Charcoal Alternatives

Charcoal is described as '- Charcoal is incredibly easy to use: Just create or open a sketch and start drawing. There are no layers, properties panels or confusing settings. Instead, Charcoal features rich tools and beautiful color palettes' and is a digital painting tool in the photos & graphics category. There are more than 50 alternatives to Charcoal for a variety of platforms, including Windows, Mac, iPad, iPhone and Android apps. The best Charcoal alternative is Krita, which is both free and Open Source. Other great apps like Charcoal are Paint.NET, MyPaint, Procreate and Clip Studio Paint.

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Charcoal alternatives are mainly Digital Painting Tools but may also be Image Editors or Photo Editors.  Filter by these or use the filter bar below if you want a narrower list of alternatives or looking for a specific functionality of Charcoal.
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  • Charcoal is incredibly easy to use: Just create or open a sketch and start drawing. There are no layers, properties panels or confusing settings. Instead, Charcoal features rich tools and beautiful color palettes.
More about Charcoal
Charcoal alternatives page was last updated Jan 27, 2021
  1. Rebelle icon
     16 likes

    Rebelle lets you create realistic watercolor, acrylic and dry media artwork, using real-world color blending, wet diffusion, and drying!.

    37 Rebelle alternatives
    Rebelle screenshot 1

    License model

    Platforms

    • Mac
    • Windows

    Top Rebelle Features

    1.  Watercolor
    2.  Tablet support
    3.  Custom Brushes
    4.  Support for Layers
    5.  Pressure Sensitivity
    6.  Dark Mode
    7.  Works Offline
    8.  Drawing Tablet Support
    9.  Natural media painting
    10.  Sketching
    11.  MultiTouch
    12.  Multiple languages
    Rebelle iconCharcoal Icon

    Rebelle VS Charcoal

    Is Rebelle a good alternative to Charcoal?
     
  2. Artrage icon
     66 likes

    A simple but lovely natural media painting and sketching program. Art oriented, but capable of loading/saving photoshop files.

    60 Artrage alternatives
    Artrage screenshot 1

    License model

    Platforms

    • Mac
    • Windows
    • Android
    • iPhone
    • Android Tablet
    • iPad

    Top Artrage Features

    1.  Support for Layers
    2.  Works Offline
    3.  Support for 4K
    4.  Drawing Tablet Support
    5.  Apple Pencil support
    6.  Texture painting
    7.  Multi-choice brushes
    8.  MultiTouch
    9.  Color blending
    10.  Upload directly to Dropbox
    11.  Sketching
    12.  Colour control
    Artrage iconCharcoal Icon

    Artrage VS Charcoal

    Is Artrage a good alternative to Charcoal?
     
  3. Paper by WeTransfer icon
     7 likes

    Over 25 million people set their ideas free with Paper®, the award-winning immersive sketching app.

    15 Paper by WeTransfer alternatives
    Paper by WeTransfer screenshot 1

    License model

    • FreemiumProprietary

    Application type

    Platforms

    • iPhone
    • iPad

    Paper by WeTransfer Features

    1.  Handwritten Notes
    2.  Note organization
    3.  Notebook
    4.  Sketching
    5.  Sketch
    Paper by WeTransfer iconCharcoal Icon

    Paper by WeTransfer VS Charcoal

    Is Paper by WeTransfer a good alternative to Charcoal?
     
  4. Expresii icon
     9 likes

    Beautiful digital watercolor painting app.

    27 Expresii alternatives
    Organic flowing paint based on fluid dynamics.

    License model

    Application type

    Platforms

    • Windows

    Properties

    1.  Lightweight

    Features

    1.  Pressure Sensitivity
    2.  Drawing Tablet Support
    3.  Support for Layers
    4.  Ad-free
    5.  Watercolor
    6.  Tablet support
    Expresii iconCharcoal Icon

    Expresii VS Charcoal

    Is Expresii a good alternative to Charcoal?
     
  5. Artecture Draw, Sketch, Paint icon
     6 likes

    Artecture enables you to sketch, draw and paint like never before. If you love to draw, regardless you are an amateur or a pro, this drawing app provides all the tools and brushes that you’d love.

    65 Artecture Draw, Sketch, Paint alternatives
    Artecture Draw, Sketch, Paint screenshot 1

    License model

    • FreeProprietary

    Application type

    Platforms

    • Android

    Artecture Draw, Sketch, Paint Features

    1.  Support for Layers
    2.  Sketch
    3.  Sketching
    Artecture Draw, Sketch, Paint iconCharcoal Icon

    Artecture Draw, Sketch, Paint VS Charcoal

    Is this a good alternative to Charcoal?
     
  6. Pixia icon
     11 likes

    Pixia is a freeware bitmap graphics editor program for Windows, created by Isao Maruoka. It was originally designed for the anime/manga community but has also been used in other branches of art.

    45 Pixia alternatives
    Main window.

    License model

    • FreeProprietary

    Platforms

    • Windows

    Pixia Features

    1.  Extensible by Plugins/Extensions
    2.  Support for Layers
    3.  Custom Brushes
    4.  Drawing Tablet Support
    5.  Sketch
    6.  Sketching
    Pixia iconCharcoal Icon

    Pixia VS Charcoal

    Is Pixia a good alternative to Charcoal?
     
  7. Artweaver icon
     59 likes

    Artweaver is a simple Freeware program for creative painting, i.e. Artweaver offers you all artistic effects which you need for your work.

    99 Artweaver alternatives
    Artweaver screenshot 1

    License model

    • FreemiumProprietary

    Application type

    Platforms

    • Windows

    Artweaver Features

    1.  Portable
    Artweaver iconCharcoal Icon

    Artweaver VS Charcoal

    Is Artweaver a good alternative to Charcoal?
     
  8. Verve Painter icon
     20 likes

    Verve (Dictionary: Energy and enthusiasm in the expression of ideas, especially in artistic performance or composition...) is the result of a curious idea I had to try using the graphics hardware to run a fluid dynamics simulation.

    55 Verve Painter alternatives
    Verve Painter screenshot 1

    License model

    • FreeProprietary

    Platforms

    • Windows

    Verve Painter Features

    1.  Portable
    2.  Vector painting
    Verve Painter iconCharcoal Icon

    Verve Painter VS Charcoal

    Is Verve Painter a good alternative to Charcoal?
     
  9. Ravioli Paint 2 icon
     5 likes

    RavioliPaint2 is paint application that supports multi-layer editing.

    57 Ravioli Paint 2 alternatives
    Ravioli Paint 2 screenshot 1

    License model

    • FreeProprietary

    Application type

    Platforms

    • Android

    Ravioli Paint 2 Features

    1.  Support for Layers
    Ravioli Paint 2 iconCharcoal Icon

    Ravioli Paint 2 VS Charcoal

    Is Ravioli Paint 2 a good alternative to Charcoal?
     
  10. FotoSketcher icon
     24 likes

    Turn your photos into beautiful paintings, sketches or drawings in seconds. FotoSketcher is a 100% free program which can help you convert your digital photos into art, automatically. If you want to turn a portrait, the photograph of your house or a beautiful landscape into a pai.

    32 FotoSketcher alternatives
    Example Old Bridge

    License model

    • FreeProprietary

    Platforms

    • Windows
    • PortableApps.com

    FotoSketcher Features

    1.  Portable
    2.  Sketch
    3.  Sketching
    FotoSketcher iconCharcoal Icon

    FotoSketcher VS Charcoal

    Is FotoSketcher a good alternative to Charcoal?
     
  11. Seashore icon
     69 likes

    Seashore is an open source image editor for Mac OS. It features gradients, textures and anti-aliasing for both text and brush strokes. It supports multiple layers and alpha channel editing. It is based around the GIMPs technology and uses the same native file format.

    121 Seashore alternatives
    Seashore screenshot 1

    License model

    • FreeOpen Source

    Application types

    Platforms

    • Mac

    Seashore Features

    1.  Real time collaboration
    2.  Crop images
    Seashore iconCharcoal Icon

    Seashore VS Charcoal

    Is Seashore a good alternative to Charcoal?
     
  12. Gimp Paint Studio icon
     29 likes

    GPS (aka Gimp Paint Studio) is a collection of brushes, patterns, color gradients, accompanying tool presets and dynamics. Tool presets are a simply saved tool options, highly useful feature of the GIMP.

    72 Gimp Paint Studio alternatives
    Gimp Paint Studio screenshot 1

    License model

    • FreeOpen Source

    Platforms

    • Mac
    • Windows
    • Linux
    • GIMP

    Gimp Paint Studio Features

    1.  Extensible by Plugins/Extensions
    2.  Categories
    Discontinued

    The project seems to be no longer developed. Last version, 2.0, released in August 2013, can be still downloaded from GitHub.

    Gimp Paint Studio iconCharcoal Icon

    Gimp Paint Studio VS Charcoal

    Is Gimp Paint Studio a good alternative to Charcoal?
     
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