To clear a canvas in Procreate, make sure the layer you want to wipe is active, then scrub three fingers left and right across the canvas. You can also tap the layer's thumbnail and choose Clear from the menu. Both methods empty only the active layer, so a multi-layer piece needs each layer cleared, or the layers grouped and deleted, to get back to a blank canvas. Any clear can be reversed with a two-finger tap to undo.

The Three Ways to Clear Procreate Content

Procreate has no single "clear everything" button. What you clear depends on what is active, so it helps to know the options before you wipe a day's work.

Method 1: The Three-Finger Scrub

The scrub is a quick way to clear a layer.

1. Tap the layer you want to empty in the Layers panel so it is highlighted.
2. Place three fingers on the canvas.
3. Swipe them left and right a few times, like erasing a whiteboard.

The motion doesn't need to be precise. Any back-and-forth swipe with three fingers is read as the clear gesture. If a selection is active, the scrub clears only the selected area instead of the whole layer. That is useful for cleaning up stray pixels, and a common surprise if you forgot a selection was live.

Method 2: Clear from the Layer Menu

If you prefer a button to a gesture, or you're using an Apple Pencil with one hand free, use the layer menu.

1. Open the Layers panel.
2. Tap the thumbnail of the layer you want to empty.
3. Choose Clear from the menu that appears.

The menu sits next to related options such as Select, Copy, Fill Layer, Alpha Lock, and Mask. Clear keeps the layer itself, along with its name, blend mode, and opacity, and removes only the pixels. That matters if you've set up a layer for a particular purpose, such as a multiply shadow layer you want to repaint.

Method 3: Clear Part of the Canvas with a Selection

When you only need to remove some of the artwork, selections give you more control than the eraser.

1. Tap the Selection tool (the S-shaped icon).
2. Choose Freehand, Rectangle, Ellipse, or Automatic, depending on the shape.
3. Draw or tap the area you want to remove.
4. Scrub with three fingers to clear it.

To keep one area and remove everything else, select the part you want to keep, tap Invert, then scrub. This is the quickest rough way to knock out a background. For flat-colored areas, Automatic selection grabs regions of similar color with a tap, and you can drag to adjust how much it picks up.

Another trick for tidy cleanup is to select the area, switch to Transform, and drag the selection off the canvas. Because you can see exactly what moves, you're less likely to wipe neighboring detail by accident.

Clearing Every Layer at Once

Since the scrub and the Clear command act on one layer, a fully layered illustration takes a few extra steps to reset.

1. Open the Layers panel.
2. Swipe right on each layer to select several at once.
3. Tap Group at the top of the panel.
4. Delete the group by opening its menu or swiping left on it.
5. Add a fresh layer if the canvas is left with none.

If you want to keep your layer structure and only remove content, clear each layer in turn instead. For a file with dozens of layers, deleting the group is much faster than clearing layer by layer.

Don't Forget the Background Color

A canvas can look "not blank" even after every drawing layer is empty. The reason is the Background Color layer at the bottom of the panel. Clearing doesn't touch it. To get a transparent canvas, toggle its visibility off. To change the base color, tap it and pick a new one in the color picker.

This matters for anything you plan to export with transparency, covered below.

Starting Fresh Without Losing the Original

Clearing is destructive, even though undo is available. Undo history is finite, and closing or reopening an artwork can limit how far back you can go. If the current state of a piece has any value, protect it first.

• Duplicate the artwork. In the Gallery, swipe left on the thumbnail and tap Duplicate. Clear the copy and keep the original untouched.
• Create a new canvas. Tap the plus icon in the Gallery and choose a size or custom dimensions. This is cleanest when you want a different resolution or color profile anyway.
• Save a variant. Export a PSD or PNG before a major wipe so you have a flat or layered backup outside Procreate.

Don't confuse clearing with Crop & Resize under Actions → Canvas. That tool changes the dimensions of the canvas and can resample the artwork, but it doesn't remove content in the way Clear does.

When Clear Doesn't Seem to Work

A few causes account for most failed clears.

• The wrong layer is active. The scrub affects only the highlighted layer. If nothing appears to change, the active layer may be empty or hidden.
• A selection is active. The clear only reaches inside the selection. Tap the Selection tool and deselect, or use Select All, if you wanted the whole layer.
• The layer is locked. Locked layers can't be edited. Unlock the layer from its menu before clearing.
• The gesture isn't registering. Check Gesture Controls in Actions → Prefs if the three-finger scrub does nothing, and make sure you're using three fingers with enough movement across the canvas.
• The layer you think is empty has a mask or clipping setup. Content may be sitting on a different layer, such as a clipped layer above the one you cleared.

If you clear the wrong thing, tap the canvas with two fingers to undo. Holding two fingers down rapidly steps back through the history.

Clearing Canvas for a Production Pipeline

Many motion designers and animators use Procreate for storyboards, texture passes, hand-drawn elements, and style frames, then bring the results into After Effects, Premiere Pro, Cinema 4D, Blender, or Nuke. A few habits make that handoff cleaner.

• Hide the background color before export. Export as PNG or layered PSD with Background Color off and you get transparency, which is what you need for compositing over footage or a 3D render.
• Clear stray marks on every layer. Faint pixels that are hard to see on white can show up as halos or noise when composited over dark footage. Select-all-and-scrub on layers you intend to leave empty, and check edges after exporting.
• Keep layers organized. Name and group layers before exporting a PSD so they import into After Effects as logical elements instead of a pile of "Layer 14" entries.
• Work at the delivery resolution. Plan your canvas dimensions up front to avoid resampling later, since resampling scales the artwork.
• Use one canvas per frame for hand-drawn sequences. If you're drawing frames for a short loop, duplicate the artwork and clear and repaint, or export frames as numbered files so they arrive in After Effects as an image sequence.

Quick Reference

• Clear a layer: three-finger scrub, or Layer menu → Clear.
• Clear part of a layer: make a selection, then scrub.
• Keep one area, remove the rest: select, Invert, scrub.
• Clear all layers: multi-select, Group, delete the group.
• Get transparency: toggle off Background Color.
• Undo a mistake: tap with two fingers.
• Protect your work: duplicate the artwork before a big clear.

Once the active layer, selection state, and background color are clear in your mind, wiping a canvas in Procreate takes seconds.

To clear a canvas in Procreate, make sure the layer you want to wipe is active, then scrub three fingers left and right across the canvas. You can also tap the layer's thumbnail and choose Clear from the menu. Both methods empty only the active layer, so a multi-layer piece needs each layer cleared, or the layers grouped and deleted, to get back to a blank canvas. Any clear can be reversed with a two-finger tap to undo.

The Three Ways to Clear Procreate Content

Procreate has no single "clear everything" button. What you clear depends on what is active, so it helps to know the options before you wipe a day's work.

Method 1: The Three-Finger Scrub

The scrub is a quick way to clear a layer.

1. Tap the layer you want to empty in the Layers panel so it is highlighted.
2. Place three fingers on the canvas.
3. Swipe them left and right a few times, like erasing a whiteboard.

The motion doesn't need to be precise. Any back-and-forth swipe with three fingers is read as the clear gesture. If a selection is active, the scrub clears only the selected area instead of the whole layer. That is useful for cleaning up stray pixels, and a common surprise if you forgot a selection was live.

Method 2: Clear from the Layer Menu

If you prefer a button to a gesture, or you're using an Apple Pencil with one hand free, use the layer menu.

1. Open the Layers panel.
2. Tap the thumbnail of the layer you want to empty.
3. Choose Clear from the menu that appears.

The menu sits next to related options such as Select, Copy, Fill Layer, Alpha Lock, and Mask. Clear keeps the layer itself, along with its name, blend mode, and opacity, and removes only the pixels. That matters if you've set up a layer for a particular purpose, such as a multiply shadow layer you want to repaint.

Method 3: Clear Part of the Canvas with a Selection

When you only need to remove some of the artwork, selections give you more control than the eraser.

1. Tap the Selection tool (the S-shaped icon).
2. Choose Freehand, Rectangle, Ellipse, or Automatic, depending on the shape.
3. Draw or tap the area you want to remove.
4. Scrub with three fingers to clear it.

To keep one area and remove everything else, select the part you want to keep, tap Invert, then scrub. This is the quickest rough way to knock out a background. For flat-colored areas, Automatic selection grabs regions of similar color with a tap, and you can drag to adjust how much it picks up.

Another trick for tidy cleanup is to select the area, switch to Transform, and drag the selection off the canvas. Because you can see exactly what moves, you're less likely to wipe neighboring detail by accident.

Clearing Every Layer at Once

Since the scrub and the Clear command act on one layer, a fully layered illustration takes a few extra steps to reset.

1. Open the Layers panel.
2. Swipe right on each layer to select several at once.
3. Tap Group at the top of the panel.
4. Delete the group by opening its menu or swiping left on it.
5. Add a fresh layer if the canvas is left with none.

If you want to keep your layer structure and only remove content, clear each layer in turn instead. For a file with dozens of layers, deleting the group is much faster than clearing layer by layer.

Don't Forget the Background Color

A canvas can look "not blank" even after every drawing layer is empty. The reason is the Background Color layer at the bottom of the panel. Clearing doesn't touch it. To get a transparent canvas, toggle its visibility off. To change the base color, tap it and pick a new one in the color picker.

This matters for anything you plan to export with transparency, covered below.

Starting Fresh Without Losing the Original

Clearing is destructive, even though undo is available. Undo history is finite, and closing or reopening an artwork can limit how far back you can go. If the current state of a piece has any value, protect it first.

• Duplicate the artwork. In the Gallery, swipe left on the thumbnail and tap Duplicate. Clear the copy and keep the original untouched.
• Create a new canvas. Tap the plus icon in the Gallery and choose a size or custom dimensions. This is cleanest when you want a different resolution or color profile anyway.
• Save a variant. Export a PSD or PNG before a major wipe so you have a flat or layered backup outside Procreate.

Don't confuse clearing with Crop & Resize under Actions → Canvas. That tool changes the dimensions of the canvas and can resample the artwork, but it doesn't remove content in the way Clear does.

When Clear Doesn't Seem to Work

A few causes account for most failed clears.

• The wrong layer is active. The scrub affects only the highlighted layer. If nothing appears to change, the active layer may be empty or hidden.
• A selection is active. The clear only reaches inside the selection. Tap the Selection tool and deselect, or use Select All, if you wanted the whole layer.
• The layer is locked. Locked layers can't be edited. Unlock the layer from its menu before clearing.
• The gesture isn't registering. Check Gesture Controls in Actions → Prefs if the three-finger scrub does nothing, and make sure you're using three fingers with enough movement across the canvas.
• The layer you think is empty has a mask or clipping setup. Content may be sitting on a different layer, such as a clipped layer above the one you cleared.

If you clear the wrong thing, tap the canvas with two fingers to undo. Holding two fingers down rapidly steps back through the history.

Clearing Canvas for a Production Pipeline

Many motion designers and animators use Procreate for storyboards, texture passes, hand-drawn elements, and style frames, then bring the results into After Effects, Premiere Pro, Cinema 4D, Blender, or Nuke. A few habits make that handoff cleaner.

• Hide the background color before export. Export as PNG or layered PSD with Background Color off and you get transparency, which is what you need for compositing over footage or a 3D render.
• Clear stray marks on every layer. Faint pixels that are hard to see on white can show up as halos or noise when composited over dark footage. Select-all-and-scrub on layers you intend to leave empty, and check edges after exporting.
• Keep layers organized. Name and group layers before exporting a PSD so they import into After Effects as logical elements instead of a pile of "Layer 14" entries.
• Work at the delivery resolution. Plan your canvas dimensions up front to avoid resampling later, since resampling scales the artwork.
• Use one canvas per frame for hand-drawn sequences. If you're drawing frames for a short loop, duplicate the artwork and clear and repaint, or export frames as numbered files so they arrive in After Effects as an image sequence.

Quick Reference

• Clear a layer: three-finger scrub, or Layer menu → Clear.
• Clear part of a layer: make a selection, then scrub.
• Keep one area, remove the rest: select, Invert, scrub.
• Clear all layers: multi-select, Group, delete the group.
• Get transparency: toggle off Background Color.
• Undo a mistake: tap with two fingers.
• Protect your work: duplicate the artwork before a big clear.

Once the active layer, selection state, and background color are clear in your mind, wiping a canvas in Procreate takes seconds.