Free game controller SVG files

Generic pads with plain buttons

These controllers are drawn to read as a game controller without being any one console’s. The outlines are our own, the four buttons are plain circles with no letters or symbols on them, and nothing carries a logo. The same design therefore suits a player on any system, and there is no maker’s mark to work round.

A thumbstick is a ring round a cap, and a ring cut all the way round lets its middle fall out. Here each ring is cut as two halves with a bridge above and below, so the cap stays joined to the pad. When the pad is 100 mm wide the bridges are about 2 mm across and the cut lines about 1.7 mm, which weeds cleanly in vinyl. Under about 60 mm wide, use the simple icon or the heartbeat line, which have no stick rings at all.

Which design for which player

For a bedroom door or a games room sign, the two-handed pad, the round badge and the pad wearing a headset are the usual picks. The retro pad, the joystick and the arcade cabinet suit anyone who grew up feeding coins into machines. The split frame takes a name or a player tag between its two halves, and the layered pad stacks four colours of vinyl or card with no bridges to weed.

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