Free ChemDraw Alternatives

Alternatives list

1. 

   

   Chemaxon Marvin

    16 likes

   Marvin suite is a chemically intelligent desktop toolkit built to help you draw, edit, publish, render, import and export your chemical structures and as well as allowing you to convert between various chemical and graphical file formats.

   19 Chemaxon Marvin alternatives

   Cost / License

   • Free
   • Proprietary

   Origin

   • United Kingdom

   Platforms

   • Mac
   • Windows
   • Linux

   • United Kingdom

   

   

   More about Chemaxon Marvin  

   

   Good alternative?Is Chemaxon Marvin a good alternative to ChemDraw?

    

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   2comments

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   Chemaxon Marvin vs ChemDraw Comments

   Positive comment by G-Matthias-Ullmann · Sep 15, 2026

   The software was commercialized also for academic users. The prices are ridiculous, about 1400 EUR for academic users! (offer from August 2026)

   Positive comment by Guest · Sep 7, 2020

   Simple structures are needed.

   2 of 2 comments

   

   

   • Chemaxon Marvin is Free and ProprietaryChemDraw is Paid and Proprietary
2. 

   

   MedChem Designer

    Like

   "MedChem Designer 3.0 is a free chemical structure drawing program. MedChem Designer can open SMILES, SDF, MOL, CSK, and RXN file types. Up to 32 compounds can be displayed in one window. Images can be exported in SMILES, SD, MOL, CQF, bitmap, JPG, or PNG formats.

   Cost / License

   • Free
   • Proprietary

   Platforms

   • Windows

   

   

   More about MedChem Designer  

   

   Good alternative?Is MedChem Designer a good alternative to ChemDraw?

    
4. 

   

   JChemPaint

    3 likes

   JChemPaint (or JCP for short here) is the editor and viewer for 2D chemical structures developed using the Chemistry Development Kit (CDK).

   Cost / License

   • Free
   • Open Source

   Platforms

   • Mac
   • Windows
   • Linux
   • Flathub
   • Flatpak

   

   More about JChemPaint  

   

   Good alternative?Is JChemPaint a good alternative to ChemDraw?

    
5. 

   

   KingDraw

    Like

   KingDraw App is a free chemical drawing editor that allows users to sketch molecules and reactions, as well as organic chemistry objects and pathways.

   Cost / License

   • Freemium
   • Proprietary

   Origin

   • China

   Platforms

   • Windows
   • Android
   • iPhone
   • Android Tablet
   • iPad

   • China

   

   

   

   +3

   

   More about KingDraw  

   

   Good alternative?Is KingDraw a good alternative to ChemDraw?

    
6. 

   

   XDrawChem

    1 like

   XDrawChem is a free software program for drawing chemical structural formulas, available for Unix and Mac OS. It is distributed under the GNU GPL. In Microsoft Windows this program is called WinDrawChem.

   10 XDrawChem alternatives

   Cost / License

   • Free
   • Open Source

   Alerts

   • Discontinued

   Platforms

   • Mac
   • Windows
   • Linux

   

   Good alternative?Is XDrawChem a good alternative to ChemDraw?

    

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   1comment

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   Discontinued

   Last release (1.10.2-1) was in January 2017.

   XDrawChem vs ChemDraw Comments

   Positive comment by Guest · Oct 2, 2016

   More simply for use in class

   1 of 1 comments

   

   

   • XDrawChem is Free and Open SourceChemDraw is Paid and Proprietary
8. 

   

   Molsketch

    1 like

   A 2D molecular editing tool for GNU/Linux, Mac OS X and Windows. Its goal is to help you draw molecules quick and easily. Of course your creations can be exported afterwards in high quality in a number of vector and bitmap formats.

   Cost / License

   • Free
   • Open Source (GPL-2.0)

   Platforms

   • Mac
   • Windows
   • Linux
   • BSD

   

   More about Molsketch  

   

   Good alternative?Is Molsketch a good alternative to ChemDraw?

    
9. 

   

   ChemCanvas

    1 like

   A very intuitive, new 2D chemical drawing tool (Qt-based).

   Cost / License

   • Free
   • Open Source (GPL-3.0)

   Origin

   • India

   Platforms

   • Linux
   • Flathub
   • Flatpak
   • Raspberry Pi
   • Windows
   • Python

   • India

   

   

   

   More about ChemCanvas  

   

   Good alternative?Is ChemCanvas a good alternative to ChemDraw?

    
10. 

    

    BKchem

     9 likes

    BKChem is a free (as in free software :o) chemical drawing program. It was conceived and written by Beda Kosata and is currently maintained by Reinis Danne.

    Cost / License

    • Free
    • Open Source

    Origin

    • Czechia
    • EU

    Alerts

    • Discontinued

    Platforms

    • Mac
    • Windows
    • Linux

    • Czechia
    • EU

    

    More about BKchem  

    

    Good alternative?Is BKchem a good alternative to ChemDraw?

     

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    2comments

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    Discontinued

    The last release was in 2010.

    BKchem vs ChemDraw Comments

    Negative comment by John Fastman · Dec 27, 2016

    BKchem is an old attempt at replacing some of ChemDraw's functionality. It succeeded partially in providing some of ChemDraw's very core chemical structure drawing features. Unfortunately, BKchem has seen no new development since 2010, leaving it in limbo.

    Positive comment by Guest · May 9, 2016

    Very usefull software. You can paste images created with BKChem in a text processor or another open source graphical software like InkScape.

    2 of 2 comments

    

    

    • BKchem is Free and Open SourceChemDraw is Paid and Proprietary
11. 

    

    MolView

     4 likes

    MolView is an intuitive, Open-Source web-application to make science and education more awesome!

    2 MolView alternatives

    Cost / License

    • Freemium
    • Proprietary

    Origin

    • International

    Platforms

    • Online

    

    Good alternative?Is MolView a good alternative to ChemDraw?

     
12. 

    

    Gnome Chemistry Utils

     4 likes

    The Gnome Chemistry Utils include six chemistry related programs:

    • GChemPaint, a 2D chemical formula editor.
    • a chemical calculator (computes raw formule, molar weight, mass composition and isotopic pattern).
    • a molecule 3d viewer using OpenGL to display molecular models. .

    Cost / License

    • Free
    • Open Source

    Origin

    • United States

    Platforms

    • Linux

    • United States

    

    

    

    +2

    

    More about Gnome Chemistry Utils  

    

    Good alternative?Is this a good alternative to ChemDraw?

     
13. 

    

    Chemik

     Like

    Cool Chemistry Tool - educational app for Students. Chemist will help you in chemical tasks! Use the Periodic Table just like a computer keyboard. With the Chemist you will learn everything you need to know about the elements, compounds and chemical reactions.

    22 Chemik alternatives

    Cost / License

    • Freemium
    • Proprietary

    Platforms

    • Android
    • iPhone
    • Android Tablet
    • iPad

    

    

    

    +6

    

    More about Chemik  

    

    Good alternative?Is Chemik a good alternative to ChemDraw?

     

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    3comments

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    Chemik vs ChemDraw Comments

    Negative comment by John Fastman · Dec 20, 2016

    ChemDraw is specifically intended for drawing chemical structures to include in documents, presentations and beyond. Chemik is specifically not intended for that and therefore can't be a replacement. (Also, the Chemik website has an explainer Youtube video which is blocked in Denmark on copyright grounds - very useful!)

    Negative comment by Guest · Jun 3, 2022

    because chemdraw is intended for drawing chemical structures, while chemik isn't

    Negative comment by Guest · Dec 7, 2016

    It is not possible to draw chemical structures

    3 of 3 comments

    

    

    • Chemik is Freemium and ProprietaryChemDraw is Paid and Proprietary
14. 

    

    MollyCule

     2 likes

    MollyCule is a completely free Open Source Chemistry visualisation program for MacOS, Linux and Windows. MollyCule is designed to be a nice, easy to use program to help ordinary people who want to explore Chemistry.

    Cost / License

    • Free
    • Open Source

    Alerts

    • Discontinued

    Platforms

    • Mac
    • Windows
    • Linux

    

    

    

    More about MollyCule  

    

    Good alternative?Is MollyCule a good alternative to ChemDraw?