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Convert a PDF or JPG floor plan to DXF or DWG

Conceptual model only. Not a survey or construction document.

Upload a PDF or JPG floor plan, get a conceptual 3D model, then export a layered DXF or DWG drawing at the paper size and scale your CAD handoff needs.

To convert a PDF or JPG floor plan to DXF or DWG, upload the file to INK TO BRICK, let the conversion reconstruct it as a conceptual 3D model, then export a plan drawing in DXF or DWG from that model. The drawing arrives layered: rooms, walls, openings, fixtures, labels and dimensions each sit on their own layer, printed to A4, A3 or Letter at a scale you pick between 1:10 and 1:1000. DXF and DWG export are on Creator and above. This page is for anyone holding a flat plan, a scan or a listing image who needs geometry a CAD program can edit rather than a picture of a drawing.

Does converting a JPG floor plan to CAD just trace the image?

No, and the difference matters more than it sounds. A trace copies the marks on the page: every hatch line, every scanner speck, every broken edge becomes a vector, and you inherit a pile of line work with no idea which closed loop is a kitchen. A reconstruction reads the drawing, decides what it is looking at, and rebuilds rooms, walls and openings as named geometry. The file you download is drawn from that model, which is why it can carry a rooms layer at all, and why the CAD drawing is a redrawing of your plan rather than a vectorized photocopy of it.

The same mechanism sets the limit. The drawing inherits the model’s reading of your source, so a doorway misread as a window or a partition misread as casework arrives in CAD as the thing the model reconstructed. That can happen even when the source is legible. Open the model in the browser and check the openings before you export, because a wrong line is cheaper to notice in the viewer than in a drawing you have already drafted over. Checking doors and windows walks that pass.

Provide scale evidence before the run: the drawing’s original units, scale denominator, and up to 30 named reference measurements. Use dimensions you can verify rather than assumed standard sizes. The conversion interprets scale from the source and context; one supplied length does not guarantee that it resolves correctly. Read the reported scale status and compare a second independent dimension in another part of the model. Choosing 1:50 for the exported sheet does not repair unresolved or incorrect model scale.

Riverside House, a reference study. This is the shape a plan export carries into CAD: room boundaries as closed figures, wall lines, openings, printed room labels and dimension chains, each on its own layer rather than flattened into one image.

What is inside the DXF or DWG file?

A plan export writes six layers, and you choose which of them to include. Layers are the reason a CAD handoff beats a PDF: the person receiving the file can freeze what they do not want, snap to what they do, and draft their own work on top without deleting yours.

The six layers a plan export can write, and the reason you would leave one out.
LayerWhat it carriesWhy you might turn it off
roomsEach space as a closed boundary, which is what lets a CAD program report an area for it.You are drafting a new layout and want the shell without the existing space boundaries in the way.
wallsThe wall lines the model reconstructed from your plan.You are rebuilding walls with your office’s own wall styles and only need them as a reference underlay.
openingsDoors and windows where the model placed them in the walls.The plan is going out as a shell for someone else to fenestrate.
fixturesWhat the model carries as fixtures, drawn as plan symbols.You want an empty plan to lay furniture out on.
labelsRoom names and the text the model prints inside each space.Your title block and text styles name the spaces, and two sets of labels fight each other.
dimensionsDimension strings taken from the model’s own measurements. In the model’s metric units, a run labeled 3.20 m is 10 ft 6 in.You dimension to your own standard, to your own faces, and would rather start clean.

Then you choose the sheet. Paper is A4, A3 or Letter. Scale runs from 1:10 to 1:1000, and 1:100 is the default. Orientation is landscape or portrait. On a multi-floor project, which is a Business feature covering 2 to 20 floors, you also pick which floors go into the export. The gating is worth stating plainly: SVG and PDF plans are on Plus and above at the default sheet, A3 landscape at 1:100 with every layer on, while changing the paper, scale, orientation, layer set or floor selection needs the export controls that come with Creator and above. DXF and DWG are on Creator and above whatever sheet you pick.

NoteWhatever the drawing looks like once it is open, it describes a reconstruction, not a measured building. Conceptual model only. Not a survey or construction document.

How do you open the file in AutoCAD, BricsCAD, LibreCAD, DraftSight or Revit?

Each program documents its own DXF and DWG handling, and those documents are the thing to follow. What follows is where each vendor writes it down, not a compatibility promise from us.

Check units before you check anything else. A DXF carries geometry in drawing units, and the receiving program has to be told what one unit means, which is why Autodesk keeps a note on units of measurement. Once the file opens, measure one length you already know, a door width or the overall depth, and compare it with your source plan. A reading off by a factor of 1000, meters read as millimeters, or by 25.4, inches read as millimeters, is a unit mismatch rather than a geometry problem. Then confirm the scale: a sheet exported at 1:50 is not a sheet at 1:100 with heavier lines, and printing one as the other halves every dimension anybody scales off it.

When is SVG or PDF enough, and when is IFC the better handoff?

Pick the format by what the person receiving it is going to do, not by which one sounds most professional. All four plan formats come off the same model, so the only question is what happens to the file next.

  • SVG, when the drawing goes into a layout, a deck or a web page and gets restyled rather than edited as building geometry. On Plus and above.
  • PDF, when somebody is going to print it, mark it up and send it back. On Plus and above.
  • DXF or DWG, when the receiver drafts on top of it in CAD and needs layers they can freeze, lines they can snap to and dimensions they can extend. On Creator and above.
  • IFC, when the receiver works in BIM and wants rooms, walls and openings as building objects carrying their own data instead of lines on layers. IFC is on Business, and it is the better handoff the moment the word coordination appears in the conversation.

The full matrix, including the 3D and schedule formats, is in the export formats guide.

What INK TO BRICK does here

You upload one floorplan as a PDF, PNG, JPEG, SVG or DXF file of up to 25 MiB. For a single-floor upload, extract the required sheet as its own one-page PDF before uploading. The conversion reconstructs rooms, walls and openings as a conceptual 3D model you explore in the browser, furnish and finish in the editor, and export in 20 formats. The floor plan to 3D page shows what that run produces, and the PDF to 3D guide covers the upload end in detail. Export is not part of Free; the library starts on Plus, and DXF and DWG start on Creator, alongside the export controls that let you set paper, scale, orientation, layers and floors. Pricing lists what each plan includes.

The common reason to want CAD out of a scanned plan is a renovation: an existing-conditions drawing you can measure, mark up and hand to whoever is doing the work. Renovation planning covers what the model gives you for that job and what it does not, and measuring a floor plan PDF is the manual method to check any number the export prints.

Worth checkingA DXF that opens cleanly is still not a survey and not a permit drawing. It is a reconstruction of the plan you uploaded, carrying that plan’s errors and the model’s reading of them. Use this model for design exploration. Verify dimensions on site before ordering or building, and have a licensed professional produce anything a building department is going to stamp.

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Planning a renovation before you commit · Measuring the plan you already have
The limit
Conceptual model only. Not a survey or construction document.