are the trademarks of their owners. Hector the Vector is not affiliated with, endorsed by or connected to any of them — the names are here only to say what the files are for.