Knitting Chart Maker
Turn any photo into a square-grid colorwork chart you can knit from — fair isle, intarsia, or duplicate stitch.
Colorwork knitting — fair isle yokes, intarsia picture panels, duplicate-stitch motifs — is worked from a chart, and that chart is a simple square grid: each square is one stitch, each color is one yarn. This knitting chart maker builds that grid directly from your photo. Upload an image, set the width in stitches, cap the palette, and get a chart with exact stitch counts per color.
If the grid looks like a cross-stitch or crochet chart, that's because it is — square-grid charts are the industry standard for knitted colorwork too. Knitting patterns have been published on square grids for a century: you read the chart square by square, one square per stitch, and the fabric follows. The generator's graph preset produces exactly that grid.
What you get
Photo to knitting chart
Any JPG, PNG, or WebP becomes a stitch grid in seconds — no hand-tracing motifs onto knitter's graph paper.
Square grid, the industry standard
Each cell is one stitch, read row by row exactly like the charts in published knitting patterns.
Palette control for fair isle
Cap the chart at 2–16 colors. Stranded knitting is happiest at 2 colors per row — the slider keeps you honest.
Stitch counts per color
Every shade gets an exact stitch count, doubling as a yarn estimate for each ball in the palette.
Free PNG download
Print it, prop it next to your needles, mark rows as you knit. Free with a small watermark, no account.
How to make a knitting chart from a photo
Upload a bold image
Simple subjects with flat color areas convert best — logos, folk motifs, geometric art, cartoon-style portraits.
Set stitches and colors
Choose the chart width in stitches (match it to your project's stitch count) and cap the palette — 2–4 colors is classic fair isle territory.
Generate and knit
Download the chart and follow it one square per stitch: right-side rows right-to-left, wrong-side rows left-to-right.
Chart maker vs. charting colorwork by hand
| Knitting chart maker | Knitter's graph paper | |
|---|---|---|
| Getting the image onto a grid | Pixels map to stitch squares automatically | Trace the motif onto paper, square by square |
| Palette discipline | Hard color cap set before you generate | Notice the seventh shade three inches into the yoke |
| Stitch counts per color | Computed exactly, ready for yarn shopping | Count colored squares by hand |
| Resizing a motif | One slider — 30 vs 60 stitches wide in a click | Redraw the whole chart |
Frequently asked questions
Can I use a photo-to-chart generator for knitting?
Yes. Knitted colorwork — fair isle, intarsia, duplicate stitch — is charted on the same square grids as crochet graphgans and cross-stitch. Each square is one stitch, each color one yarn. Generate the chart here with the graph preset and read it exactly like a chart from any knitting pattern book.
How do I read a knitting colorwork chart?
Each square is one stitch. When knitting flat, read right-side rows from right to left and wrong-side rows from left to right, starting at the bottom. In the round, every row is read right to left. Follow the square's color for which yarn to knit that stitch with.
Knit stitches aren't square — will my picture distort?
Stockinette stitches are wider than they are tall (roughly 4:5), so a chart knit exactly as drawn comes out slightly wider than the source image. Traditional fair isle ignores this and looks fine; for pictorial panels, swatch your gauge and pick a grid width that compensates, or accept the subtle stretch — most knitters do.
What size grid should I choose for fair isle?
Match the chart to your project's stitch count. Small repeating motifs for hats and yokes work at 20–40 stitches wide; a pictorial panel on a sweater front usually needs 60–100. Keep the palette at 2 colors per row for classic stranded work — more colors per row means longer, snag-prone floats.
Is this knitting chart maker free?
Yes. Generating and downloading charts is free with a small watermark, no account needed. The same engine powers the crochet chart tools on this site — the grid is shared, only the stitching differs.