Molsketch is a graphical application for drawing and editing two-dimensional molecular structures.
The application provides a conventional desktop chemical drawing environment with tools for constructing molecules, selecting atoms and bonds, editing structures and arranging elements on a drawing canvas. A periodic-table-style element selector makes it easy to change atom types, while drawing settings allow users to control features such as bond width, atom fonts and other visual properties.
Molsketch supports more than straightforward atom and bond diagrams. Drawings can contain reaction arrows, equilibrium arrows, mechanism arrows, frames, brackets and free text. It can also represent lone pairs and radical electrons. Alignment, spacing and structure-cleanup tools help produce consistent diagrams, and users can explicitly control the direction of attached hydrogen atoms where needed.
The program uses its own MSK document format and MSM format for individual molecules. OpenBabel integration significantly extends file handling by allowing structures to be imported from and exported to additional chemistry formats. Molsketch can also use OpenBabel to optimize coordinates. Recent development has included fixes to its OpenBabel export path as well as continued work on rendering and drawing behaviour.
This is free and open source software.
Key Features
- Provides graphical tools for drawing and editing two-dimensional molecular structures.
- Supports reaction arrows, equilibrium arrows, mechanism arrows, text, frames and brackets.
- Represents lone pairs, radical electrons, implicit hydrogens and configurable atom and bond properties.
- Uses OpenBabel to extend structure import, export and coordinate-processing capabilities.
- Exports drawings as SVG, PNG, BMP and JPEG graphics and supports adjustable bitmap resolution.
Website: github.com/hvennekate/Molsketch
Support:
Developer: Hendrik Vennekate
License: GNU General Public License v2.0

Molsketch is written in C++. Learn C++ with our recommended free books and free tutorials.
Related Software
| Chemistry: Chemical Structure Drawing | |
|---|---|
| Ketcher | Web-based toolkit for drawing and editing chemical structures |
| XDrawChem | Draw chemical structures, reactions and schemes |
| JChemPaint | Build and manipulate chemical structures interactively |
| ChemCanvas | Sketch chemical structures with a clean graphical interface |
| Molsketch | Draw molecular structures and export publication-ready graphics |
| Butlerov | Create structural formulas and chemical reaction diagrams |
| BKChem | Create and modify molecular structures and diagrams |
Read our verdict in the software roundup.
LinuxLinks helps you discover the best free and open source software for Linux. Explore our extensive collection of recommended applications, including alternatives to popular proprietary software.We also publish software reviews, Linux tutorials, hardware reviews, free programming books and articles covering the wider open source community. Browse our Linux resources to discover more. Know a useful free and open source Linux application we haven't covered? Suggest a program for inclusion. Has your software been featured on LinuxLinks? Display one of our Featured on LinuxLinks badges on your website or GitHub README. |


Please read our Comment Policy before commenting.