In this post, I will introduce you to 5 free websites to create UML online. With these online UML designer websites, you can draw different types of UML diagrams like ERD, DFD, Activity diagram, etc. for your SRS, SDD, etc. These online UML editors let you design a professional UML diagram which can be exported as an image file like PNG, JPG, etc. and other formats like PDF, SVG, etc. Their online UML designing interface makes the task a lot easier for you to draw an UML diagram from the scratch or you can also select a UML template to ease up your work. Most of these online UML designers also supports real-time collaboration so that you can design UML diagrams with your peers.
Draw.io:
The first online UML designer on my list is Draw.io, which is completely free to use. On it, you can create almost all types of UML diagrams like Activity, State, etc. It also supports other types of modeling diagrams like Network diagrams, Circuit diagrams, etc. You can quickly get started with Draw.io, visit the link provided above and select a cloud platform where you want to save your UML diagram. It supports Google Drive, Dropbox, OneDrive, etc. After that, you need to select which UML diagram you want to draw. This will open its online UML editor. The symbols to draw various UML diagrams like Activity, Deployment, etc can be found in a toolbox that stays on the left of its interface. In this toolbox, all the symbols are categorized by UML diagram types. Let’s say you want to draw an Activity diagram, then you can find all the symbols to draw an Activity diagram in the “UML” section of the toolbox. Drag and drop these UML diagram symbols on to its editing canvas and then connect them together. Next, you can adjust the diagram shapes appearance from the Format panel. In the Format panel, there are options to change the shape style and the text style. You can toggle the Format panel from the View menu at the top and then adjust the formatting properties of the selected shapes. Finally, when all your UML diagram components are placed at the right place and you have formatted them properly, you can download it as JPG, PNG, SVG, etc format.
You can draw following UML diagrams on Draw.io:
- Class
- Object
- Activity
- State
- DFD
- Collaboration
- Use Case
- Deployment
Cacoo:
Cacoo is the second free website on my list to create UML online. Its free plan lets you create and manage 6 UML projects and supports real-time collaboration with up to 15 people. I will prefer it over Draw.io because of its real-time collaboration feature as it lets you add the most number of people to collaborate in the real-time to draw UML diagrams together, as compared to other online UML designer websites on my list. Well, you can design Use Case, ERD, etc UML diagrams with it. The exporting options are also good as you can choose to download the designed UML diagrams as PNG, JPG, and PDF formats.
You have to create an account on Cacoo to get started with its online UML designer app, which can be seen in action in the screenshot above. From the Project Dashboard of Cacoo, you can choose to create a new UML diagram. This will open its online UML editor in a new browser tab and you will be prompted to select a template. Switch to the UML category and select a diagram type you want to design. If you don’t want to use a template, then you can also select to create a blank UML diagram. After you have selected a UML diagram to design, you can flawlessly work with its UML designer app. The controls are pretty easy to get used to and most of the time you have to just drag and drop necessary symbols to design an UML diagram. The symbols stay in its Stencil toolbox which can be placed anywhere on its interface. Drag and Drop symbols from this Stencil toolbox onto its editing canvas to insert. After that, you can play with their formatting settings to customize their appearance from the Inspector tool. To add real-time collaborators, you can invite people by email.
In the end, you can save the designed UML diagram as an image file on your PC. Use the Export option at the top to download the UML diagram.
You can draw some of these UML diagrams online on Cacoo:
- State Machine
- Use Case
- Sequence
- Class
- Activity
- Package
- ERD
Creately:
Creately is yet another free website to create UML online. Just like other online UML designer websites in this article, you can use it draw most of the UML diagrams to be added in your SRS, SDD, and other documents like ERD, all level DFDs. However, the free plan comes with certain limitations such as you can only create 5 public diagrams and zero private diagrams. But, the good thing is that you will get the real-time collaboration feature with up to 3 people.
The link provided above will give you the access to its homepage from where you can create a free account to use its online UML designer tool. I must say its UML diagram editing interface works quite smoothly and helps you to perfectly align the various elements together. Apart from that, the steps to design UML diagrams are pretty similar to what we did in websites mentioned above. The symbols to draw various UML diagrams are available in the toolbox on the left. In case, you didn’t find the UML symbols, you can add them explicitly. Click on the “+Get More Objects” at the bottom of the toolbox and then select UML to import drawing shapes for all types of supported UML diagrams. You can also select specific diagrams to import symbols related to that diagram only. After you have imported the required diagram symbols, you can add them to its editing canvas by drag and drop. You can now adjust their formatting or styling properties. The Properties panel on the top-right is dedicated for this purpose and you can adjust the shape, font, etc style.
Finally, when your UML diagram is complete, you have the option to export it as PDF, PNG, and JPG.
You can draw following UML diagrams online in Creately:
- Class
- Object
- Activity
- State
- Sequence
- Component
- Deployment
- Communications
Lucidchart:
Lucidchart is another free online UML designer website on my list to create UML online. I find its free plan quite limited as you can only keep 3 active UML diagrams but you do get the option to real-time collaborate with peers to design UML diagrams with your colleagues. From its online UML designer app, you can draw Activity, DFD, State, etc diagrams and export them as PDF, JPG, PNG, etc. Once you have created an account on Lucidchart, you can create a new blank UML diagram or choose a UML diagram template to edit. The interface of its online UML designer editor is shown in the screenshot above. All UML diagram symbols are present in the toolbox on the left. All the symbols are categorized under different UML diagrams. You can drag and drop these UML diagrams from the toolbox onto its canvas. After that, you can connect and align them to design your UML diagram. Once done, done you can export the UML diagram as an image or PDF format.
Following are the diagrams supported by Lucidchart:
- ERD & Data Flow
- Activity
- Sequence
- Component
- Class diagram
- Use Case
- State Diagram
GenMyModel:
GenMyModel is yet another free online UML designer to create UML diagrams online. With its online UML diagram editor app, you can easily draw UML diagrams like Class, Object, etc. and export them as an image (from the public page of your diagram) and as an XML file. The free plan is very limited though as you can’t create private diagrams and the UML diagrams can be only be made up of 60 limited diagram symbols. However, it doesn’t impose any limits on the number of diagrams you can create. For exporting UML diagrams, you can download them as SVG, PNG, and JPG.
From its project dashboard, create a new diagram which will open its online UML editor in a new tab. The screenshot above displays its UML designer. On the left side, there is a toolbox which includes all the symbols to draw the UML diagrams. After that, you can adjust their styling and formatting to make the UML diagram look more professional.
At the end, you can download the UML diagram as XML file and an image file from the diagram public page.
You can draw these UML diagrams online on GenMyModel:
- Class
- Object
- Sequence
- Deployment
- State
- Activity
Verdict:
I hope I would have ended your search for some good websites to create UML online. From the online UML designers above, I liked Draw.io as it is completely free, Cacoo because of its real-time features, and Lucidchart as it is easiest to use.
