How To Draw A Butterfly With Easy Step By Step Instructions

If you’re in the mood to draw something beautiful, then drawing a butterfly is a great choice.

Butterflies are one of the world’s most beautiful creatures and there’s so much variety to each and every one of them.

They all have some unique patterns whether that’s the color of their bodies and wings or their pretty patterns. It’s not a huge surprise that you’re here looking to learn how to draw a butterfly.

Below, I’ve created a step by step tutorial that will show you exactly how to draw a butterfly.

They’re absolutely easy to draw and you’ll be excited to get to the part where you can add all those pretty details on the wings.

The fantastic thing about choosing to draw a butterfly is that you can use them virtually anywhere.

Whether you want to create an entire spread full of different butterflies or you want to add a few details to a page, this butterfly drawing will make any spread stand out.

Things To Consider When Drawing A Butterfly

Before we get to the actual drawing, let’s take a look and break down the structure of a butterfly first so that you’ll know exactly how to go about drawing them.

The great thing about analyizing your drawing beforehand is that you get to have a clear understanding of the subject. This is useful when you’re drawing a subject that you’re unfamiliar with.

The butterfly is made up of a long body, two antennas, and four wings. The wings normally join or meet together at the center of the body.

By having a good idea of how you intend to begin the drawing, everything else will soon fall into place.

Steps For Drawing A Butterfly

Step 1: Drawing The Body

This is our very first step to drawing a butterfly. To begin, draw a small circle and then draw an oval to connect the circle making up the first part of the body.

Step 2: Adding More To The Body

You’ll then want to draw an even longer shape making it thinner than the previous shape and connecting it to the rest of the body.

Once you have completed this shape, you can move onto drawing the wings.

Step 3: Drawing The First Wing

Now it’s time to draw the shape of the wings.

You can choose to start with any side of the body but for this drawing, I chose to begin on the right-hand side.

Draw a slightly curved line from half way down the body in the shape shown above.

You’ll want to make sure it’s much wider and away from the body.

Step 4: Drawing The Opposite Wing

Bring that line down in another curved shape closing off the first wing.

As you have done for the previous shape, do the same thing for the other side of the butterfly making it more shapely.

Step 5: Drawing The Lower Wings

Now we can move onto the lower wings and you can do this by slightly overlapping the lines of the previous wings and the drawing it away from that wing creating this oval kind of shape.

Step 6: The Completed Structure Of The Butterfly

To finish off the structure of your butterfly drawing, do the exact same step as you had done for the other side of the butterfly.

The other detail you can add in this step are the antennas of the butterfly.

Make one line longer than the other and more slanted to give it a nice effect.

Step 7: Adding Details To Create A Pattern

Here comes the fun part you have finally been waiting for and that’s adding the details to create a beautiful pattern.

It’s much easier to just go with the flow and add circles and shapes where you see fit.

You don’t have to stick to the exact same reference but continue following a pattern.

It will be easier to start with the larger shapes and then fill in the small ones so that it looks cohesive.

Step 8: Final Drawing

You’ll want to continue adding your patterns to the butterfly wings and then fill in the spaces with a black marker or the color of your choice to really make this butterfly drawing stand out.

As you can see, when you add all of those neccessary details, your drawing looks way better than if you only left it as is with the structure.

Coloring and adding those details will make a world of difference to the way your final drawing turns out.

Don’t forget to block in the body of the butterfly as well!

Final Thoughts

As I promised, learning how to draw a butterfly is way easier than you thought but more so, it’s actually really fun to draw butterflies.

It’s also pleasing to draw something that you know will look amazing in the end after you have added all the details and gave it life by coloring the drawing in.

You can use this butterfly drawing anywhere you want to and I’m sure you’ll have loads of fun drawing this multiple times.

If you found this drawing tutorial helpful, let us know in the comments below and be sure to check out our awesome step by step tutorials.

There’s something for everyone.

Lastly, head over here to learn how to become better at drawing if you’ve been struggling with learning how to draw on your own.

This guide will be of huge help to you on journey as a self-taught artist.