Objects will not align correctly

Symptoms

If one or more of these match what you are seeing, you are on the right page.

• •The alignment controls are not visible in the Properties Panel
• •Everything aligns to the wrong edge
• •The element you wanted to stay put moved instead
• •Aligning to centre does not centre on the canvas

Causes and fixes

Ordered from most to least likely. Work down the list — each cause is paired with what to do about it.

1. 1

   Fewer than two elements are selected.

   The alignment controls only appear with a multiple selection. Select at least two elements.

2. 2

   The alignment boundary is Selection when it should be Canvas.

   Switch to Align to Canvas to centre an element on the canvas. The default, Align to Selection, uses the combined bounding box of the selection instead.

3. 3

   No key object is designated.

   Click an already-selected element to make it the key object — it shows a thicker highlight border. Everything else then aligns to it and it stays where it is.

4. 4

   A group is being aligned as a unit.

   A group aligns by its combined bounding box. Enter the group by double-clicking it if you need to align its members relative to each other.

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