Microsoft Visio: Free al­ter­na­tives for creating diagrams and flow charts

From the de­vel­op­ers who brought us the GNOME Project, Dia is a vi­su­al­iza­tion software primarily known through the GNOME Linux desktop en­vi­ron­ment of the same name. This al­ter­na­tive to Microsoft Visio is based on the GIMP Toolkit (GTK+) which is written in C – a free component library that offers diverse control elements for the design of user in­ter­faces. As with most GNOME Project ap­pli­ca­tions, Dia is subject to the GNU General Public License (GPLv2) and is available for use free of charge. Most Linux dis­tri­b­u­tions contain the in­stal­la­tion files for the program within the package man­age­ment system, or al­ter­na­tive­ly, can also be found in the GNOME software selection. There are also versions available for macOS and Windows systems, which can be found in the download section of the official website.

Dia offers a standard set of general polygon and line objects, which can help you create diagrams and flow­charts for a wide range of in­dus­tries; an ad­min­is­tra­tor could compile an overview of a firm’s network, an engineer could outline struc­tur­al systems, or a database spe­cial­ist could even visualize an ER (Entity Re­la­tion­ship) model. Other spe­cial­ist objects for the re­al­iza­tion of your diagrams can also be found in the online “shape repos­i­to­ry”. In order to make the process as easy as possible, the Microsoft Visio al­ter­na­tive also offers many options and shortcuts, which allow you to select, unselect, copy, and delete several shapes. This means you can work with a man­age­able drawing surface, which thanks to the co­or­di­na­tion system, also enables the precise po­si­tion­ing of in­di­vid­ual elements.

Created by the German software company yWorks, the yEd Graph Editor is un­doubt­ed­ly one of the best free Microsoft Visio al­ter­na­tives on the market. The vi­su­al­iza­tion software is written in Java and is based on several Open Course com­po­nents, such as the Batik SVG Toolkit and XML Beans from Apache, or various libraries like dom4j and Twelve­Mon­keys (both under BSD license). However, it is not published under a free license, meaning the source code cannot be changed. But yWorks has made the cross-platform editor, which is suitable for Windows, MacOS, Linux, and the Java Runtime En­vi­ron­ment available for use free of charge. Alongside the desktop version, which can be found in the download section of the company’s official website, there is also an ad­di­tion­al online version, which includes some fee-based “Pro Features.”

yEd provides numerous com­po­nents for the creation of versatile and mul­ti­fac­eted diagrams. Alongside a large number of geometric nodes and link types, there is also a choice of UML (Unified Modeling Language) symbols for software-specific class and object diagrams, BPMN (Business Process Model and Notation) symbols for the depiction of business pro­ce­dures, as well as several flowchart com­po­nents. This al­ter­na­tive to Microsoft Visio has different functions, which will help you arrange and annotate the desired com­po­nents of a diagram. Automatic layout al­go­rithms, helpful guides, and or­thog­o­nal con­nec­tions, all make po­si­tion­ing very simple. At the same time, the program’s in­scrip­tions provide good read­abil­i­ty. Below are some notable features of the yWorks editor:

• High-per­for­mance search and marking tools

• Undo and Redo functions

• Develop multiple diagrams at the same time

• Versatile and adaptable user interface

• Different viewing options (mouse wheel zooming, etc.)

• Automatic layout gen­er­a­tion for complex volumes of data

• Import different sources of data, like excel tables(.xls), GEDCOM data, XML & GML files,

• Shortcuts for important functions

• Extensive preview area (general overview, object prop­er­ties, object structure)

yEd Graph Editor offers six standard saving formats. These are the main format .graphml, the condensed version .graphmlz, the binary format .ygf, .gml (Graph Modeling Language) and .xgml (.gml with XML-based Syntax) as well as .tgf, the “Trivial Graph“ format. On top of this, there are also various output formats, like .html, .pdf, .jpg, .png or .gif, in which you can export your diagrams from this free Microsoft Visio al­ter­na­tive.

Another Microsoft Visio al­ter­na­tive, Diagram Designer, was released in 2003 by de­vel­op­ers Michael Vinther and Mattes Dolak, and was published under the GNU General Public License on sourge­force.net. Since then, Vinther and his company Meesoft are solely re­spon­si­ble for the software’s further de­vel­op­ment. Although no longer operating under a free license, the program is still available to use without charge. The source code of the most recent Open Source version of the software is available through the Source­forge Repos­i­to­ry. The newest version, along with packages in various languages, can be found on FossHub, where Diagram Designer has reg­is­tered several hundred thousand downloads. Even if Diagram Designer’s user interface is not visually of the same standard as Visio, when it comes to creating diagrams, this freeware program can certainly be viewed as a viable al­ter­na­tive to its Microsoft coun­ter­part. Par­tic­u­lar­ly im­pres­sive is the choice of flowchart and UML com­po­nents, as well as the range of technical symbols. The available object templates are widely adaptable, while also being con­nectable with the help of arrows and lines. In addition, there are several packages with finished object templates; all of which are available for download from the official website. The program allows you to build com­pre­hen­sive flow charts, schemat­i­cal­ly represent work and pro­duc­tion processes, or even visualize your design ideas. Here you’ll see some of the most important functions the software has to offer:

• Spell check
• Function graph plotter
• Easy shading options
• Work on several objects at the same time

Apache OpenOf­fice (pre­vi­ous­ly OpenOf­fice.org), with its text pro­cess­ing ap­pli­ca­tions, spread­sheet assembly, high-quality pre­sen­ta­tion option, and the addition of the drawing program Draw, is a viable and free office al­ter­na­tive to Microsoft Visio. Since 2012, the software package has been further developed through the Apache Software Foun­da­tion, meaning the most recent versions are valid under the Apache License Version 2.0 (ALv2). Like all Office Suite programs, Draw is written in C++ and com­pat­i­ble across all platforms. In addition to the official versions for Windows, macOS and Linux, there are also other versions from third-party providers which have enabled use on further platforms, e.g. Android. An overview of all available in­stal­la­tion files can be found on the website’s download section. Draw boasts a large range of functions as a free al­ter­na­tive to Microsoft Visio. Primarily the ap­pli­ca­tion serves to produce vector graphics from geometric com­po­nents. Equally, it can also be used to edit pixel graphics, or to generate complex flow and or­ga­ni­za­tion charts. The re­la­tion­ship between various objects can be il­lus­trat­ed with the aid of spe­cial­ist lines, also known as con­nec­tors, as well as glue points. Given that Draw is a set part of the office package, tables diagrams or formulae, which may have been compiled by other com­po­nents like Calc or Math, can easily be in­te­grat­ed into the software. Likewise, com­po­nents from Draw can just as easily be im­ple­ment­ed into Open Office documents of different types. Some of the most important features of OpenOf­fice Draw are:

• Layer Man­age­ment for the outlining of hi­er­ar­chi­cal and or­ga­ni­za­tion­al threads

• Magnetic grid point system and rulers allowing for pinpoint po­si­tion­ing of in­di­vid­ual elements

• Cus­tomiz­able and ex­tend­able toolbar

• Variety of geometric shapes (standard shapes, symbols, block arrows, flow chart tools, legends, stars and banners)

• Rendering of three-di­men­sion­al drawing objects according to the Flat, Phong, or Gouraud methods

• Uses cubic Bézier curves

Google’s free online service Office Suite is not just made up of the well-known Google Docs (ap­pli­ca­tion for communal word pro­cess­ing), Google Spread­sheets (communal spread­sheets), Google Calendar, and e-mail service Gmail, but also includes the vi­su­al­iza­tion software Google Drawings. As with all of these Google programs, you must first log in to be able to access the software. Available over a classic Google web frontend, this Microsoft Visio al­ter­na­tive will au­to­mat­i­cal­ly save your projects in Google Drive – as it does with all docs, tables, or calendar entries. This means it requires a working internet con­nec­tion and browser. On Android and iOS mobile devices, the program can be accessed through the Google Drive app, down­load­able from the Google Play and App Stores. Google chrome also features a plug-in, which makes it possible to work with the tool in an offline capacity. Alongside an extensive selection of shapes, arrows and symbols, Google Drawings also features curved and angled (“Elbow”) con­nec­tors; both of which will further aid your project. In addition, there are also four ready-made diagram templates; bar charts, his­tograms, pie charts, and line graphs. These can be accessed with one single click, and can also correlate data from Google Spread­sheets. Tables can be easily in­cor­po­rat­ed into your diagrams or flow­charts. Once the required amount of lines and columns has been specified, the drag-and-drop function makes it easy to transfer the table to the desired position. Other features offered by this online al­ter­na­tive to Microsoft Visio include:

• Spell-checker, including custom dic­tio­nary

• In­te­grat­ed search tool for facts/images from Google Drive and internet

• Numerous sim­pli­fied keyboard shortcuts

• Comment tool

• Range of special char­ac­ters, symbols, and icons available for text fields

• Edits visible for all users

Any dis­cus­sion on the best al­ter­na­tives to Microsoft Visio has to include Draw.io. Sharing many sim­i­lar­i­ties with its Google coun­ter­part, this web ap­pli­ca­tion is based on the free JavaScript library mxGraph. For this reason it was orig­i­nal­ly released in 2011 under the name “mxGraph online.” Main­tained and developed by the JGraph company, the program is available under the free license GPL v3 on the Draw.io website. The ap­pli­ca­tion is supported on desktop, tablet, or smart­phone, with the complete source code available to view on GitHub. As a fully client-side software, Draw.io can be used in offline mode with a free, down­load­able desktop app available for use on Windows, macOS, Linux and Chrome OS.

Regarding the saving of their documents, Draw.io users have several options. Diagrams can be saved using the online cloud services Google Drive, OneDrive, and Dropbox, re­gard­less of which device you are using. But saving locally onto a hard drive is only possible on the desktop version. To get you started quickly, this Microsoft Visio al­ter­na­tive offers numerous useful diagram templates from some of the following areas:

• Business
• Graphics
• Tech­nol­o­gy
• Flow­charts
• Maps
• Cloud
• Network

According to the developer Lucid Software, their program “Lu­cid­chart” is used by more than 15 million users as an al­ter­na­tive to Microsoft Visio. The web ap­pli­ca­tion, which was released in 2008 and is written in a variety of coding languages including Java, Ruby, PHP and JavaScript, can be accessed directly through the official website. A pre­req­ui­site is having an in­di­vid­ual user account, where you can choose between a free “Lite” edition and three paid sub­scrip­tion options. The latter three grant access to ad­di­tion­al features like pre­sen­ta­tion mode, or extended storage space, and also removes the limits on documents and chart scope that exist in the free version.

Lu­cid­chart provides around 100 ready-to-use templates for creating and designing high-quality diagrams. The software covers cat­e­gories like education, mind-maps, companies, floor plans or entity re­la­tion­ships (ER). Thanks to various icons, shapes and arrows, you can also create your own in­di­vid­ual diagrams, which allow you to get access to special premium com­po­nents if you are signed up to the “Pro” or “Team” plans, including importing and editing existing Visio projects. You also have the option to save finished projects to their servers, or download them directly to your device in the following formats:

• .pdf
• .png (Standard / with clear back­ground)
• .jpeg
• .svg (Standard / with clear back­ground)
• .vdx
• .csv

The 2009 Microsoft Visio al­ter­na­tive “Creately” was developed by Aus­tralian developer Cinergix. More than half a million users in more than 100 countries use the software, which is available as both a desktop and web app to create custom diagrams, either in­di­vid­u­al­ly or as part of a team. However, the free version has limited function, with the entire range of Creately functions being reserved for users with an active monthly sub­scrip­tion (or those who purchase the desktop program). If you can work well with 5 documents, a single project folder and access for up to three people, then the free version could be a good free al­ter­na­tive to Microsoft Visio.

Creately shines with a huge selection of chart and flowchart templates. Around 1,000 pro­fes­sion­al­ly designed templates and millions of sample projects from the community are available to you – whether as a basis for or a source of in­spi­ra­tion – at any time, including the following cat­e­gories:

• Business strategy and processes
• Product life cycle
• IT struc­tures
• Design
• Sales and Marketing
• HR (Human Resources)
• Education

The Viet­namese software company Evolus are launched Pencil Project in 2008, a vi­su­al­iza­tion project based on the Mozilla Firefox web browser. Thanks to this format, the GPL-licensed Microsoft Visio al­ter­na­tive has long been installed and used as a simple Firefox extension. However, this is no longer the case with newer versions, which are now based on the open source framework Electron (formerly Atom Shell). The developer is still providing cross-platform editions for macOS, Windows or Linux (Ubuntu, Fedora) that can be down­loaded free of charge through the official Pencil Projects website.

Pencil Project gives you access to various graphical elements, which can easily be moved with drag-and-drop so that the diagram, prototype or idea flow chart can be created as quickly as possible. In addition to the standard flowchart objects and geometric shapes, the available com­po­nents include buttons and icons for desktop and web UI’s, as well as typical Android and iOS elements. You can also search for high-quality clipart graphics through an in­te­grat­ed Open­Cli­part.org interface and add them to your project. The al­ter­na­tive to Visio uses the in-house .epgz format to store files on the local hard drive. In addition, your project can be exported in the following formats:

• .png
• .pdf
• .html
• .svg
• .odt (OpenOf­fice document)