Have you been trying to figure out how to Copy & Paste in Procreate? If you’re totally new to Procreate this tool can seem impossible to find. But, that’s where I come in. I’m going to walk you though how to not only copy and paste but also cut (which I’m sure you’ve been wondering about too)!

Let’s get started.

1. Hold out your had and make the number 3.

Make sure you are using your pointer, middle, and ring fingers to do this or it won’t work. It has to be those three. Using your dominant hand to do this might help you get the best result possible.

2. Take those three fingers and swipe down

If you did this correctly you will see a tool panel pop up in the middle of the screen. I recommend putting your ipad on a table when you first try this to make sure your 3 fingers all hit the screen at the same time.

3. You’ll see a menu pop up with options to Cut, Copy, Copy All, Duplicate, Cut & Paste, and Paste

Depending on what you want to do you can select one of these options. If you’re not exactly sure what you need to do just start experimenting with each option. This will help you understand what each button does so you can begin utilizing these tools in your daily design projects.

4. Select what you want

Cut: Use this to cut/delete any object from your current layer

Copy: Use this to copy any of your selections from your current layer or to copy everything on this layer together

Copy All: Use this to copy all of the layers that are visible in your entire canvas

Duplicate: Use this to duplicate a selection from your current layer or to copy everything on this layer together. The duplicated content will now appear in its own NEW layer.

Cut & Paste: Use this to cut/delete your selection or cut/delete everything in your layer entirely and paste the contents in a NEW layer. This will leave the old layer empty.

Paste: Use this to paste anything you’ve cut or copied anywhere you choose.

PRO TIP: You can paste anything you copied into any Procreate canvas file in your gallery. This comes in handy when you need to make multiple variations of your designs for different purposes.

5. ACCESS COPY & PASTE FROM TOOLBAR

You can access some of the basic settings by going to the wrench icon up in the top left of your screen. This pulls up your Actions Panel. Then tap ‘Add’ to get to basic options that way.