Coordinates in Å, with a standard bond drawn as 1.54 Å. Angles are measured from the horizontal, counterclockwise.
API
Commands: list, scheme, properties, calc, nmr, inchi, addSmiles, addReaction, addText, addChart, addRadar, import, delete, clear, undo, redo, clean, export, table, setStyle, setRole, setAmount, prefixStyle, picture, set, image, selection, select, atoms, highlight, check, saved, markSaved, zoom, readOnly, smilesFromName, addName (common names everywhere, systematic names in the apps); in the Mac, Windows and Linux apps also name, and the same commands from scripts on this computer (local API, see the documentation). The documentation describes the format.
Credits and sources
Reactio Draw (© 2026 Pavel Sakharov) is free software under the GNU Affero General Public License v3.0 or later: you may use, share and change it, and anyone who distributes it or a modified version, or runs a modified version for others over a network, must publish the complete source code under the same license. Your drawings and files are yours. Third-party components keep their own licenses (THIRD-PARTY-NOTICES.md and LICENSES/ with the source code).
The editor itself (drawing, reading labels, layout, files, the reagent table, NMR prediction) is code written for this project. Parts made by others are listed here with their licenses; their full license texts are under Licenses . OpenChemLib 9.25.1 (openchemlib-js, the JavaScript build of Thomas Sander's OpenChemLib), included unchanged except for packaging as a plain script, is used for 3D shapes and rotation (a likely conformer from its torsion data, then relaxed with its MMFF94s+ force field, the MMFF94s variant of MMFF94: T. A. Halgren, J. Comput. Chem. 1996, 17, 490; MMFF94s: J. Comput. Chem. 1999, 20, 720), for stereochemistry in SMILES (reading @/@@, writing stereo SMILES) and for comparing structures; licensed BSD-3-Clause.
The journal drawing styles, the color themes Publication, Presentation, Pastel and Jmol, and the CDX property table are taken from ReShiki (© 2026 Ameyanagi and ReShiki contributors, MIT OR Apache-2.0, used under MIT; ReShiki takes the CDX table from the published CDX documentation of CambridgeSoft); the Jmol element colors come from Jmol .
Journal style values (ACS, Nature, RSC, Angewandte, Synthesis / Synlett) follow the publishers' guidelines for authors.
Paste name (desktop apps): names are read by OPSIN 2.9.0 (D. M. Lowe et al., J. Chem. Inf. Model. 2011, 51, 739), shipped unchanged as a separate program next to the app and run with the Java installed on the computer; licensed MIT (its bundled libraries keep their own licenses).
Name (desktop apps): names are made by openclatura (A. Mirza, K. M. Jablonka, R. Fedorov; rule-based, after the IUPAC 2013 recommendations), run unchanged in the computer's own Python with RDKit; licensed MIT. Each name is read back with OPSIN and compared with the drawing.
NMR prediction: contains information from nmrshiftdb2 (S. Kuhn, N. E. Schlörer, Magn. Reson. Chem. 2015, 53, 582), which is made available here under the nmrshiftdb2 Database License. The shift tables were made by Reactio Draw from measured spectra in the 2026-03-15 export; tables and method are published with the source code (data/nmr).
Atomic weights, monoisotopic masses and isotope abundances: standard IUPAC/NIST values.
InChI and InChIKey: made by the InChI library (InChI Trust / IUPAC; licensed MIT), compiled unchanged to WebAssembly and kept in the page; it runs here, nothing is sent anywhere. Build files: tools/inchi with the source code.
Made with the help of Claude (Anthropic). New versions, source code, questions and bug reports: github.com/Paivel/reactio-draw
Interface
Theme
As the system Light Dark Match the paper
Colours of the panels and buttons. As the system follows the light or dark mode of your computer; Match the paper turns the panels dark on a dark paper (night blue, dark grey, black, blueprint) and light on a light one. The sheet keeps its own paper colour in every theme.
Accent colour
Your own colour
Buttons, selection and highlights of the interface; the drawing keeps its own colours. A colour too light or too dark to read is adjusted for each theme.
Top bar
Full: every button visible Compact: File, then four menus
Full shows every group of buttons; a click on a group's ⋮ folds it into one menu, and another click unfolds it. Compact keeps the File buttons and puts the rest into four menus in one row: Arrange, Structure, Style and Text.
Drawing
NMe, NBoc, SiMe2 typed on an atom in a chain or ring
One label: the group beside the atom (N over Me) On a bond: the group on its own bond (N–Me)
How an element with a group, typed on an atom that already has bonds, is drawn. Typing it with a dash (N-Me) always puts the group on a bond.
t, i, s, n in groups (tBu, iPr, sBu, nBu)
Leave plain: tBu Italic: 𝑡Bu Italic superscript: ᵗBu Apply to selection
How the prefix letter of tBu, iPr, sBu, nBu, OtBu, CO2tBu is written. New labels you type follow it; Apply to selection changes the labels of the selected structures (the whole sheet when nothing is selected).
Ends of curved arrows
Touch the atom or bond Small gap (default) Larger gap
How far a curved (mechanism) arrow drawn from or to an atom or the middle of a bond stays off it. An atom with a label always keeps at least a small gap, so the head does not run into its letters. Arrows already drawn keep their ends.
Warnings
Warnings on the sheet
Untick a kind to stop marking it. The red text of a label that is not understood stays; only its dashed frame goes. Nothing here is ever drawn in copies or exports.
New documents
Style of new documents
Use this document's style Apply to this document Reset
Set the open document the way you like it — drawing style (ACS, RSC…), heteroatom colours on or off, colour theme, paper, font, grid — and press Use this document's style: every new document starts that way. Apply to this document gives the open one that look. Reset: new documents take the look of the document that is open.
Toolbar layout
Drag any toolbar button to move it; drag a group by its ⋮ grip (or, on the left, its heading) to move the whole group between the panels. Reset puts every button back. Reset button layout
Settings file
Hotkeys, button layout, your labels and templates in one file, to keep or to move to another computer.
Export hotkeys and settings Import…
Reagent table
Covers the whole sheet the selected reaction
Hotkeys
Every command and tool can have its own key. Reset hotkeys
Click a key, then press the new key (Shift allowed). Esc cancels, Backspace removes the key. Saved in this browser.
⌨
Fixed keys
Esc deselect, close menus
Del ⌫ delete the selection, or the atom, bond, arrow or text under the pointer
← ↑ → ↓ move the hotspot between atoms and bonds (Shift: atom to atom); with a selection, nudge it (Shift: larger steps)
Alt + ← → rotate the selection 15° (Shift: 1°)
Ctrl + → clone the selection across a new arrow
Ctrl + C copy the selection (or the whole drawing) as CDXML: other chemistry editors paste it with the same layout, arrows and text
Ctrl + V paste structures, CDXML or SMILES
Ctrl + wheel, middle button zoom; move the view
Mouse
Ring tool + click a bond fuse a new ring onto that bond (annulation), on the less crowded side
Template + click a bond or an atom a bond: fuse your template onto it (norbornene, a chair, any ring system); an atom: it becomes one of the template's ring atoms (spiro inside a chain or ring); only an atom with one free bond left, or a template without a ring, gets it by a new bond. With the template taken up, Tab picks which of its bonds or atoms is used; a key given to a template in the Hotkeys tab does the same over a bond or an atom
Right-click an arrow arrow menu: head, line, curve, equilibrium (with the Arrow tool a single click opens it)
Double-click a reaction arrow selects the whole reaction: structures, reagents, plus signs and conditions
Drag arrow handles lengthen or shorten the arrow (a curved one along its circle or oval; Alt: freely); the middle handle bends it; the edges of the selection box stretch it into an oval
Alt + drag an arrow end move the end freely (without Alt it follows the circle or oval)
Click a table cell edit it on the sheet: Enter saves, Tab next compound, Esc cancels; Role opens the role menu, Limiting picks the limiting reagent
Alt + click mass, volume or amount mark it as the measured quantity (red bold); a value you type is marked automatically
− fewer rows / + all rows under the sheet table: hide or show the empty rows (not exported)
Ctrl/Cmd + drag copy the selection
Shift + drag move along one axis
Alt + drag move without smart guides; while drawing a bond, any length and angle
Drag the round handle rotate the selection (Shift: 15° steps)