Cross stitch pattern paper
Charting paper at the size your stitches will actually be, for the count of fabric you actually have. Centre marks included, because you start from the middle.
Cross stitch paper is a square grid at one square per stitch, and the only thing that makes one sheet different from another is how big that square is. That comes from the fabric: 25.4 mm divided by the number of stitches you get to the inch. Print at 100% and you can hold the sheet against the cloth and see your finished design at its real size before you thread a needle.
The catch is that fabric is not sold by stitches per inch. It is sold by count — threads, or Aida blocks, to the inch — and on evenweave and linen a stitch is worked over two threads. So 28 count evenweave is 14 stitches per inch, exactly the stitch size of 14 count Aida, and a sheet of 28 count paper drawn at 28 squares to the inch is wrong for almost everybody who asks for it. The toggle here gets it right, and the caption prints both numbers so the sheet can never mean something other than what it says.
Set the stitch counts to your design size and the grid becomes the design, with the finished measurement printed underneath in both millimetres and inches — which is the number you need before you buy fabric and cut a margin for the frame.
Cross stitch paper by count
- 11 count cross stitch paper11 stitches per inch · 2.31 mm squares
- 14 count cross stitch paper14 stitches per inch · 1.81 mm squares
- 16 count cross stitch paper16 stitches per inch · 1.59 mm squares
- 18 count cross stitch paper18 stitches per inch · 1.41 mm squares
- 22 count cross stitch paper11 stitches per inch · 2.31 mm squares
- 25 count cross stitch paper12.5 stitches per inch · 2.03 mm squares
- 28 count cross stitch paper14 stitches per inch · 1.81 mm squares
- 32 count cross stitch paper16 stitches per inch · 1.59 mm squares
Questions
Which count do I have?
If it came in a kit and nobody said, it is almost certainly 14 count Aida — that is the default here. Aida has visible square blocks with holes at the corners; evenweave and linen look like plain woven cloth with no obvious blocks at all.
Why is the 28 count page drawn at 14 squares to the inch?
Because that is what 28 count evenweave stitches at. The count is the number of threads to the inch, and cross stitch on evenweave or linen is worked over two of them, so 28 threads give 14 stitches. If you genuinely are stitching over one thread, switch the fabric control to Aida and the grid doubles to 28 squares to the inch.
Will it print at the true size?
Yes, at 100% scale. The grid is drawn in millimetres at 25.4 divided by your stitches per inch, and the page size is declared to the printer. Print the calibration page once to confirm your printer is not shrinking to fit, and then ten squares of 14 count paper really will measure five sevenths of an inch.
What are the arrows on the edges?
The centre. You find the middle of the fabric by folding it in half twice and start stitching there, so the chart has to agree about where its own middle is. Static PDFs rarely mark it.
Can I chart a design that is bigger than one page?
Not across pages, no — this prints one sheet. Set the stitch counts to what fits and chart in sections, or move up to A3 or tabloid, which at 14 count holds a little over 150 stitches across.
Other tools
- Beading graph paperCharting paper drawn from the bead's own measurements, so the beads on the page are the size of the beads in the tube.
- English paper piecing templatesPick a shape, type the side length you actually want, and print it at true size.
- Bubble answer sheet generatorScantron-style answer sheets, built to your question count.
- Blank clock facesClock faces with hands drawn where they genuinely belong — at 3:45 the hour hand sits three quarters of the way to four, because that is what a clock does.
- Blank periodic tableEvery blank periodic table online is a fixed image.
- Attendance sheet and gradebook gridsPaste twenty-eight names, choose a month, print.
- Printable graph paperAny spacing you like, in millimetres or inches, printed at true size.
- Printable dot grid paperDot paper at the spacing you actually use — 5 mm for a bullet journal, or whatever you type.
- Printable lined paperCollege ruled, wide ruled, or handwriting paper with a dashed midline — at the real spacings, not an approximation.
- Year in pixelsOne cell a day for a whole year, drawn for the year you name — so February is the right length and the months stop where they actually stop.
- Savings and goal colouring chartsType your goal and how many cells you want.
