How to convert an SVG to an embroidery file

Why SVG is ideal for embroidery

An embroidery machine doesn't stitch a picture, it follows stitch commands generated from your artwork's shapes. Because an SVG already is clean shapes with crisp edges, each one maps directly to satin borders, fills and running stitches with no fuzzy tracing in between. That means sharper outlines, cleaner lettering and more predictable results than you'd get from a PNG or JPG.

Why you can't just rename the file

Renaming logo.svg to logo.pes doesn't work, the contents are completely different. An SVG stores shape paths; an embroidery file (PES, DST, JEF, EXP, XXX) stores needle movements, stitch types and colour changes. The SVG has to be digitized: each shape converted into stitches, with direction, density and an underlay decided for it.

Step by step

1. Upload your SVG. Embify reads the vector shapes directly, no tracing needed.
2. Set the finished size. Embroidery is size-specific, enter the real size you'll stitch (for example ~90 mm for a left chest).
3. Check the colours. Each SVG fill is matched to a thread shade; adjust any that look off.
4. Preview the sew-out. See exactly how the stitches land, including direction and coverage, before committing thread.
5. Export. Download in your machine's format, PES, DST, JEF, EXP or XXX.

Get the cleanest result

SVGs convert beautifully, but a few habits help: keep the design bold and simple, limit it to a handful of solid colours (each colour is a thread change), expand any text to outlines so fonts don't shift, and remove tiny detail or hairline strokes that thread can't reproduce. If a line vanishes or text looks crowded in the preview, scale up or simplify and re-run.

Where to get an SVG if you don't have one

SVGs are more findable than most people think:

• Ask whoever designed the logo. Designers work in vectors; the SVG (or EPS, or PDF) exists somewhere in their files, probably attached to an old email already in your inbox.
• Export one from design software. Illustrator, Affinity Designer, Inkscape and Figma all export SVG directly. If the logo was made in any of them, it's a two-click job.
• Check your brand assets folder. Companies with a brand pack usually have vector versions sitting next to the PNGs, often labelled 'print'.
• Trace your PNG into one. If a bitmap really is all that exists, tracing converts it, and Embify does this automatically when you upload a PNG, so in practice you can skip the middle step and upload what you have. The result depends on the PNG's quality, which is the subject of the PNG guide.

Preparing an SVG so it stitches cleanly

SVGs arrive in better shape than bitmaps, but a few habits from screen design still need undoing before thread gets involved:

• Expand text to outlines. If the SVG contains live text, the file references a font rather than containing the shapes. Convert text to paths before exporting so the lettering is locked in exactly as designed.
• Flatten the gradients. Vector gradients are still gradients, and thread still can't sew them. Pick solid colours deliberately.
• Release masks and clipping paths. What looks cropped on screen may still exist in full underneath a mask. Flatten the visible result so what you see is what gets digitized.
• Delete hidden layers and stray points. Old drafts left invisible in the file can confuse any automated reader.
• Mind hairline strokes. A 0.25 pt decorative stroke is invisible at stitch scale. Thicken what matters, delete what doesn't.

If that list sounds daunting: upload the file anyway. The preview will show you instantly whether any of it actually applies to your logo, and most clean logos sail through untouched.

How vector shapes become stitch types

The translation from SVG to stitches follows the geometry, and knowing the mapping helps you predict the result:

• Narrow filled shapes and bold strokes become satin stitch, the smooth shiny column. Lettering and borders live here.
• Large filled regions become fill stitch: rows of stitches at a chosen angle covering the area.
• Thin strokes and open paths become running stitch, a single clean line of stitches.

Width is the deciding factor. A shape about 1 to 8 mm across sews beautifully as satin; wider than that and satin stitches get too long to be stable, so it switches to fill; thinner than a millimetre and there's only room for a running line. This is why the same star shape can come out three different ways at three different sizes, and why setting the finished size before digitizing matters so much.

Worked example: from Figma to a stitched polo

A concrete run-through, since this is the path a lot of modern logos take. Your logo lives in Figma, where the brand designer built it.

1. In Figma: select the logo frame, right-click the text layers and choose outline stroke/flatten so the lettering becomes shapes, then export the frame as SVG. If the logo uses a gradient fill, change it to the closest solid brand colour first; it takes a minute and beats letting any tool guess.
2. Upload the SVG. The shapes come through exactly as drawn, no tracing, no fuzz. This is the moment you appreciate vectors.
3. Set 90 mm wide for the left chest, and pick the polo fabric preset.
4. Check the preview. In this example the icon and name sail through, but the registered trademark symbol next to the name renders at 1.5 mm, a speck. Delete it in Figma, re-export, re-upload. Total detour: three minutes.
5. Export PES for the shop's Brother machine, plus a DST because the uniform supplier asked for one. Same conversion, two downloads.

Elapsed time, including the trademark detour, is about ten minutes, and most of it was in Figma rather than the converter. That's typical: with a clean SVG, the digitizing is the fast part, and the preview exists to catch exactly the kind of tiny-detail surprise the ® symbol provided.

SVG quirks that catch people out

Four surprises account for most 'but it's a vector!' confusion:

1. There's a photo hiding inside. SVG files can embed bitmap images, and a 'vector' logo is sometimes just a JPG wrapped in an SVG shell. The wrapping changes nothing; it traces like the bitmap it is.
2. The text changed font. Live text renders in whatever font the opening software substitutes. Outline the text before exporting and this can't happen.
3. Overlaps behave differently in thread. On screen, a shape drawn over another simply covers it. In stitches, both layers may sew, doubling density where they overlap. Clean digitizing handles this, but wildly overlapping construction is worth flattening first.
4. The canvas isn't the design. A tiny logo floating on a huge artboard, or one that extends past the canvas edge, can confuse size detection. Crop the artboard to the design before exporting.

Strokes vs fills: one last vector subtlety

Vector shapes come in two flavours, and they digitize differently. A fill is a closed shape with colour inside; it becomes satin or fill stitch by area, exactly as it looks. A stroke is a line with a thickness setting painted along a path, and its thickness is a property, not a shape, until something converts it.

The safe habit from design software: expand or outline strokes before exporting (the same menu neighbourhood as outlining text). That locks each stroke's thickness into a real closed shape, so what you drew is exactly what gets digitized. It also forces the useful question: is this stroke thick enough to be a satin border, or is it decoration that should be deleted? At stitch scale there's no in-between, and deciding in the design file beats discovering in the preview.

SVG vs EPS vs PDF: does it matter?

All three carry vector shapes, and any of them beats a bitmap for digitizing. SVG is the web-native format and the one you'll meet most; EPS is the traditional print exchange format that older logo files ship in; PDF can contain the same vector art wrapped in a document.

For embroidery purposes, treat them as interchangeable and send whichever you have. The only real warning is the same one as above: any of the three can secretly contain a bitmap instead of true vectors, usually betrayed by fuzzy edges when you zoom right in. True vectors stay razor sharp at any zoom.