Free dot to dot maker: turn a picture into a connect the dots sheet

It depends on who will join them and how long you want it to take. The four levels are 20, 40, 80 and 150 dots, and you can type any number from 10 to 300. They are starting points of ours, not a standard: fewer dots suit someone who is still learning to count in order and wants a quick result, more dots suit someone who likes a long, fiddly puzzle and a picture that looks like the original when it is finished. Do the sheet yourself first; it takes a minute and tells you more than a rule would.

Drawings, clipart, logos and icons work best: one clear subject on a plain or see-through background. Photos usually need the Better cut-out: the quick cut-out finds a clear subject in few of them, and when it finds none the page says so and offers the Better cut-out, a one-time download of about 169 to 172 MB that your browser keeps and runs on your device. A photo with a plain wall or a white background behind the subject goes through the plain-background route and needs no download. The outline of the subject is what becomes the dots, so a picture that has only one shape gives the cleanest sheet. A busy photo, a crowd or a scene full of objects gives a messy outline, and thin parts such as whiskers, wires and small lettering are usually left out. The edge of the photo is never drawn as an outline. If the subject is cut off by it (a cat that fills the frame), the outline is open: the dots run along the part of the subject that is really there, start and end at the edge, and the last dot is not joined back to 1. If the cut-out only follows the edge of the picture, or only a thin strip of it lies clear of the edge (a face that fills the frame), the page says that this photo has no clear subject to outline and suggests the better cut-out or a different picture, and makes no sheet. If the first try is wrong, the "Find the outline" choice lets you pick how the subject is found.

Three ways, all on your device. If the picture already has a see-through background, that is the outline. If it has a plain background, the colour touching the edge is removed, which keeps the white of an eye or the hole in a handle as part of the subject. Otherwise the subject is cut out of the photo with a cut-out method that guesses from colour where the subject ends. The page says which one it used, and you can choose another if it got it wrong. A photo cut-out is a guess: check the preview before you print. For photos there is also a second choice, "Better cut-out for photos": a trained cut-out model that your browser downloads once (about 169 to 172 MB, kept by the browser) and runs on your device. Most photos need it: the quick cut-out leaves too much of the background in, or none of the subject. It is only used when you choose it, and your picture still never leaves your computer.

Along the outline, about the same distance apart, with dots moved onto sharp corners so a star keeps its points, and the dots a little closer together where the line bends. The numbering runs clockwise from the dot nearest the top, which is ringed so it is easy to find. Join the last dot back to number 1 to close the shape.

No. Each number is put on the side of its dot that is free: the first place tried is straight out from the outline, then around the dot until a spot touches no dot, no line from one dot to the next and no other number. If a sheet is too crowded the numbers are made smaller, down to 6 pt, and if a number still cannot be placed the page tells you which one instead of printing it on top of something. Fewer dots, smaller dots or a bigger sheet always makes room.

Besides the outline, the page looks inside the subject for the few features that make the picture readable once it is joined. In flat-colour pictures (clipart, logos, icons) these are closed shapes of one colour: the eye of a cartoon face, a window, a wheel, the ring of a badge; and the thin parts, such as the veins of a leaf or the stripes of a cupcake liner, which are printed as one line along their middle. A photograph has shading instead of flat colour, so the page draws it as lines first: the same on-device line drawing as the Clean shapes page of the Coloring page maker, with nothing downloaded for it, a few seconds after the outline appears. Inside a photograph it keeps an inner part only if it is a clean, compact, round shape of a readable size that sits where a feature would: a pair of eyes, or one big part such as a carved hole. Shadows, slivers, spikes and loose lines are left out, and so are fur, grass, grain and texture, so many photos get only the outline, on purpose. The page does not know what a feature is, it keeps the strongest shapes, so look at the preview before you print. The "Inner details" choice has three settings. As printed lines, the default: the two biggest shapes can become dots (from 60 dots) and the rest are drawn as thin printed lines that have no numbers, at any dot count. As dots: up to three shapes are dotted, each with at least 12 dots, and nothing is printed. Off: the outline alone. The numbers run on from the outline: if the outline is 1 to 107, the next shape is 108 to 120, and so on, each with its own ringed first dot. Join the last dot of a shape back to its ringed dot, lift your pencil and carry on at the next number; the foot of the sheet lists which numbers belong to which shape. Thin strokes such as eyebrows and whiskers are left out, and so is lettering: every word and line of it, whatever the sizes, never half a word. A single big letter standing alone cannot be told from a drawing, so it is drawn like any other shape.

A PDF on US Letter or A4, with the dots, numbers and lines drawn as vectors so they print sharp at any size (the faint picture, when it is used, is a light grey image): the puzzle sheet, and, if you leave the box ticked, a second page with the finished picture to check against. A PNG of the page at 300 dpi, and an SVG with the dots and the numbers as real shapes and text that you can open in a design program. The PNG and SVG are the sheet shown in the preview, the puzzle or the answer. The faint picture behind the dots is optional, and the answer page always has it. No watermark, no sign-up.

Because at that many dots, on that paper, the bigger numbers could not all be placed without touching something. The page says what size it used. To keep the bigger numbers, choose fewer dots or a smaller dot size.

No. The picture is opened, outlined and drawn in your browser and the files are saved from memory on your computer.