Free boat SVG files

Long, low drawings

Most boats on the water are two or three times as long as they are tall, so a design that is 100 mm long is often only 35 to 50 mm high. The slim parts are the ones that stand up from the deck: bow rails, pennant poles, fishing rods and canopy struts are about 2 mm wide at that size. In vinyl they cut well from about 120 mm long, which suits a cool box, a tackle box or the side of a tumbler. For a shirt, 220 to 280 mm long is usual.

Every boat sits on a strip of water that joins the hull, the motor and anything in the water into one piece. On the rowing boat the water is a single wavy line across the hull instead. For card and wood, use the fishing boat silhouette: it has one window cut out and a straight base, and stands up in a shadow box without any trimming.

Which boat is which

The bass boat is the low one with pedestal seats and a trolling motor on the bow. The pontoon boat is the party boat with a railed deck and a canopy. The centre console has its helm in the middle under a hard top, with rods standing behind it. The shrimp boat has outrigger booms with nets, and the paddle boat is a river steamer with a wheel at the stern. None copies a real builder’s hull, so you are free to add the name of your own boat.

How to open the files

• Cricut Design Space: choose Upload, pick the SVG, and add it to the canvas. Set the width you want; the shape is already welded.
• Silhouette Studio: Designer Edition and above open the SVG. The free Basic Edition does not, so open the DXF instead.
• LightBurn, xTool Creative Space and Glowforge: import the SVG, then set the layer to cut, score or engrave.
• Inkscape, Illustrator and Affinity: open the SVG. It is a plain filled path, so you can recolour it, add a stroke or combine it with your own work.
• Printing or sublimation: use the PNG, which has a transparent background.

Each design page lists the file’s narrowest part at seven sizes, so you can tell whether it will survive at the size you plan to cut.

Questions