How to Make a Cut Line Around a Design in Adobe Illustrator

Creating a clean, professional cut line around a design is an essential skill for anyone working in digital crafting, printing, or product design. Whether you're preparing stickers, decals, or intricate cutouts, adding a precise cut line ensures your design is production-ready. In this tutorial, I'll walk you through a simple method using Adobe Illustrator, but you can adapt these steps for similar design programs.

Why You Need a Cut Line

A cut line serves as a guide for plotters, laser cutters, or die-cut machines to know where to cut around your design. Without a clear cut line, the cutter might either miss critical edges or cut too close to the artwork. This extra layer of preparation guarantees accuracy and preserves the integrity of your design.

Step-by-Step Guide: Creating a Cut Line

Here’s how you can make a cut line around your design:

1. Make a Copy of the Original Design

Start by duplicating your original artwork. This way, you preserve the original in case you need to revert or make additional edits later. Select your design and use Edit → Copy (or Ctrl+C) and Edit → Paste (Ctrl+V).

2. Use Image Trace and Expand

With the copy selected, go to Object → Image Trace → Make and Expand. This step converts your raster artwork into vector paths, allowing Illustrator to recognize shapes and outlines.

💡 Tip: Adjust Image Trace settings for better accuracy depending on your design’s complexity.

3. Remove the Background

Now that your design is traced and expanded, select the background (often a solid color like red) and hit Delete on your keyboard. This clears any unwanted backdrop, leaving only the traced design.

4. Ungroup and Release the Copy

Go to Object → Ungroup to separate all vector elements in the traced design. You may need to ungroup multiple times depending on the file. This makes it easier to isolate the shape you’ll use for the cut line.

5. Change Fill to Stroke

Select the silhouette of the design (the outermost shape you want as your cut line). Change the Fill to None and apply a Stroke color instead. This stroke will represent your cut line.

🎨 Pro Tip: Choose a bright stroke color (like green) so it stands out clearly against the artwork.

6. Remove Extra Lines

Zoom in and carefully delete any internal or unnecessary paths that aren’t part of the main outline. You want a clean, continuous stroke around your design—no stray shapes or overlapping paths.

7. Place the Cut Line Over the Original

Finally, align the cut line you’ve created over your original design. This overlay acts as a guide for your cutter, showing exactly where the machine should cut.

✅ Done! You now have a ready-to-use cut line surrounding your artwork.

Final Thoughts

This process may sound technical, but once you go through it a few times, it becomes second nature. Creating cut lines is crucial for projects involving vinyl cutting, sticker printing, or laser engraving. Taking the time to set up your file properly saves headaches (and materials) later.

If you’re using a different design software, don’t worry—the steps are similar, though the tool names might vary. Always look for features like trace, expand, ungroup, and outline stroke to achieve the same result.

Do you have favorite tips or shortcuts for making cut lines? Let me know in the comments below!