DrawPad
Draw straight on the screen — over any app, or on a canvas of your own
DrawPad has two halves. Inside the app is a proper canvas: twelve colours, brush sizes from 1 to 80, typed text and pictures from your gallery that you can drag and pinch into place, an eraser that shows exactly what it will wipe, undo and redo, pinch to zoom and drag to pan, and Save to write a PNG into your gallery. Strokes are kept as vectors rather than pixels, so zooming in shows real detail instead of a magnified blur. The second half is the screen overlay: tap Screen and a transparent canvas covers the whole phone, so you can draw over WhatsApp, a video, a map or the home screen. A small bubble floats on top — tap it for the tools, drag it anywhere. Draw mode takes your touches; Pass mode lets every tap through to the app underneath while the marks stay floating above it.
What it does
- Draw on top of any app — the marks float over whatever is on screen
- Draw / Pass switch: keep using the phone normally with the drawing still showing
- Floating bubble you can drag anywhere; tap it to open or hide the tools
- Add text and pictures from the gallery, then drag to move and pinch to resize them
- Eraser with a ring showing exactly what it will wipe — it rubs out lines, words and photos alike
- Pinch to zoom and drag to pan — strokes stay sharp because they are vectors, not pixels
- 12 colours, brush size 1–80, undo and redo
- Volume keys double as shortcuts while the overlay is up
- Save the drawing to Pictures/DrawPad as a PNG
- Optionally draw above the status bar and the pull-down notification shade
- Completely offline — no account, no internet, no ads
What you need
- Android 7 or newer
- "Display over other apps" permission, for drawing on the screen
- Optional: DrawPad turned on in Accessibility, only if you want to draw over the notification shade too
Install
- 1.Download the APK and open it on the phone.
- 2.If Android warns "unknown source", allow this app to install.
- 3.Open DrawPad — the canvas is ready straight away.
How to use
- 1
Draw in the app
Draw with one finger. Pick a colour from the row at the bottom and set the thickness with the Size slider. Two fingers pinch to zoom and drag to move around; Fit brings the whole drawing on screen and 1:1 goes back to normal. Save writes a PNG into Pictures/DrawPad.
- 2
Draw on the screen itself
Tap Screen at the top. Android asks for the "Display over other apps" permission the first time — allow it for DrawPad. The app steps aside and a transparent canvas covers the phone, so you can draw over anything.
- 3
The floating bubble
Tap the bubble to open the tool panel and tap it again to put it away; drag it to park it anywhere. The panel holds Draw/Pass, the colour, the brush size, B100 for how strong the bubble's border is, Erase, Undo, Clear and ✕ to stop.
- 4
Use the phone while the drawing stays
Tap Pass. The marks stay floating on the screen but every tap goes through to the app underneath, so you can scroll, type and switch apps normally. Tap Draw to go back to drawing.
- 5
Add words and pictures
Tap Text to type a word — it lands in the middle ready to be positioned. Tap Img to pick a photo from the gallery. Either one can be dragged to move and pinched to resize while Move is on; tap Brush when you are done. The eraser works on them just like it does on a line: only the part under your finger goes.
- 6
Volume-key shortcuts
While the overlay is running, volume up switches between Draw and Pass and volume down opens or closes the tool panel, so you do not have to reach for the bubble. The keys go back to changing the volume as soon as the overlay is stopped. This needs DrawPad turned on in Accessibility.
- 7
Draw over the notification shade
Android places app overlays underneath the status bar and the pull-down shade, so marks disappear when the shade opens. To have them on top of those as well, turn DrawPad on in Settings → Accessibility, then stop and start the overlay once.
Safety
- 🛡Everything stays on the phone — nothing is uploaded and there is no account.
- 🛡The Accessibility option reads nothing: it does not inspect the screen or your content, it only lets the canvas sit above the status bar.
- 🛡In Draw mode your touches go to DrawPad, so tap Pass or ✕ whenever you want the phone back.