Illustrator

Use rulers

Rulers help you accurately place and measure objects in the illustration window. Rulers appear at the top and left sides of the illustration window. The point where 0 appears on each ruler is called the ruler origin. The default ruler origin is located at the lower-left corner of the artboard.

  • To show rulers, choose View > Show Rulers.
  • To hide rulers, choose View > Hide Rulers.
  • To change the ruler origin, move the pointer to the upper-left corner of the illustration window where the rulers intersect, and drag the pointer to where you want the new ruler origin.

    As you drag, a cross hair in the window and in the rulers indicates the changing ruler origin.

    Note: Changing the ruler origin affects the tiling of patterns.
  • To restore the default ruler origin, double-click the upper-left corner of the illustration window where the rulers intersect.
Note: Rulers are also available for individual crop areas. To set rulers around crop areas, double-click the Crop tool to open the Crop Area Options dialog box, and select Show Crop Area Rulers.