Why Excalidraw Is the Secret Weapon for Stunning Diagrams

As a programmer, drawing diagrams—architecture charts, flowcharts, swimlane diagrams, and other schematics—is an essential skill, not for art but for clear communication.

Previously I used macOS Keynote for diagrams, which can produce nice visuals but is labor‑intensive and heavily dependent on personal aesthetic taste.

Excalidraw

Excalidraw is an online sketch‑style drawing tool that can replace Keynote and ProcessOn. It produces hand‑drawn‑looking diagrams, yet it also allows a more formal style when needed.

Below are examples of different diagram types created with Excalidraw:

Business Architecture Diagram

Swimlane Diagram

Schematic Diagram

Simple Flowchart

Interface

The main interface is similar to other diagram tools, but the visual output differs significantly.

You can quickly drag rectangles, diamonds, ellipses, arrows, lines, etc., from the top menu.

After selecting an element, the left panel lets you configure line style, including formal, hand‑drawn, right‑angled, or rounded options.

You can control fill color, fill pattern (solid, grid, or none), and border color.

Font Issues

Excalidraw’s official site is https://excalidraw.com/ . For Chinese users the default font support is poor, resulting in unsatisfactory text rendering.

The default Chinese font looks passable but not ideal.

Switching to a better font improves readability. I prefer the open‑source “Xiaowei WenKai” font.

I have deployed a version of Excalidraw that includes the Xiaowei WenKai font at https://excalidraw.moonkite.cn/ . Feel free to use it directly.