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CADTutor provides the best free tutorials and articles for AutoCAD, 3ds Max and associated applications along with a friendly community forum. If you need to learn AutoCAD, or you want to be more productive, you're in the right place. See our tip of the day to start learning right now!
Free Tutorials and More…
The Tutorials section provides over 100 original tutorials for AutoCAD, 3ds Max and other design applications. Michael’s Corner is an archive of productivity articles that brings you the best AutoCAD tips and tricks. Our Forum is a lively community where AutoCAD users can ask questions and get answers. The Downloads area provides free AutoCAD blocks, free AutoLISP routines and free images.
Tutorials of the Moment
Recently viewed tutorials
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Surfaces
The first and perhaps most crucial stage in creating a 3D landscape scene is the creation of accurate and seamless surfaces. This tutorial explores a number (not all) of techniques for creating quick and accurate surfaces from 2D lines and should give the user a feel for the range of tools available. Format: Text/Image
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Site Layout Exercise 2
This exercise is designed to progress your skills in 2D drafting and to test your understanding of layouts and printing to scale from paper space. Format: Text/Image
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Object Snap
A tutorial giving an overview of all the AutoCAD object snaps (osnaps) with some worked examples. The tutorial also covers the use of temporary tracking points and object snap tracking. Format: Text/Image
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Object Properties
This tutorial describes how to control the display of objects (colour, linetype etc.) using layers. It also explains what layers are and how they should be used. Format: Text/Image
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Units and Scales
If you're asking yourself "what scale do I draw in?" or "what units should I use?", you need this tutorial. Format: Text/Image
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AutoCAD 2010: The User Interface - Part 3
This video tutorial completes your guided tour of the AutoCAD 2010 user interface. Running time: 4min 04sec Format: Video
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CADTutor Tutorials
Our tutorials are comprehensive but straightforward introductions to AutoCAD and related software. They are designed to help beginners get to grips with design workflows as quickly as possible. There are over 100 to choose from, some text/image based and others in video format. Whatever stage you are at in your learning, you should find a tutorial to help.
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CADTutor Forums
Our forum is a vibrant community of experts and beginners. The main focus is helping beginners get to grips with AutoCAD and to help more advanced users become more productive. The AutoLISP forum is one of the busiest out there, providing expert advice for busy professionals.
AutoCAD Productivity
Tool Palette Basics
From: AutoCAD Productivity Articles #144
Originally published: February 2016
I learned something new about tool palettes last year — thanks to Nate at Wellcare in Tampa — and I wanted to pass it along. It's a trick that I should have thought of and can be used in a number of situations in AutoCAD. Specifically, the Ctrl key!
Short version: Rather than doing a right-click Copy / right-click Paste — which always put the copy at the bottom of the tab — simply hold down Ctrl, then drag & drop.
How to Copy Tools Onto and Between Tabs on a Tool Palette
Open the Tool Palette (Ctrl + 3). [For future reference, if you're new to palettes, I have a sample palette on my website, complete with a block source drawing and instructions.]
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To copy a tool below itself, hold down Ctrl, select the tool, then drag it down a smidge and release. You should see a very small plus-sign at your cursor indicating that you are making a copy.
To copy a tool between tabs, hold down Ctrl, then drag your cursor onto another tab and hold it there. You will initially see a No-Can-Do sign, but then it will flip over to that tab.
Drag your tool to the desired location — you will see the same plus-sign at your cursor — then release!
See all the articles published in February 2016
Michael's Corner
Between 2003 and 2016, Michael Beall (and one or two guests) wrote almost 600 articles for CADTutor. The focus of these articles is AutoCAD productivity, and although some of them are now more than a few years old, most remain relevant to current versions of AutoCAD. The article above is just one example. Check out Michael's Corner for a full listing.
Image of the Week
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2nd – 8th June 2025
This week's image is by rgarjr
Software used: Inventor
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Last Week's Image
Last week's image is by Noahma
Software used: AutoCAD Architecture
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Two Weeks Ago
This image is by abstracted
Software used: Modeled in Inventor 2008, rendered in 3ds Max 2008 with V-Ray.
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Three Weeks Ago
This image is by Lazarus
Software used: AutoCAD 2009
Gallery of Work
Over the years, our forum members have contributed hundreds of images, showcasing their amazing work. The images above are just a small selection that demonstrate the wide range of project types our community is involved with. Take a look at our gallery to see all the images published in the last 12 months.
Tip of the Day
Keeping the UCS icon in its place
By default, AutoCAD always displays the UCS icon at the drawing origin (0,0) unless the origin is off screen, in which case, the UCS icon sits quietly in the bottom left-hand corner of the drawing area.
If you find the UCS icon distracting when it's floating in the middle of the screen, you can force it to be displayed in the bottom left-hand corner using the ucsicon command.
Enter an option [ON/OFF/All/Noorigin/ORigin/Properties] <ON>:
Use the "Noorigin" option to force the icon into the bottom left corner and the "ORigin" option to set it back to the default.
See the UCS Icon tutorial for more details.
Missed a Tip?
Did you miss yesterday's tip? Maybe you forgot to drop by or maybe you don't visit over the weekend. If so, you can now see all the tips published during the past week. Also, if you have a tip you'd like to share with us, you can post it on our forum and if we like it, we'll publish it here.