Excalidraw is a free online whiteboard that draws everything in a hand-sketched style. You can use it with no account. A paid plan, Excalidraw+, is offered in the corner with a 14-day free trial. We tested the free app on November 5, 2026, in desktop Chrome and a phone-sized window. We have no relationship with Excalidraw.
How we tested
- Opened excalidraw.com with no account.
- Drew a box, an ellipse, and an arrow with keyboard shortcuts, and added text labels.
- Tried undo and redo.
- Exported a PNG.
- Reloaded the page to see if the drawing survived.
- Opened it on a 390 px wide screen.
What worked
The app was ready in about four seconds. The single-letter shortcuts work as soon as the page loads: R for a rectangle, O for an ellipse, A for an arrow, T for text. We drew a small flow (“Signup form” pointing to “Dashboard”) in under a minute without opening a menu.
Undo and redo with Ctrl+Z and Ctrl+Shift+Z behaved as expected. After a full page reload the drawing was still there, saved in the browser. The start screen on mobile says this plainly: drawings live in browser storage, which can be cleared, so save to a file regularly.
The export trap
The export dialog (Ctrl+Shift+E) has switches for Only selected, Background, Dark mode, Embed scene, and a 1x, 2x, or 3x scale. When we opened it while the “Dashboard” label was still selected, Only selected was already on and the preview showed just that one label. It is easy to export a fragment of your drawing without noticing.
With nothing selected, the PNG at 1x came out 720 by 190 px and 19 KB, cropped tight around the shapes.
On a phone
At 390 px wide the tools move to a bar along the bottom of the screen and the canvas fills the rest. The start screen gives four options: Open, Help, Live collaboration, and Sign up.
What we did not test
We did not try live collaboration or the paid Excalidraw+ plan. Starting a live session creates a shareable link, and we kept this test to things one person can do alone.
What we would fix first
- Turn Only selected off by default when the export dialog opens, or show a short note when it is on.
- Put a visible save-to-file reminder in the main menu, not only on the start screen.
Who it is for
Anyone who wants to sketch a flow, a wireframe, or a quick diagram without an account. It is fast to start and stays out of the way. Just check the export settings before you share the file.
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