Tools
Single letters, no modifier. They activate a tool by driving its rail button, which means a tool key works even when that tool is hidden inside a group slot: pressing C activates the Ellipse and pulls it into the shape slot, whatever was sitting there before.
| Keys | Does |
|---|---|
| V | Select |
| P | Pen |
| N | Pencil |
| R | Rectangle |
| C | Ellipse |
| L | Line |
| I | Spiral |
| T | Text |
| G | Gradient |
| Z | Zoom |
| U | Paint Bucket |
| W | Tweak |
| B | Shape Builder |
| A | Spray |
| Y | Magic Wand |
| Q | Lasso |
| * | Star (lives in the shape slot, so this opens it from the group) |
| F2 | Edit paths by nodes |
| F7 | Dropper |
| Shift+W | Width tool (W on its own is Tweak, same slot) |
| Shift+E | Eraser |
| Shift+O | Artboard |
| Shift+B | Blend |
| Shift+N | Shaper |
| Shift+D | Cycle the Drawing Mode (Normal, Behind, Inside) |
P is the Pen, not the Pencil. Two tools wanted the same letter, so the Pencil moved to N. If you are coming from Illustrator, this is the one that will catch you.
Every other tool is reachable only by picking it from its group slot's flyout. That includes the Star, Flare, Arc, the two grids, the anchor tools, Calligraphy, Blob Brush, Smooth, Scissors, Knife, the transform tools, Width, Mesh, Intertwine, Envelope, Measure, Dimension, Perspective Grid, Live Paint and the Connector.
Paint
These drive the paint proxy on the rail. All of them act on the active paint, the one whose swatch is currently on top.
| Keys | Does |
|---|---|
| X | Toggle which paint is active (fill or stroke) |
| Shift+X | Swap the fill and stroke colours |
| D | Default: white fill, black stroke, stroke width 1 |
| / | Set the active paint to none |
| , | Open the colour picker on the active paint |
| . | Apply a linear gradient to the active paint |
Global
| Keys | Does |
|---|---|
| Ctrl+Z | Undo |
| Ctrl+Y | Redo |
| Ctrl+X | Cut the selection |
| Ctrl+C | Copy the selection |
| Ctrl+V | Paste (offset slightly, repeatable) |
| Ctrl+Shift+Z | Redo (second redo key) |
| Ctrl+A | Select all |
| Ctrl+Shift+A | Deselect |
| Arrow keys | Nudge the selection |
| Shift+Arrow keys | Nudge ten times as far |
| Escape | Cancel or step out of the current interaction |
| Delete | Delete the selection |
Nudge distance is configurable in Preferences under behaviour, along with the undo limit and the duplicate offset.
When keys are ignored
The tool and paint keys are letters, so they have to stand down when a letter means a letter. They do nothing while your focus is in a text field, a text area, a dropdown, or any editable region. That is why typing "draw" into a text object does not fire four tools.
They also stand down whenever Ctrl, Cmd or Alt is held. Anything with a modifier belongs to a different layer of the app, so Ctrl+R will not draw a rectangle.
Why the menus disagree with this page
Worth saying plainly: the editor's menus print accelerator labels next to a lot of items, and a good number of those labels do not fire. The mechanism that was supposed to turn menu labels into live keys does not run at all, so a menu shortcut only works if it was separately hand-registered. Many were not.
Ctrl+X used to be the worst of these: Edit ▸ Cut advertised it while the key itself was wired to Redo, so pressing it undid your undo instead of cutting. That one is fixed, and Ctrl+X now cuts. Redo kept Ctrl+Y and Ctrl+Shift+Z.
The Star and Width tooltips used to advertise keys that nothing listened for. Both are wired up now: * selects Star and Shift+W selects Width. If a key here ever does nothing, tell us rather than assuming your keyboard is at fault.
A few tools carry stale comments in the source claiming shortcuts they never registered. The Connector, Live Paint Bucket and Blob Brush have no keyboard shortcut at all. Pick them from the rail.
We have since stripped the menu labels that pointed at a key belonging to something else, so the menu no longer promises Ctrl+/ for Division or Shift+Ctrl+K for Break Apart. What remains is the wider problem: most menu labels still do not fire, because the table that would make them fire never runs. Until that lands, treat this page as the list and click the menu item when in doubt. Clicking always runs the real command.
Common questions
Why does pressing a tool key do nothing sometimes?
You are almost certainly focused in a text field, a text area or a dropdown. The tool keys deliberately stand down there so you can type. Click empty canvas first, or press Escape.
The menu shows a shortcut that is not on this page. Which is right?
This page. The menu's shortcut labels are cosmetic strings and only some of them have a real key behind them. If it is not listed here, it does not fire.
Can I change the shortcuts?
Not currently. Preferences covers tool defaults, interface and behaviour settings such as nudge distance and undo limit, but there is no key remapping page yet.
Is there a shortcut for every tool?
No. Twenty-three tools have keys; the rest are picked from their group slot's flyout. Since a slot remembers your last pick, a tool you use constantly is one click away even without a key.