How to make a custom ribbon in AutoCAD

If you have your own set of favorite tools and commands of AutoCAD then you can create a custom ribbon panel in AutoCAD especially for your favorite tools.

These custom tools will be quickly accessible like like the one shown in the image below.

Using the CUI

To make your custom panel type CUI on the command line and press enter, this will activate customize user interface window. 

From this window under Customizations in All Files panel expand ribbon tree by clicking the + icon next to it.

Right click on Panels and select New Panel from the contextual menu as shown in the image below.

A new panel will be added below existing panels with default name panel1.

Rename this panel to My Panel by right clicking and selecting rename from the contextual menu.

Adding custom tools

Now we can add our favorite tools to this panel from command list panel which is under Customization in All Files panel as shown in the image below.

This panel lists all commands of AutoCAD and you can search your command using the search bar at the top of commands list panel.

Let’s assume that we want to add Donut command to this panel, type Donut and this command will reach to the top of the list.

Right click on Donut command and select copy from the contextual menu.

Go to My Panel which we have created in steps above and expand the tree by pressing the + icon, now you will see Row 1 in the My panel tree.

Right click on Row 1 and select paste from the contextual menu.

Repeat this process for all other commands which you want to add to this panel.

Assigning tab to the panel

Now our custom panel is ready for use we need to assign a tab for this panel. 

Right click on My panel and select copy from the contextual menu.

Then go to tabs and click on + icon to expand it then select the tab on which you want to paste this panel.In this example, I will paste it on Manage tab.

Select Manage tab then right-click on it and select paste from the contextual menu as shown in image below.

Click on Apply and then OK to close Customize User Interface window.Now go to manage tab and there you will see My panel with the custom tools and commands as shown in the image below.

To delete this custom panel go to CUI window and delete My panel from the list of panels by right clicking and selecting delete from the contextual menu.

Make sure you delete correct panel and avoid deleting any other panel accidentally.You can also make your own tool palette in AutoCAD and export the palettes to other workstations as well.

These tool palettes are especially helpful for saving all frequently used blocks and annotations, visit the linked article to learn more about tool palettes.

Summary

As you can see making custom ribbon panel in AutoCAD is a time saver if you work with custom commands or scripts.

You can keep all your scripts at one place and access them directly without having to always manualy load it.

If you have questions related to this article let me know in the comments area down below.