How To Cut Vinyl with a Cricut Machine [A Beginners Guide]

Are you wondering how to cut vinyl with a Cricut machine? If yes, you’re in the right place. Craft vinyl is a flexible and versatile material used for various craft projects, including decorated mugs, stickers, tumblers, and decals.

While you can cut vinyl by hand, cutting vinyl with a Cricut machine lets, you create even cuts and complex designs. This blog will guide you through the simple steps to cut vinyl with a Cricut and show you how to get stunning results every time.

Whether you’re a Cricut beginner or more experienced, it’s worth your time to take and learn how to cut and apply vinyl for the best outcomes. Let’s talk all about how to cut vinyl with a Cricut machine!

 What Supplies Will You Need To Cut Vinyl with a Cricut Machine?

Here’s what you need to start to cut vinyl with a Cricut in the following:

• Cricut Machine

• Cricut StandardGrip Cutting Mat

• Adhesive Vinyl

• Cricut Basic Tool Set

Instructions To Cut Vinyl with a Cricut Machine

Follow the steps to cut vinyl with a Cricut machine given below:

Open Project, Or Create a New Project

First, you must open Cricut Design Space and create a new project or open a saved one. You can use Cricut library pictures, create a “Make It Now” project, or upload your own pictures.

Prepare Project for Cutting

If you are doing a “Make It Now” project or using a picture found in the Cricut picture library, you can probably skip these next few steps; those pictures are usually ready to go straight to the machine without extra work.

If you have uploaded your own picture (either a jpeg or SVG file), here are some tricks to deal with layers, colors, and groups so you can prepare the picture for cutting.

You can check if your picture is ready to be cut by clicking the green “Make It” button in the upper right corner.

You’re good to go if the following screen displays your picture divided into mats by colors or layers, with proper spacing and alignment. Skip the rest of this section and send your picture to the machine for cutting. (For example, the picture below displays 3 different mats, one for each color of the heart, and all the shapes are properly spaced.)

But if the next screen you visit looks “smush” (like the picture below) with color-separated shapes but not properly spaced, you may need to press the gray Cancel button to go back. And some adjustments will have to be made to cut the design of your Cricut before sending.

For your picture spacing to be correct, the shapes need to be “attached” to the Cricut Design Space. Start by choosing all the shapes of one color, hold down Shift, and click each red bar in the picture itself. Also, you can hold down Shift and click each red bar layer in the Layers panel on the right side.

After selecting everything in one color, press the gray Attach icon in the Layers panel at the bottom. Adding layers will group them, so they all move together when you move or resize the picture. Also, it forces the layers to line up exactly as they appear on the screen when cut, rather than treating them as a bunch of individual shapes that can be rotated or moved to fit.

Repeat for other “groups” of size and shapes that need to be properly fleshed out.

Send Your Picture to a Cricut Machine for Cutting

Once all different colors are added, tap the green “Make It” button to send your picture to the Cricut machine for cutting.

Your design will be automatically divided into different mats based on color. You can cut up a multi-colored or multi-layered design in a single project.

Change your Project Copy field to create multiple copies of the project. Then select the material size for each mat, and if you are cutting vinyl on an iron, be sure to turn on the mirror switch. Also, you can move the pictures to the mat preview right if you want. (It helps align pictures if you make more than one copy.)

After everything looks right, tap the green Continue button.

From here, follow the on-screen steps! Be sure the Cricut machine is turned on and appears in the Connect Machine window at the top screen. Select the Smart Dial on the Cricut machine to vinyl.

Attach a piece of vinyl to the cutting mat, ensuring your paper backing side is down.

Then, put the mat into the Cricut machine by clicking the flashing Load/Unload button.

Once your mat is loaded, the screen will ask you to click the flashing Go button.

Once your machine completes the cut, the screen will display a progress bar. The screen will ask you to click the Load/Unload button to take off your cutting mat when it’s completed cutting.

If you only had one color, then you are done.

If you’ve a second or third color to cut, carefully peel the vinyl off the cutting mat and then put the vinyl of the following color on the mat. Load the cutting mat into the machine by clicking the Load/Unload button, then tap the Go button when it flashes. Repeat until all mats are cut.

When the final cut is completed, take off the cutting mat and tap the green Finish button on the screen to go back to the project.

And you are done!

Now, remove the background vinyl and apply it to the project! Use some transfer paper if you’ve many pieces and want to maintain the spacing when transferring vinyl to the project. Peel the backing off your transfer paper, press it over weed-out vinyl, and then peel off the transfer paper and vinyl design to stick to it. Place vinyl where you want it on a project well, then gently remove the transfer tape leaving the vinyl on the project.

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