How to draw a spider: A fun and simple guide for all ages.

Even if you’re scared of spiders, our simple spider drawing tutorial is perfect for spooky sketches this Halloween.

We’ve designed this tutorial to show you the basic principles of how to draw a spider, but once you know how it’s done it’s easy to add variations to shape and style to draw your own custom creepy creatures.

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The key to spider drawing is understanding their anatomy. A spider's body is divided into two sections: the front section (cephalothorax) and the back section (abdomen) – a spider's legs may appear between the two sections, but they are always actually attached to the front section.

Fun fact! – A spiders cephalothorax is the head and thorax combined. This is why spiders are not classed as insects which have separate head and thorax sections – insects have three body parts and arachnids have two!

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How to draw a spider

Step 1

Start by drawing a simple circle.

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Step 2

Draw another circle roughly half the size as the first one, with approximately a quarter of the smaller circle's diameter overlapping the large circle.

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Step 3

Draw two straight lines to form an X that cross at the top point of the large circle, and pass through the points where both circles meet. Your lines should extend to the same distance as the widest points of the large circle.

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Step 4

Now make another straight line on both sides at an angle halfway between the bottom line and the large circle.

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Step 5

Create two more straight lines at an angle halfway between the top lines and the small circle, extending to line up with the top of the small circle.

Now draw the two front legs. They should angle inwards and extend to approximately three times the length of your short line, as well as their end point being in line with the intersecting point of the two circles.

With all of the legs, drawing the lines with a slight inwards curve will help them to look a bit less rigid.

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Step 6

Draw the next two front legs on either side. These should be almost vertical and extend to approximately two thirds of the front legs. 

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Step 7

Now draw your bottom two legs, keeping them close to the large circle and curving slightly inwards. These should be slightly longer than your front legs.

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Step 8

Draw the final pair of legs, angled outwards ever so slightly more than the outer front legs. You may need to extend the short first lines slightly to ensure the legs aren’t too close to the previous back legs.

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Step 9

Add on two small fangs at the front of the small circle.

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Step 10

Now go round each of the legs adding a secondary line to thicken the legs, with each leg culminating in a point. This is a good point to add more slight curves to your lines, and you can add lines at the joints of the legs if you wish.

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Step 11

Now simply go over your lines with a fineliner pen. Be sure to only go over the entire large circle in pen and not the bottom portion of the small circle, as per the picture. 

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Your spider drawing is now complete! Now that you know the basics, you can start getting creative - for simple spider silhouettes you can just fill in your spider with a pen.

Or if you fancy mixing it up, try experimenting with different body shapes and leg positions. Here we’ve used a thinner body shape and longer legs to create a different spider appearance, but was still made using the same steps.

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What sort of spider drawing will you make?

This tutorial is designed to show you the basics of how to draw a spider, but it’s just the beginning. You can use the same theory to draw a long spindly spider like a daddy longlegs, or make one with a stout body and thick hair legs for a tarantula-style spider. 

More scary sketches for Halloween

From haunted houses to petrifying pumpkins, you’ll find loads of illustration inspiration in our roundup of Halloween drawing ideas.