Illustrator: Resize Artboard With Objects Inside

Question

I've been looking everywhere, and cannot find my answer so I wanted to ask here. I know how to re-size my artboard in Illustrator and all that, but I cannot get my artboard to re-size with objects inside of it.

The reason I want to do this, as I'm creating an identity for a small start-up company in it. I want to be able to print a PDF(which I can do), with all the images. What I don't want, is the printing of various sized logos(etc), when you print them they are the same size. So I need to be able to re-size the artboard with the objects inside on the fly for creating jpg, png, etc. I hate re-sizing the artboard, then going and re-sizing the objects to fit the artboard. Can I just re-size both at the same time?

Answer 1

This can be done in a hacky way.

1. Create a layer that is a rectangle encompassing the entire artboard you want to scale. Make sure the rectangle snaps to the edges of the current artboard.
2. Make sure all layers within the artboard including the rectangle are selected.
3. Scale and transform the layers up to the desired size.
4. Then just simply redraw the artboard to the edges of the rectangle. The artboard tool should snap to the edges of the rectangle.

Answer 2

Select all the objects you wish to resize then click Object -> Transform -> Scale. You can scale uniformly and preserve ratio or independently for each axis, but do remember to tick the Scale Strokes & Effects box. Afterwards, resize the Artboard independently.

Answer 3

Ok I've been scratching my head on this too. Was trying to manually calculate the transformation Grrr...

In my case I have svg art centered on 300x300 artboard. I need them to be 220x220 while maintaining position and relative scale.

So with the 300x300 artboard, create a 300x300 rectangle, right click Arrange -> Send to Back (so you can see your art). Select all, and make a group. Now resize to 220x220 (shift and drag to maintain aspect ratio), I also positioned top right 0x0. Now Shift+o or select resize artboard, and set to 220x220. Ungroup and delete background rectangle.

Hope this helps someone.

Answer 4

Not that I'm aware of.

The artboard size is not "connected" to the objects on it in any way. There's no command to "resize objects to fit artboard".

You might try looking into scripting. If it can be done at all, it will require scripting.

Answer 5

There is no way to do what you are asking inside of Illustrator itself.

BUT there is a way to do what you want while exporting your artwork to png/jpg/whatever. When exporting 'for web', you can resize your entire artwork, using pixels or percentages.

An Example: say I've got an image file of South America, with Colombia in blue. My artboard is 350 x 720 pixels. Now I want it to be twice the size.

• I hit 'Save for web and devices' and select the file format I want.
• I select the 'image size' tab (it's pretty well hidden, thanks Adobe)
• I enter the size I want (eg 200 percent)
• I hit 'Apply'
• I inspect my image to see if it's any good.
• If it is, I hit save.

It's not the fastest way of working when you need to do a lot of files. But it is way quicker than some of the options in the other answers.

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Another way to go would be to open up your file in Photoshop and resize it on import. The upside to this is that Photoshop handles rasterizing much better than Illustrator, reducing chances of artifacts and errors in your images. Downside is that you have to open the file again for every different size.

Answer 6

Do you have to resize a too many artboards? If not, try filling each artboard you need to resize with a rectangle of its same size, then group each rectangle with the contents of each artboard. Next, resize your artboards as you need. Then resize all the groups you just made so that the rectangle fits its respective artboard. Finally, delete each of the rectangles you made earlier.

This is so you keep the proportions between the artboard and its contents. Hope this helps.

Answer 7

Place the illustrator file in InDesign, then resize:

You can PLACE the Illustrator file in an InDesign document as a linked graphic, at whatever size you need. Then you can export to PDF from there for printing.

Answer 8

1. Select vector
2. Go to "Object"
3. From drop down menu select "Artboards"
4. Select "Fit to Artwork bounds"

Answer 9

First, select your vector graphics.

1: 'Transform panel' > Scale vector graphics to desired size.

2: 'Object menu' > Artboards > Fit to Artwork Bounds.

Done:)

Answer 10

I recently had to downsize many web screens that I made on Illustrator, and resizing the already designed artboards with objects on them seemed like a pain.

Here is a very quick hack to resize one or many (already exported) image files (at least on mac). You need to use terminal, but it is very easy:

Make and export your images in Illustrator (or PS or whatever you are using) in the maximum possible size you would need. Create a new folder with copies of these images (or just make a copy of the image itself if you only need to resize one or two images). Open terminal, navigate to the folder of the image and run the command:

sips -Z xxxx <filename>

Replace "< filename >" with the name of your file, and "xxxx" with the maximum dimension you want the image to have. "-Z" maintains the aspect ratio of the image.

If you are new to terminal, < filename > can also be replaced with the full PATH of the file, if you can't be bothered to navigate to the folder. (Tip: drag and drop files and folders from the Finder into Terminal instead of typing the whole name out)

The above will resize one image. To resize multiple images, make sure you are in the right folder and use:

 sips -Z *.<file extension> 

This resizes ALL images in the folder you are in with the given file extension.

CAUTION: sips does not create a copy, it will directly resize the image, so make sure to copy your images first if you want to keep the originals. For quality, this works best ONLY to make images smaller, not bigger.

Example:

cd /FOLDER_WITH_MY_IMAGES
sips -Z 1024 *.png

This will resize all my images that have the extension .png in the given folder to a maximum dimension of 1024 px, maintaining the aspect ratio.

For more information type in terminal:

man sips

Answer 11

two steps can do it perfectly firstly make sure "snap to" is checked on from "view" menu chose "snape to grid" or snap to point" then group all images "placed files" .... resize all to desired size then the artboard... the "snap to" make it easy to get equal sizes easily.. hope you do it thanks a lot

Answer 12

Using Adobe Illustrator CC version 21.0.0:

1. Click File > Document Setup.
2. Click Edit Artboards.
3. Set the Reference Point to one of the corners (e.g., top-left or bottom-right).
4. Lock the aspect ratio by linking the width (W) and height (H).
5. Change the width or height as desired.
6. Use the selection tool (e.g., type v).
7. Unlock all objects and layers.
8. Select all objects and layers.
9. Click Select > All on Active Artboard (or Select > All).
10. Ensure the Reference Point hasn't changed.
11. Ensure the aspect ratio remains fixed.
12. Change the width or height to the same values as were used to scale the artboard.

Not perfect, but should get pretty close.