# Convert an image to SVG for laser engraving. Turn a logo, line drawing or clip art into vector paths your laser software can fill-engrave or cut — and know exactly what the trace gives you before the laser fires: filled shapes, a background rectangle to delete, and a canvas measured in pixels. Text of . The page itself also carries the working image converter. > **The short answer** > > Trace the image into filled vector shapes, delete the white background rectangle the trace includes, then set the real-world size in your laser software, because the SVG is measured in pixels. pic2svg turns high-contrast artwork into closed, filled paths that suit fill engraving and cutting solid silhouettes. It has no centerline mode: a drawn line comes back as a thin filled outline, so a vector cut follows both of its edges. Photos are better engraved as images in your laser software's raster mode. ## What does a traced line drawing look like? A coaster design drawn for this page — a rounded border 14 px wide, an ellipse 10 px wide and a rule 8 px wide, all black on white — traced on 2026-10-22 the way the converter uploads it (as a lossless PNG), with the same engine and settings. Left is the input, right is the SVG exactly as the engine wrote it. ### Coaster line design, Balanced preset - Input: PNG, 800 × 600 px, 23.7 KB: ![Black line drawing on white: a rounded rectangle border, an ellipse inside it and a short horizontal line below the ellipse](https://pic2svg.com/examples/uc-image-to-svg-for-laser-engraving/laser-coaster-line-art.png) - Output: SVG, 2.6 KB, 6 paths, polygon mode, Balanced preset: ![The traced SVG of the same coaster design: filled black ring shapes and a filled bar on a white background](https://pic2svg.com/examples/uc-image-to-svg-for-laser-engraving/laser-coaster-line-art.svg) Six paths. The first is a white (#FFFFFF) rectangle covering the whole 800×600 canvas, two more white shapes sit above it, and each black stroke became its own filled black shape: the border and the ellipse as rings with an outer and an inner contour, the rule as a closed outline 8 px tall. ## How do you convert an image to SVG for a laser? Four steps on this page, then two jobs in your laser software. 1. **Add the cleanest artwork you have:** Drop, choose or paste the image into the converter on this page. High-contrast flat artwork — a logo, a line drawing, clip art — traces into the fewest, cleanest shapes. Signed out you trace one image at a time; a free account lets you trace up to 12 in one batch. PNG works well; see [PNG to SVG](https://pic2svg.com/png-to-svg/) for how transparency is handled. 2. **Pick a trace preset:** Balanced is the default and the one used for the example above. Compact merges near-identical colours for fewer shapes, which helps on a blurry or compressed source. 3. **Preview the vector:** Check the preview before anything else. Line art like the example goes up as a lossless PNG and comes back clean, but a compressed JPG or a scan can leave small stray shapes along edges; delete those before you cut. To confirm the file is real paths rather than an embedded picture, see [how to check if an SVG is a real vector](https://pic2svg.com/how-to-check-if-svg-is-a-real-vector/). 4. **Download the SVG:** The SVG download is free and needs no account, like tracing and the preview. PDF needs Starter or above; EPS, AI and DXF need Pro or Advanced. See [pricing](https://pic2svg.com/pricing/) for the current plans. For laser software that imports SVG, the SVG is the format to take. ## What should you check before you engrave or cut? How the engine treats every image, shown on the example trace. None of it means your file is broken; it is cleanup to do before the job runs. - **There is no centerline tracing:** The engine only traces filled colour regions, so every line in your drawing comes back as a shape with two edges. In the example, the 8 px rule became a closed outline 8 px tall and the border became a ring with an outer and an inner contour. Fill-engrave those shapes and you get the strokes as drawn. Run them as a vector cut or score and the laser follows both edges of every stroke. A single-line score needs a centerline tool or a redraw. - **Delete the background rectangle:** Transparency is flattened onto white before tracing, and white is traced like any other colour. The first path is a rectangle covering the whole canvas — 800×600 in the example, and the same in every trace we checked — and here two more white shapes sit on top of it. Delete or disable every white shape, or your laser software will treat them as artwork to engrave or cut. - **Check the fill colours:** Each colour region becomes its own path with its own fill. The three black strokes in the example all came back as #000000, but a scan with uneven ink can give several near-black fills. If your laser software assigns settings by colour, check them and recolour the dark shapes to one colour if needed; we have not tested how any particular program groups these fills. - **Set the size in your laser software:** The SVG's width, height and viewBox are the trace canvas in pixels (800×600 here), with no physical unit. Larger uploads are scaled down to about 600,000 pixels before tracing. Scale the design to its real size in your laser software, for example by setting one known dimension, rather than trusting the size it opens at. - **The DXF opens in millimetres:** The DXF export holds the closed contours of the drawing in millimetres: a hole is its own contour, so it cuts as a hole, and the canvas-edge rectangle is left out. Type the width you need in DXF width (mm) under your result and the drawing is exactly that wide; left empty, it is 96 pixels per inch, so the example opens at 179.9 × 127 mm: the extent of its border, without the empty margin around it. Cut contours can be near-white too, so do not delete DXF lines by colour. In the example two contours lie exactly on the inner edges of the border and the ellipse; if your laser program would cut those edges twice, use its remove-duplicates tool. For CAD and CNC, see [image to DXF](https://pic2svg.com/image-to-dxf/). - **Photos and text:** A photo is reduced to flat colour bands before tracing — the 320 × 213 photo-like sample on [JPG to SVG](https://pic2svg.com/jpg-to-svg/) comes back as 50 banded shapes — so engrave photos as images in your laser software's raster mode instead. Lettering becomes outlined shapes, not editable text, which is fine for engraving but means you cannot retype it. ## SVG or DXF from pic2svg: which should your laser get? Both files come from the same trace. The DXF row is what the current exporter writes, measured on the example above. Source: scripts/examples/image-to-svg-for-laser-engraving.py | Format | Geometry | Inner contours | Size and units | | --- | --- | --- | --- | | SVG | Filled paths; straight segments in polygon mode, curves in spline mode | Kept as separate subpaths of the same shape | Pixels: viewBox 0 0 800 600 for the example; no physical unit | | DXF (Pro and Advanced) | 7 closed outlines, each keeping its colour, including 2 white ones to delete; curves become short straight segments (finer on Advanced) | Their own closed outlines | Millimetres: 179.9 × 127 mm for the example (the border's extent) | ## Laser engraving questions ### Can I convert a PNG to SVG for laser engraving? Yes. Any transparency is flattened onto white first, so a cut-out PNG comes back with a white background shape you delete before engraving. Flat art with 48 or fewer quantised colours traces as straight-edged polygons, but anti-aliased edges can push it into curve mode. ### Does pic2svg do centerline (single-line) tracing for laser cutting? No. Every line becomes a thin filled shape, so cutting it in a line or vector mode cuts both edges of the stroke. It suits fill engraving and cutting solid silhouettes; for single-line scoring use a centerline tracer or redraw the paths. ### Should I use SVG or DXF in LightBurn? Laser programs such as LightBurn commonly accept both. The SVG is free and opens at the trace's pixel size; the DXF (Pro and Advanced) opens in millimetres with every outline closed. In the SVG, delete the white background shapes first; in the DXF, keep the contours, which can be near-white too. We have not tested LightBurn's importer ourselves. ### Why does my traced SVG open at the wrong size? Because the SVG is measured in pixels of the traced canvas, not in millimetres or inches. Scale it to the size you want in your laser software before you run the job, or download the DXF with the width typed in DXF width (mm). ### Can I engrave a photo by tracing it to SVG? It is the wrong tool for that. The converter reduces a photo to about 32 flat colour bands, a poster rather than the photo; your laser software's raster or image mode engraves a photo directly and is built for it. ### Is converting an image to SVG for a laser free? Tracing, previewing and the SVG download are free, with no account needed for one image. PDF needs Starter or higher, and EPS, AI and DXF need Pro or Advanced — see [pricing](https://pic2svg.com/pricing/). ## Related converters and guides - **PNG to DXF:** [Convert a PNG logo, part or line drawing into a DXF of closed outlines in millimetres.](https://pic2svg.com/png-to-dxf/) - **Image to DXF:** [Export a trace as AutoCAD R2010 polylines for CAD, CNC and laser software.](https://pic2svg.com/image-to-dxf/) - **Drawing to SVG:** [Trace ink drawings, pencil sketches and hand lettering, and see what survives.](https://pic2svg.com/drawing-to-svg/)