PDF Export

Q: How do I get the chart onto fewer pages?

Pick a smaller block of pages under Split by in Setup. Fewer pages means more squares, and smaller ones, on each page. A3 paper fits more on a page, and turning the pages sideways can help a wide chart.

The short version

Your pattern, as a PDF you can print and stitch from, or send to a buyer. Open it with Export › PDF Chart… or Cmd/Ctrl+P. The PDF itself fills the screen and the settings sit beside it, so every change shows up in the pages you're looking at.

For most patterns, three choices are all you need:

Paper: the size your printer takes.
Chart style: black and white symbols, or color.
How many pages the chart is split across.

Then flip through the preview and press Download PDF. Everything else on this page is for when you want more control: a different cover, extra thread on the shopping list, a watermark for patterns you sell.

Your settings are remembered, so the next pattern starts where you left off.

PDF Export overview: pick the settings, check the preview, download

Paper and chart style

Both are at the top, under Setup. The line under each choice tells you what it means for the printout.

Paper. Pick what your printer takes: A4, US Letter or A3. Your first PDF starts on the usual paper where you live (US Letter in North America and some other places, A4 almost everywhere else). A3 fits the biggest symbols on a page, but many home printers can't take it. The two little sheets beside the sizes turn the pages sideways, which suits a wide chart.

Chart style.

B&W: black symbols on white. Cheapest to print, photocopies cleanly, and it's all you need to stitch from.
Color: symbols on colored squares. Easier to read at a glance, best from a color printer.
No symbols: colored squares only. Pretty, but hard to follow wherever two colors are close.

The same corner of a chart page in B&W, Color and No symbols

How many pages

A big chart won't fit on one sheet at a size you can read, so it's split across pages. The trade-off is simple: fewer pages means smaller squares. Squares that are too small make it easy to lose your place, and too many pages means a lot of shuffling paper.

Under Split by, the Pages grid shows a small map of your chart. Point at a block of pages and the map shows where the cuts would fall; click to choose it. More page counts lists every option.

Split by Pages: pointing at a block of 6 pages shows on the chart map where the cuts would fall

Would you rather think in squares? Choose Squares to set how many fit across a page, or Size for how big each one prints.

For diamond painting, fuse beads, needlepoint canvas and C2C, Actual size prints every square at its real size, so you can lay the chart under your canvas or check it against your drills. Print at 100%, not "Fit to page", and measure the 50 mm bar on each chart page to make sure.

What's in the PDF

Under Customize is every page your PDF can have, in print order, with the page total at the top. Switch off anything you don't need. The chart pages always print, and pages that don't apply to this pattern aren't listed (no backstitch pages without backstitch, for example). Click a page to change what's on it.

Page	What it's for
Your cover PDF	A cover you designed yourself, printed first. Plus Pass.
Cover page	Title, author, description and a picture of the finished piece: plain, realistic, or your own image (Plus Pass), with an optional border.
Section map	The whole chart in miniature with each page marked, so you know which sheet comes next. Only printed when the chart takes more than one page.
Instructions	Your stitching notes. For cross stitch and needlepoint it adds a Finished sizes table: how big the piece comes out on other fabrics, with yours marked.
Thread key	Your shopping list and reference: every color with its thread name, strands, stitch count and how much thread you need.
Written instructions	C2C crochet only: the rows written out in words.
Chart pages	The chart itself, with grid, row and column numbers, center lines and a small map showing where you are.
Backstitch pages	Backstitch on pages of its own, split and numbered like the chart, so the outlines don't hide the symbols.
Your back page	Your own PDF printed at the end: care notes, other patterns, a thank-you. Plus Pass.

Diamond painting, fuse beads and C2C crochet print a Color key instead of a thread key, without thread lengths or strands.

Extra thread

Running out of a color two-thirds of the way through is the worst. On the Thread key page, Extra thread adds a margin to every thread length and skein count, so whoever stitches the pattern buys enough.

Extra to buy: None, +10%, +20%, +30%, or Custom (up to +100%). It needs Thread length needed switched on.
Note under the heading prints a line telling the stitcher the lengths already include extra, so they don't add their own on top. Leave the text empty for the standard wording, or write your own and use {{extraPercent}} for the number.

The Extra thread card on the Thread key page: Extra to buy set to +20%, and the note under the heading as it will print

Fine-tuning the chart

Open Chart pages in the list for everything about how the chart reads on paper.

Repeat on edges repeats a few squares from the neighboring page along each edge (None, 3 or 5), so it's easy to line up where one page ends and the next begins. 3 is the default and suits most people.
Chart sits (Top left or Centered) only moves the part-full pages at the right and bottom.
Chart layout can put the whole chart on one large sheet instead, for a plotter or a tablet. On ordinary paper that's far too small to work from.
Grid & numbering: where the row and column numbers count from (the corner, or 0 at the center, handy if you start stitching from the middle), how often they appear, how bold the grid lines are, and the center lines.
Symbols:
- Symbol style › opens the Symbols panel, the same one as in the editor. The style belongs to the pattern, so changing it here changes the editor and every export too. See Symbol Styles.
- Symbol size makes the symbols bigger or smaller (50–120%) if they feel cramped or lost in their squares.
- Empty squares: Blank or Dots. Dots mark the squares with no stitch, so blank areas are easy to count.

Margins, fonts and page numbers

The Every page row, at the end of Setup, holds what isn't about any one page:

Paper & measurements: margins (Narrow, Normal or Wide), units and number format. Units here only affect the PDF, never the editor; see Units in the PDF and in the editor.
Type & page furniture: the typeface, text size, the running header on every page, and page numbers.
Watermark & footer and File: mostly for sellers; see Selling your patterns.

Finding your way around

Can't find a setting? Type what you'd call it in Search settings ("grid", "heading", "font", "margin") and click a match to go straight there.
Changes apply as you make them. There's no save button; Done and Back just close the page. On a computer, Esc steps back.
The preview catches up by itself a moment after each change. If it ever looks wrong, the refresh button at the bottom of the panel redraws it.
Jump around the PDF with the page thumbnails under the preview (on a computer). Click a section name to open its settings. A dot next to a name means you've changed it from your preset.

Stitching from a tablet

If you stitch from the Pattern Keeper app, tick Pattern Keeper file at the top of the panel. You get a PDF made for it, with just the chart and the key, and everything else is set for you. Untick it and your own settings come back as you left them.

Pattern Keeper can't show backstitch or partial stitches. If your pattern has them, the panel says what will be left out and offers to turn partial stitches into full ones. Pattern Keeper files need a pass or an unlocked pattern.

Selling your patterns

With a Plus Pass, the PDF can look like it came from your shop, not from Stitchmate:

Your own cover and back page: add PDFs you designed to the front and back, or use your own image on the generated cover.
Watermark and footer: your own watermark text and strength, and a license line. With a Personal Pass the license line reads "For personal use only, not for sale".
Files for designers: clean PDFs to finish in Illustrator or Affinity. See Editing in Illustrator or Affinity.
A ZIP of every version your buyers expect. See Bundles.

You can switch any of these on and see them in the preview whatever your plan. When you download, Stitchmate lists the ones your plan doesn't include, and you can upgrade right there or download without them.

Placeholders and formatting

Writing the same instructions for every pattern? Use placeholders: words in double braces that fill in each pattern's own details. Write Stitched on {{fabricLabel}}, finished size {{finishedSize}} once and it's right on every PDF.

The Formatting link next to each text field lists the placeholders, each showing what it would print for the pattern you have open. Click one to insert it. Instructions text can also use bold, italic, headings, lists and links your buyer can click.

Placeholder	What it prints
`{{patternName}}`	The pattern title, or your own cover title
`{{stitchCount}}`	Width × height in stitches
`{{totalStitches}}`	Every stitch in the pattern, the thread key counts added up
`{{colorCount}}`	How many thread colors the pattern uses
`{{fabricLabel}}`	Fabric name and count, such as Aida 14 count
`{{finishedSize}}`	Finished size on the selected fabric
`{{finishedSizeTable}}`	A list of finished sizes on common fabrics. Put it on a line of its own.
`{{chartPageCount}}`	How many chart pages the pattern is split across
`{{strandsCount}}`	Strands recommended per stitch
`{{extraPercent}}`	The extra thread the key adds, in percent. Write % after it.
`{{stitchUnit}}`	What the craft counts: stitches, drills, or beads
`{{tileColumns}}`	How many chart pages across
`{{tileRows}}`	How many chart pages down
`{{sectionList}}`	The first few chart page references in reading order, such as A1, B1, C1 …
`{{width}}`	Just the width, in stitches
`{{height}}`	Just the height, in stitches
`{{fabricCount}}`	Threads per inch of the selected fabric
`{{designer}}`	Your author line from the cover page
`{{copyrightYear}}`	The current year, for your own copyright line

The standard instructions include {{finishedSizeTable}} once. If you write your own and leave it out, the card lets you know.

Bundles: several files in one ZIP

Buyers often want more than one version: color to view, black and white to print, a file for Pattern Keeper. Every version as one ZIP, at the top of the panel, makes them all in one go. Out of the box you get a color PDF, a black and white PDF, a Pattern Keeper PDF and a preview image.

Edit contents… lets you drop the ones you don't sell and choose, for each file, what it contains and which preset it uses. Your list is kept for next time. The ZIP button needs a Plus Pass.

The same look on every pattern

You don't have to set anything up twice. The next pattern you export starts from the settings you left, apart from what belongs to each pattern: its cover title and how many chart pages it takes.

Make PDFs for different purposes, like your own copy and the version you sell? Save each look as an export preset and switch between them from the Preset menu at the top of the panel.

Downloading the PDF

When the preview looks right, press Download PDF. The file is named after your pattern.

No pass yet? You can still set up and preview the whole PDF. The button reads Unlock to download and shows the ways to unlock this pattern or get a pass.

The PDF step in photo import

When you turn a photo into a pattern, the last step of the converter is this same PDF export, with the same settings and presets, and what you change there carries over. It always reflects the pattern as you left it on the Pattern step, so go back and change something and the PDF follows. See the PDF step in the image import guide.

Editing in Illustrator or Affinity

Open an exported PDF in Illustrator and it complains about missing fonts with names like NotoSans-Regular and PatternSymbolsRegular. Nothing is actually missing: every font is embedded, which is why the file prints and displays correctly everywhere else. Illustrator just won't use an embedded font for editable text, so it swaps in one you have installed.

For ordinary text, the swap is only cosmetic. For the symbols it wrecks the chart: a replacement font has nothing where the symbols live, so the chart fills with empty boxes.

The File card under Every page fixes both. It needs a Plus Pass.

Keep symbols as vectors

Tick Keep symbols as vectors and each symbol becomes a shape instead of a character. With no symbol font in the file, there's nothing to swap and nothing to break. The shapes stay fully editable: recolor, scale, pull apart.

The cost is small: the file grows a little, and you can't search for or retype the symbols. The printout is identical.

Remove the last fonts too

Vector symbols fix the chart, but Illustrator still lists the text fonts as missing. To silence it, set the Typeface to Helvetica (standard) under Every page › Type & page furniture. That embeds nothing and uses the Helvetica already on your computer, so the file opens with no warnings, and titles and thread codes stay editable text.

Helvetica covers Latin characters only. If your pattern has Cyrillic or other non-Latin text, keep a regular typeface and accept the font prompt for the text. The vector symbols are safe either way, and the panel warns you when a typeface can't print some of your text.

Downloading the symbol font

Need the symbols to stay text? Download font in the File card gives you the symbol font to install (an OpenType .otf file, named after the pattern). It's made for that one pattern only: open a different pattern's PDF with it installed and you'll see the wrong shapes. Unless you specifically need editable symbol text, vectors are the easier route.

Tips & gotchas

Print one chart page first. Check the symbols are big enough for your eyes before printing all of them.
B&W saves ink. Black symbols on white are all you need to stitch from.
Turn a wide chart sideways. Landscape pages can fit it on fewer sheets.
Big charts start with more on each page. On Color or B&W, split by squares, a chart over 200 squares both ways starts with Narrow margins and 60 × 80 squares per page instead of 40 × 50.
Start in the middle? Number the rows from 0 at the center lines (Grid & numbering) and every page tells you how far you are from the center.
What you see on screen doesn't change the PDF. The editor's View Options (stitch style, grid, symbols) are separate; the PDF has its own.

FAQ

Do View Options affect the exported PDF?

No. View Options (stitch style, symbols, grid) only change how the editor shows your pattern. The PDF has its own chart style, grid, and symbol settings in the export panel.

Can I export only part of the pattern?

Not directly: the PDF always holds the whole pattern. To print a section, use the Selection tool to copy it into a new pattern, then export that.

Why does Illustrator say fonts are missing?

Nothing is missing. The fonts are embedded, but Illustrator won't use an embedded font for editable text, so it swaps in one you have installed. Turn on Keep symbols as vectors (Every page › File) so the symbols are shapes rather than text, and set the Typeface to Helvetica (standard) so the file embeds no fonts at all.

What does Repeat on edges do?

Each chart page repeats a few squares from the pages next to it, so the edges line up when you lay the pages side by side. You can choose None, 3 (the default), or 5.

How do I get the chart onto fewer pages?

Pick a smaller block of pages under Split by in Setup. Fewer pages means more squares, and smaller ones, on each page. A3 paper fits more on a page, and turning the pages sideways can help a wide chart.

How do I use the same settings on my next pattern?

You don't have to do anything: the next pattern starts from the settings you left, apart from what each pattern keeps for itself (its cover title and chart pages). To keep several looks and switch between them, save each one as an export preset.