How to draw a tiger — easy step by step drawing ideas

Tiger drawing ideas are the ones kids ask me for most once they have a few farm animals under their belt, and I understand why: a tiger feels like a real grown-up drawing, with stripes and whiskers and a bit of jungle glamour. The good news is that learning how to draw a tiger — at least the cute, sitting, big-eyed cub version we make in the studio — is not harder than drawing a cat. It is a circle, an oval, four short legs and a set of short stripes, and everything else is just confidence.

I love teaching this one because the stripes do so much of the work. Even a slightly wonky outline turns into an unmistakable tiger the moment the black stripes go on, and the bright orange coloring at the end makes the finished drawing pop off the page. Kids who normally hesitate over their pencil lines suddenly get bold, because they can see the animal appearing in front of them.

In this tutorial we will build our tiger cub in six easy steps, following the practice sheet below. I will share the pro tips I use when teaching it, the mistakes that catch out nearly every beginner, and a few quick rescues for the moments when your tiger starts drifting toward "cat" or "zebra". Find an orange crayon, sharpen a pencil, and let us draw.

The 6 steps to easy tiger drawing ideas

Step 1 — Draw the head circle

Start with a big round circle in the upper half of your paper, a little above the middle. This is the tiger cub's head, and on a cute cartoon cub the head is the biggest single shape in the drawing, so make it generous. Draw it lightly — a soft pencil line you can erase later — and do not worry if it is a touch egg-shaped. Real tiger heads are a little wider than they are tall, so a slightly squashed circle is actually perfect.

Leave plenty of room underneath. The body, the legs and the paws all hang below the head, and the two back legs will spread out wider than the head on each side. If the head is too low on the page, the paws run off the bottom and the tiger looks like it is sinking.

Step 2 — Add the ears and body

On top of the head, draw two small round ears — think of two little half-circles sitting on the head at about the ten o'clock and two o'clock positions. Tiger ears are short and rounded, nothing like the tall pointed triangles of a cat, and that roundness is one of the details that makes the cub look soft and friendly.

Now draw the body. Directly below the head, add a rounded oval that is narrower than the head and about the same height. It should tuck up underneath the chin so the two shapes overlap slightly, because a sitting cub has almost no visible neck. Keep the body slim; the legs and the big paws we add next will give it all the width it needs.

Step 3 — Add the legs, paws and tail

Draw the two front legs first: two straight, slightly tapered lines coming down from the lower body, side by side, each ending in a round paw at the bottom. Then add the back legs. A sitting tiger tucks its back legs out to each side, so draw a big rounded haunch on the left and right of the body and finish each with a large oval paw pointing forward at the ground.

Finally, add the tail: a long, thick curve that starts behind one back leg and sweeps out to the side, curling up at the tip. Give it a rounded end rather than a point. The tail is a wonderful line for kids because it can be as long and loopy as they like and it always looks right.

Step 4 — Add the face

Now the personality arrives. Draw two big round eyes in the lower half of the head, a little below the middle line and fairly far apart. Add a small white shine dot in each one. Below and between the eyes, draw the muzzle: two soft bumps side by side, like a small heart or a letter "m", with a tiny rounded triangle nose sitting on top where they meet.

Under the nose, draw a short line down and then a small curved smile. Add three short whiskers on each side of the muzzle, a little curved line inside each ear, and — the touch that makes it a tiger — a small tuft of fluffy cheek fur sticking out on each side of the head.

Step 5 — Add the stripes

This is the step that turns a cat into a tiger. Start on the forehead with three short lines between the ears: one vertical stroke in the centre and one on each side, angled slightly outward. Then add two or three short curved stripes on each cheek, sweeping out from the eyes toward the edge of the head.

Move down the body: a few stripes across the shoulders and down the sides, two little stripes on each leg, and three or four rings around the tail. Every stripe is a short stroke with a pointed end — think of a wide-tipped leaf shape, or a stroke that starts thick and tapers off. Keep them short and spaced apart; the orange fur between them is what makes the pattern read.

Step 6 — Finish and color

Darken the lines you want to keep and erase the light scaffolding underneath — especially the top of the body oval hidden behind the chin and any guide lines under the paws. Then color the tiger bright orange all over, leaving the muzzle, the chest, the inner ears and the paws white. Fill every stripe solid black, add a pink nose and pink paw pads, and put a black dot in each eye with the white shine left showing.

Then give your tiger a place to sit. A few blades of tall jungle grass, a big green leaf behind it, a butterfly for it to look at, or a little paw print trail across the page are all easy additions. Sign your name in the corner — every finished drawing deserves a signature.

Common mistakes to avoid

Drawing pointed cat ears

This is the number one tiger mistake. Most kids have drawn a cat before, and cat ears are tall pointed triangles, so that is what the hand wants to do. But tiger ears are small, low and round, and pointed ears instantly turn the cub back into a house cat no matter how many stripes you add.

Draw each ear as a small half-circle sitting on the head, no taller than it is wide. If yours already came out pointy, simply round off the tips with a curved line and erase the points — it takes five seconds and it changes the whole animal.

Too many stripes

Once kids discover how much fun stripes are, it is hard to stop, and the tiger ends up covered edge to edge with thin black lines. The problem is that with no orange showing between them the pattern stops reading as stripes and starts reading as a scribble, and the coloring step becomes a chore.

Keep the stripes short, thick and well spaced, and leave the muzzle, chest and belly completely stripe-free. A useful rule: if you cannot fit a finger between two stripes, you have too many.

Eyes placed too high

It feels natural to put the eyes in the top half of the head, but that gives the tiger a long, serious adult face. Baby animals of every kind have eyes that sit low on the head, with a big forehead above them.

Place the eyes just below the middle of the head circle and make them larger than you think you need. If they came out too high, draw a new pair lower down and turn the old ones into two extra forehead stripes — nobody will ever know.

Troubleshooting

"My tiger looks like a cat"

Check three things: the ears (round, not pointed), the cheek fur (add fluffy tufts on each side of the head) and the stripes (bold forehead and cheek stripes are the strongest tiger signal). Fix those and the cat disappears.

"The body looks too big and heavy"

The body oval is probably as wide as the head or wider. Erase the sides of the body and redraw it narrower, then let the big haunches and paws provide the width down low. Head bigger than body is the cub formula.

"The face looks grumpy"

The eyes are probably small or too far up, and the mouth is a straight line. Enlarge the eyes, add a bright shine dot in each, and curve the mouth up into a smile that reaches toward the cheeks. Bigger eyes and a wider smile fix almost every grumpy tiger.

Key takeaways

FAQ

What age is this tiger drawing tutorial for? The six-step version works from about age 5 with a grown-up nearby, and most kids around 7 and up can follow the sheet on their own. The shapes are a circle and an oval, and the stripes are just short lines, so it is friendlier than it looks.

How many stripes should a cartoon tiger have? Fewer than you think. Three on the forehead, two or three on each cheek, three or four down the back, two on each leg and a few rings on the tail is plenty. Too many stripes turn the tiger into a zebra and make coloring a chore.

What materials do we need? A pencil, an eraser, paper, and crayons or markers in bright orange and black. A pink crayon for the nose and paw pads is a nice extra, and the white muzzle and belly are simply left uncolored.

How do I make my tiger look like a cute cub instead of a scary tiger? Make the head bigger than the body, keep the eyes large and low on the face, and give it a small closed smile instead of an open mouth with teeth. A sitting pose with round paws pointing forward also reads as a baby animal every time.

That is your tiger! Whether it came out sleek and striped or gloriously lumpy, you built a whole jungle cat out of a circle, an oval and a handful of short lines — and that belongs on the fridge. Keep the sheet handy, draw a whole family of cubs in the tall grass, and come back tomorrow for a new tutorial.

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