What Is Excalidraw? The Free Sketch Whiteboard for BAs
Excalidraw is a free hand-drawn whiteboard that runs in your browser, with no account. See what it is good for, quick sketches in meetings and workshops, and what it is not good for: formal BPMN or UML, big diagrams and long-lived documentation. Example: a made-up online shop returns process.
Step by step
What Excalidraw is
- What is Excalidraw?. What is Excalidraw, and when should a business analyst use it? It's a free sketch whiteboard for quick drawings in meetings. Here's the workshop sketch we'll build, and then when not to use it.
- excalidraw.com. Go to excalidraw.com. It's free, it runs in your browser, and you don't need an account. The empty canvas is ready right away.
- The toolbar. All the tools sit in the toolbar at the top. Rectangles, diamonds, ellipses, arrows and text. That's most of what you need.
A quick meeting sketch
- Sketch it live. Say you're in a workshop about returns for our online shop. Someone says it starts with the customer. Draw an ellipse and type customer. The customer asks to send something back. Draw a rectangle next to it. Request return. Drag an arrow from the customer to the request. It sticks to both shapes. Next, the warehouse checks the item that comes back. Another arrow, from the request to the check. Then the customer gets their money back. Put that step below. And an arrow down from the check to the refund.
- Change it fast. Now someone in the room says, we give store credit, not cash. No problem. Select the box, press Enter, and retype. Changes take seconds, so you keep up with the talk.
Why it looks hand-drawn
- Rough on purpose. See the hand-drawn look? That's on purpose. A rough sketch looks like a draft, so people talk about the idea, not the colours and fonts.
What it's not for
- Not for formal work. Now, what it's not good for. Formal BPMN or UML with strict notation, big diagrams with fifty shapes, or documents that must last for years. For those, use draw.io or Visio.
- The finished sketch. Click an empty spot to see the finished sketch. Four shapes and three arrows, drawn in about a minute while people talk.
Recap
- The rules. So, Excalidraw is free, needs no account, and is great for quick sketches in meetings. The rough look keeps people on the ideas. For formal notation or long-lived documents, switch to draw.io or Visio.
