Animation Paper Alternatives for Hand-Drawn 2D Animation

Animation Paper is a hand-drawn 2D animation app for Windows, macOS and Linux, built around fast drawing, flipping, a light table and an X-sheet. It still works and costs nothing, but it has not reached a full release. The Animation Paper home page offers a free beta and lists colour layers, paint and fill as coming soon, along with a touch version for iPad and Android. The newest post in its announcements, Alpha 8.1, is dated June 6, 2024, and added merge layers and scenes up to 8K.

That gap is the main reason people look around. Animation Paper is excellent for roughs and line tests, but anyone who needs to colour, composite or hand files to a studio needs more. The picks below are ordered for traditional animators, free tools first, then the paid studio standards.

Prices below are as of November 6, 2026. Our method is on How we review tools.

Quick comparison

Krita

Krita is a painting program first, but its animation workspace covers what most Animation Paper users do: a timeline, onion skins, per-frame drawing on raster layers and export to video or image sequences. You also get Krita's full brush engine, colour fills and layer effects, which Animation Paper does not have yet.

Version 5.3.4.1 was released on October 7, 2026, according to the Krita download page. It is free and open source under GPLv3 from krita.org. Paid copies on Steam, the Epic Games Store, the Microsoft Store and the Mac App Store carry the same features and fund development.

Best for: Animators who want to draw and colour frame by frame in one free app.

Pricing:

• Free from krita.org (GPLv3)
• Paid store versions with automatic updates; price set by each store

Watch out for:

• There is no iPad or iPhone version; the download page says iOS devices are not supported.
• It has no X-sheet in the traditional sense, so exposure sheets and timing charts from Animation Paper do not carry over.

Official site: Krita.

OpenToonz

OpenToonz is the open source release of Toonz, the software Studio Ghibli customised for its productions. It has a real X-sheet, vector and raster levels, scanning and clean-up of paper drawings, and an ink-and-paint stage for colouring. Effects and compositing are built in through a node schematic.

Version 1.8.0 was tagged on June 19, 2026, on the OpenToonz GitHub, and the code is BSD-3-Clause, so studios can modify it. Animators who like Animation Paper's X-sheet will find the same timing logic here, with far more around it.

Best for: Small studios and serious hobbyists who need a full 2D pipeline at no cost.

Pricing:

• Free and open source (BSD-3-Clause)

Watch out for:

• The interface is dense. Tahoma2D exists as a fork mainly to simplify the workspace, which says a lot about the learning curve.

Official site: OpenToonz.

TVPaint Animation

TVPaint is the paid tool that feels most like paper. It is bitmap-based, with a light table, exposure sheet and brushes tuned for pencil and paint. Version 12 comes in Standard and Professional editions.

The free trial opens Professional features with no time limit, but the TVPaint product page says you cannot save or export. The price is on request from TVPaint or resellers, with upgrade paths from version 11 and education pricing.

Best for: Professional animators who want paper-style raster drawing.

Pricing:

• Price on request from TVPaint or resellers
• Upgrade paths from version 11 and from Standard to Professional
• Education pricing with proof of enrolment

Watch out for:

• No price is published, so you have to ask TVPaint or a reseller for a quote before you can budget for it.

Official site: TVPaint Animation.

Toon Boom Harmony

Harmony is the studio standard for TV animation, and version 27 is current, per the Harmony product page. It handles traditional paperless animation, cut-out rigs, effects and compositing in one app, and runs on Windows 10 and 11 and recent macOS releases. A 14-day trial is offered.

Pick the edition carefully. Essentials covers basic drawing and animation. Advanced adds full paperless and simple cut-out work. Premium adds advanced rigs and unlimited effects. The Toon Boom shop lists Essentials at $31 a month or $259 a year, Advanced at $79 or $606, and Premium at $143 or $1,161.

Best for: Animators aiming at studio jobs or TV pipelines.

Pricing:

• Essentials: $31/month, $259/year, $738 for 3 years
• Advanced: $79/month, $606/year, $1,727 for 3 years
• Premium: $143/month, $1,161/year, $3,308 for 3 years
• Student plans from $6.75/month

Watch out for:

• It is subscription only, and the cheaper Essentials tier is aimed at enthusiasts. For full hand-drawn paperless work you need Advanced or higher.

Official site: Toon Boom Harmony.

Clip Studio Paint EX

Clip Studio Paint is best known for comics and illustration, but the EX edition includes full-length animation tools: a timeline, onion skins and frame-by-frame cels you can colour with the same brushes and fills used for illustration. Ver. 5.0 arrived in March 2026.

The Ver. 5.0 announcement lists EX at $277 and PRO at $63 as one-time licences. PRO limits animation to 24 frames, so animators need EX. Subscriptions start from $0.99 a month on the purchase page and cover iPad, Android and iPhone too.

Best for: Illustrators who want one app for drawing, colouring and short animated pieces.

Pricing:

• EX Ver. 5.0: $277 one-time (Windows, macOS)
• PRO Ver. 5.0: $63 one-time, animation up to 24 frames
• Monthly and annual plans from $0.99/month, all platforms

Watch out for:

• One-time licences cover Windows and macOS only. Tablet and phone versions need a subscription.

Official site: Clip Studio Paint EX.

Blender Grease Pencil

Grease Pencil turns Blender into a 2D animation tool where strokes live in 3D space. You can draw frame by frame with onion skins, then move a camera through the drawings, light them, or mix them with 3D models. It is popular for storyboards and stylised shorts.

Blender is free under the GNU GPL, and the Blender download page lists 5.2.3 LTS from October 22, 2026, for Windows, macOS on Apple Silicon and Linux. Nothing else on this list lets you put hand-drawn lines into a 3D set.

Best for: Animators who want to combine hand-drawn lines with camera moves or 3D sets.

Pricing:

• Free and open source (GNU GPL)

Watch out for:

• The interface is built for 3D, so a pure 2D animator has to learn objects, modes and the 3D viewport before drawing comfortably.
• macOS builds need Apple Silicon and macOS 13 or later, per the download page.

Official site: Blender Grease Pencil. Our listing: Blender Grease Pencil.

Pencil2D

Pencil2D is the closest in spirit to Animation Paper: a small, focused app for bitmap and vector frame-by-frame drawing with onion skins and a simple timeline. It starts fast and runs on modest hardware, which makes it good for classrooms and line tests.

The project is GPLv2 and current version 0.7.2 dates from March 2026, per the Pencil2D download page, with builds for Windows 7 or later, macOS 10.14 or later and a Linux AppImage.

Best for: Students and hobbyists who want a light, free tool for rough animation.

Pricing:

• Free and open source (GPLv2)

Watch out for:

• There is no tweening, as a Pencil2D forum answer from April 2023 confirms, and no X-sheet. Every frame is drawn by hand.

Official site: Pencil2D.

Tahoma2D

Tahoma2D is a fork of OpenToonz that trims the workspace for solo artists. It keeps the X-sheet and levels but adds a hints bar, direct MP4 and GIF export, and stop-motion capture. Version 1.6.3 was tagged on August 31, 2026.

For an Animation Paper user who wants colouring and compositing without OpenToonz's full complexity, it is a sensible middle step. The Tahoma2D site offers it free, and the code is BSD-3-Clause like its parent.

Best for: Solo animators who want OpenToonz features with less setup.

Pricing:

• Free and open source (BSD-3-Clause)

Watch out for:

• The Mac build needs macOS 15 or later and the Windows build 64-bit Windows 8.1 or later, which rules out older machines.

Official site: Tahoma2D.

How to choose

When to stay with Animation Paper

Keep Animation Paper for roughs, keys and line tests. Its drawing and flipping are very fast, files move between Windows, Mac and Linux, and it exports MP4, ProRes MOV, GIF and PNG or OpenEXR frame stacks with X-sheet data, per the product page. Roughing in it and colouring in Krita or OpenToonz costs nothing while it stays free.

Frequently asked questions