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Tux Paint

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description Tux Paint Overview

Tux Paint is an award-winning drawing program for children aged 3 to 12. It combines an easy-to-use interface with fun sound effects and an encouraging cartoon mascot. It is designed to be simple enough for young children while offering enough tools to be creative. While it is excellent for its specific niche, it is not a general-purpose graphics tool.

Its features are intentionally limited to prevent overwhelming the user, making it unsuitable for any professional or even intermediate artistic work. It is strictly an educational tool.

help Tux Paint FAQ

Is Tux Paint really free, and who makes it?

Yes, Tux Paint is completely free and open-source software, first released in 2002 by developer Bill Kendrick under New Breed Software. There are no ads, subscriptions, or in-app purchases.

What ages is Tux Paint designed for?

It targets children aged roughly 3 to 12, with oversized buttons, a simple full-screen canvas, sound effects, and the Linux penguin mascot Tux offering encouragement. It is widely used in schools and kindergartens as a first drawing program.

Does Tux Paint run on Windows, Mac, and Linux?

Yes, Tux Paint is cross-platform, with versions for Windows, macOS, and Linux, and it has appeared on additional platforms like Android over the years. That makes it a go-to choice for schools with mixed or older computer fleets.

Can I stop my child from printing or quitting Tux Paint accidentally?

Yes, the program's configuration options let parents and teachers disable the Quit and Print buttons, among other settings. Since it runs entirely offline and contains no advertising, it is considered a safe choice for unsupervised use.

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