SketchCafe is a whiteboard for the diagrams you draw to explain something - the boxes, arrows and scribbles you would otherwise sketch on a napkin and then lose. Everything you draw comes out hand-drawn, so a rough idea still looks like a rough idea.
There is no account to make and nothing to sign in to. Your drawings are ordinary files on your Mac, the app works offline, and nothing you draw leaves the machine.
Highlights
- Draws the way you think - shapes, arrows and freehand strokes come out with a hand-drawn wobble, so a half-finished diagram reads as a sketch rather than a document you owe someone a final version of.
- Everything stays on your Mac - there is no account, no sign-in wall and no syncing. Drawings are files on your disk, and the app works exactly the same with the Wi-Fi switched off.
- Several drawings at once - open them in tabs across the top and switch between them without losing your place - each one keeps its own scroll, zoom and undo history.
- Saves as you go - once a drawing has a home on disk, SketchCafe keeps it written down for you. The dot on a tab tells you when something is still unsaved.
- Export for wherever it's going - PNG for a chat message, SVG when it needs to scale, PDF when it needs to be printed or attached.
- Opens straight from Finder - double-click a drawing, or right-click and Open With - it works whether or not the app is already running.
- Reusable pieces - keep the shapes you draw over and over in your own library and drop them into any drawing.
- Light and dark - follows your Mac's appearance, or pick one and stay there.
How it works
Open SketchCafe and you get a blank canvas and a row of tools. Pick a rectangle, an arrow or the pencil and start drawing - the canvas runs on forever in every direction, so you never have to decide up front how big the picture will be.
Press ⌘S when you want to keep it, and from then on SketchCafe saves the drawing for you as you work. ⌘N opens another one in a new tab. When it is ready to leave the app, export it as a PNG, an SVG or a PDF.
Perfect for
- Anyone explaining a system - boxes, arrows and a few words beat a paragraph when you are describing how something fits together.
- Product and design work - wireframe a screen roughly enough that people comment on the idea instead of the pixel spacing.
- Teachers and students - work a problem out visually and hand the picture over as a PNG.
- Anyone who thinks on paper - an infinite canvas for the diagram you would otherwise draw on a napkin and lose.
