Convert text to outlines before you cut
A laser, plotter or vinyl cutter follows shapes. Live text isn't a shape yet - it's an instruction to draw letters in a font. Converting it to outlines turns each letter into ordinary vector geometry, so the machine cuts exactly what you see.
Live text is up to the software that opens it
When an SVG with live text reaches your cutting software, that software decides how to draw it - it may substitute a different font if it doesn't have yours, or treat the text as something to engrave rather than cut. Either way, the letters on the workpiece may not be the letters you designed. Outlined text has no font to substitute: it is the same closed shapes everywhere.
Three steps in the editor
1. Select the text
Select one text object, or several at once. Each one needs to use Inter or Mono (see below for why).
2. Convert it
Click Convert to outlines in the Text section of the inspector, or open the command palette and choose Convert Text to Outlines.
3. Check the result, then export
Each text becomes one filled shape in the same place, the same size, the same colour and the same rotation, on the same layer - and it stays selected. It is now ordinary geometry: you can edit its nodes like any other path.
It's one undo step.Converting several texts at once is still a single step, and one undo brings all of them back as live text. If any selected text can't be converted, nothing is changed and the editor tells you why - you never end up with half a sign outlined.
Why the letters come out as clean single outlines
Inside a font, some letters are built from pieces that overlap - a stem crossing a bowl, for example. On screen the overlap is invisible. But a laser cuts every outline it is given, so overlapping pieces would cut straight through the middle of a letter. When Anchorsmith outlines text it merges those pieces into each letter's true outer shape (and its holes, like the inside of an O). The font's own curves are kept wherever the pieces don't cross; where they do, the new join is traced to within 0.01 mm.
What can't be outlined, and what to do
The text uses a system font
Anchorsmith can only outline the fonts whose letter shapes it ships - Inter and Mono. A system font (such as Serif, or a font from an imported SVG) is drawn by your computer, and Anchorsmith does not have its letter shapes, so outlining it with a look-alike would cut different letters from the ones on screen. Switch the text to Inter or Mono first.
Bold or italic is turned on
Bold and italic are drawn by the browser rather than stored in the font, so their exact shape can't be outlined. Turn them off first.
A character has no shape in the font
If the text contains a character the font doesn't include, the conversion stops and names the character, instead of cutting a blank or a wrong letter.
The text is empty
There is nothing to outline. Add some text, or delete the empty object.
Try it on your own text
Drawing needs no account. Exporting your file needs a free account, and SVG export is never watermarked.
Open the editor