Octostitch vs Tajima Embroidery i2

Octostitch is desktop embroidery digitising software for craft businesses and hobbyists, with tools to create designs and prepare them for embroidery machines. Stitches appear as you draw, and a sew-out playback lets you review the design. Stitch options include satin with automatic underlay, tatami and guided fills, appliqué, bean stitch, and cut lines. Guided auto-digitising lets you crop artwork, choose threads, remove the background with a brush, and assign stitches. The thread library covers Madeira, Isacord, Robison-Anton, Sulky, Gunold, and Brother. You can also make and share reusable fonts, decorative patterns, and tatami fills. Octostitch imports and exports PES, DST, JEF, VP3, EXP, XXX, HUS, and TAP formats, and runs on Linux, macOS, and Windows. The free trial lets you explore the digitising workflow, but saving projects and exporting machine formats require a licence. The one-time price is £40. The purchase includes commercial use with no extra licence or per-design fees.

Tajima Embroidery i2 turns vector artwork into ready-to-sew embroidery designs inside Adobe Illustrator or CorelDRAW. It is aimed at screen printers, creative professionals, promotional product companies and digitizers. The software includes over 20 standard fills, 135 carved fills and more than 150 programmed fills, plus over 125 digitized embroidery fonts and TTF conversion. AutoDigitize analyzes vector artwork, selects stitch types and provides stitch estimates with 3D previews. Production controls cover garment recipes, pull compensation, underlay, stitch density and length, AutoClip, automatic satin stitching, overlap and start-and-stop placement. Thread charts support color selection, and 3D design renderings can be exported as PNG files for customer approval. Supported hosts include specified Illustrator releases on Windows and Mac and CorelDRAW releases on Windows. A high-speed internet connection is required for the listed configurations. Server-based authentication allows access from computers running supported host software. The product is paid with pricing on request through a local distributor. Tajima’s privacy policy describes collection of registration, uploaded-content and usage data.