The 10 best free animation software in 2021

1

Pencil2D

“Pencil2D: The easiest and simplest program to do 2D animation. If you're going to rely on frame by frame hand drawn animations for your game then this is easy and simple enough to do it perfectly. But if you need anything else then it's super lacking unfortunately.” - u/xTMT, Reddit

#Art Tools #Animation #2D Animation

2

Animation Paper

Animation Paper reimagined PAP 4.0 from the ground up, aiming for a more minimalistic and intuitive design. This free 2D animation software will remind you of traditional light-table animation, complete with onion-skinning, light setup, layers, and black, blue, red and green pens for planning and drafting poses and scenes. The application layout is unfussy and simple but packed with features for traditional animation. For many, it will be worthwhile to take the tutorials on YouTube.

#2D Animation #Animation #Graphic Design 10 social mentions

3

Synfig Studio

Synfig Studio is a feature-rich free 2D animation app. Besides the usual drawing tools, keyframes, onion-skinning and shape tools that you find in many other free animation software, Synfig lets you create bitmap and vector animation and also offers some advanced features that require a bit of a learning curve.

#Animation #2D Animation #Art Tools

4

Blender

This free animation software offers tools for modeling, lighting, video operations after conversion, other animation tools and much more. Blender also works across all major platforms and operating systems, making this free 3D animation software perfect for anyone who wants to put in the effort to learn it.

#3D #Game Development #Game Engine 137 social mentions

5

Krita

Formerly a digital painting software similar to Photoshop and Paint.Net, Krita now supports animation via onion-skinning and frame-by-frame raster animation thanks to the sheer amount of support for a 2015 Kickstarter. Krita also has drawing tablet and touch screen support.

#Concept Art #Art Tools #Illustrations 296 social mentions

6

Clara.io

The simple interface has a clean design. If you still have queries you'd like answered, it’s one of the few free animation apps with its own forums, so you can turn to the 80,000-strong community that shares its artwork on the Clara.io's cloud.

#3D #3D Modeling #Digital Drawing And Painting 14 social mentions

7

DAZ 3D

Daz 3D is the developer behind DAZ Studio and was once responsible for re-releasing the popular software Bryce 5.5 as a freeware after acquiring Bryce from Corel.

#Digital Drawing And Painting #3D #Illustration 6 social mentions

8

OpenToonz

For any animators, beginners or veterans alike, OpenToonz is the perfect 2D software for anyone looking to improve on their skills. A fun fact about OpenToonz is that it has a high level of customization and is often used by Studio Ghibli, the Japanese anime film studio responsible for movies like My Neighbor Totoro, Spirited Away and Kiki’s Delivery Service.

#Art Tools #Animation #2D Animation 25 social mentions

10

Stykz

As the name suggests, StyStykzkz is the perfect free animation software for stick figures, letting you manipulate vector figures into 2D animation. It works well as a planning tool for your animation. Like most free animation apps on this list, Stykz is cross-platform, running on both Windows and Mac only (but not Linux).

#Animation #2D Animation #Art Tools