Pixel Pak

Pixel Pak is open in another browser tab, so this tab does not autosave. Save a project file (Export, Save project file) to keep your work, or close the other tab and reload.

Preview8 fps

Per-frame times

x – y – input: none yet 1×

Contrast 1.0:1

R0 G0 B0 A255

Hex (#rgb, #rrggbb or #rrggbbaa)

100%

Speed 8 fps Per-frame times

Frame time ms

Onion skin Ping-pong

Past Next Show Colour tint

Frames to

This is a single canvas. A tile sheet splits the canvas into equal tiles, so each tile can be a frame of an animation.

Tile 1

Tile 1 / 1

Speed 8 fps

Play tiles to

Stay inside the tile you start in Show tile grid

Animated tiles

On the map, a tile can cycle through other tiles by itself.

Tile shows to

Every ms

Tile tools work on the active layer.

A tile map arranges your tiles into a level or scene. First make a tile sheet, or build one from a level mockup picture.

Tile 1

Map ×

Animate tiles

Autotile

16 tiles from tile

Autotile painting

Tile order in the set

Arrange your 16 tiles in this order. Each tile shows which sides touch another tile of the set: ↑ above, → right, ↓ below, ← left.

Flips count as repeats

Two fingers pan and zoom. A quick two-finger tap undoes and a three-finger tap redoes. A stylus button or the pen's eraser end erases. On a laptop, scroll to zoom and hold Space to pan. Press ? or the Keys button to see and change every keyboard shortcut.

A new version of Pixel Pak is ready. Your drawing is autosaved.

About Pixel Pak

Made by MI Pixel Ltd, an independent game studio in the UK. Where Retro Gaming Meets Innovation.

Palettes
Endesga 32 by Endesga · Sweetie 16 by GrafxKid · DB16 by DawnBringer · Resurrect 64 by Kerrie Lake · AAP-64 by Adigun A. Polack · Apollo by AdamCYounis · Pear36 by PineappleOnPizza · PICO-8 by Lexaloffle · Commodore 64 (Pepto values). The artist-made palettes are free to download from Lospec. Console and computer palettes are the colours of the machines themselves; some are approximate because emulators and monitors differ.

Fonts
Hanken Grotesk, JetBrains Mono and Pixelify Sans, used under the SIL Open Font Licence.

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Send feedback

Pixel Pak

Nothing is open yet. Start a new drawing at the size you want, pick a template, or open a project file you saved earlier.

The New dialog also has templates, including a small heart.

New canvas

Start from a template

Or a blank canvas

Width (px) Height (px)

Tile width (px) Tile height (px)

Tiles across Tiles down

Creating a new canvas replaces your current drawing.

Recolour everywhere

Change the main palette colour, and every pixel of it in every layer and frame changes too. Semi-transparent pixels keep their see-through amount.

→

Swap palette

Recolour every layer and frame from your current palette to another one. Good for enemy variants, day and night versions or team colours. One undo puts it all back.

Swap to Match colours

→

Unlock the full version

Free: canvases up to 32 px, 2 layers, 4 frames, small maps, one drawing at a time. Full version: up to 256 px, 12 layers, 64 frames, big maps, up to 8 drawings open, Lasso, Blend, Text, Mirror, Dither, custom palettes, Smart scaling, pivot points, sprite-sheet and Tiled export. One licence works on up to 3 of your devices and keeps working offline. Replaced a phone? You can remove old devices from this dialog.

Buy the full version

The full version is coming soon. Free is yours to use in the meantime.

Already bought? Paste your licence key

Device code (for tester access):

Send feedback

Welcome to Pixel Pak

A pixel art editor for sprites, animation and tile maps. A few things worth knowing:

Draw anywhere. Pick a tool from the toolbar. On a touchscreen, pinch with two fingers to zoom and pan, tap with two fingers to undo and with three to redo.
Layers and frames. Use layers for outlines, colour and shading, and frames for animation. Mark a layer as a Guide to keep an outline you can trace over.
Retro mode. Open Palettes and pick a console to lock your colours to what that machine can show. "Snap my artwork" converts a finished sprite to those colours.
Templates and tile maps. Start from a template in the New dialog, or build a tile sheet and lay out a map.
Keep your work safe. Your drawing autosaves in this browser, but browsers can clear that. Use Export, then Save project file (or Ctrl+S) to keep a .pxpak file.
Install it. Use your browser's Install or Add to Home Screen option to run Pixel Pak like an app, even offline.

The Free button at the top shows what the full version adds.

Made by MI Pixel · Where Retro Gaming Meets Innovation

Keyboard shortcuts

Click a shortcut, then press the key you want. Esc cancels. The ✕ clears a shortcut.

Export

Only tag

Columns Leave empty for a square-ish sheet.

Hidden layers are left out. Press and hold the image to save it, or right-click it on a laptop.

File name

Leave empty for automatic names with today's date.

Pivot point

The pivot is the spot a game engine uses to place and rotate your sprite, usually the feet or the centre. It is saved in the project and written into the JSON export. A red cross shows it on the canvas (never in exported pictures).

X (px) Y (px)

Smart downscale

Makes your drawing smaller. Each block of pixels becomes the colour that fills most of it, so nothing blurs and no new colours appear.

Outline colour

Before

After

Remove works on each layer's own pixels, so an outline drawn on its own layer is left alone. Hide or delete that layer instead.

Downscaling clears your undo history. Save a project file first if you want a safety copy.

Smart upscale

Makes your drawing bigger and smooths the staircase edges of diagonals and curves. It never blurs and never adds new colours.

Before

After

Upscaling clears your undo history. Save a project file first if you want a safety copy.

Canvas size

Width (px) Height (px)

Tiles across Tiles down

Where should your art sit? It stays in that spot when the canvas grows or shrinks.

Resizing clears your undo history. Save a project file first if you want a safety copy.

Reference picture

A picture to trace over. It shows behind your art and is never exported or saved with the project.

Show it Draw it on top of my art Opacity50% Size100% Left0 Up0

Import a picture or GIF

Choose a PNG, JPG, GIF or sprite sheet.

Tile width (px) Tile height (px)

Add its colours to my palette

Palettes

Palette

Console limit

Only allow colours a console can show

Paste a hex list (for example from Lospec)

Palette files (.hex, .gpl, .pal, .txt or a PNG strip)

Effects

Add an outline around the art on the active layer.

Include corners

Art touching the edge of the canvas or tile has no room for an outline. Leave a one pixel gap.

Active layer

Import a level mockup

Pick a picture of a level made of equal-sized tiles. It is cut up into a tile sheet and a map, and repeated tiles are only stored once.

Tile width (px) Tile height (px)

Treat flipped and rotated copies as the same tile

Choose a picture to start.

Importing replaces your current drawing and map.