Zooming the Canvas

The canvas can be zoomed in and out in many ways. For many of the options, the zoom changes by a default factor of 1.41 (repeat twice to zoom by a factor two). This factor can be changed in the Steps section of the Inkscape Preferences dialog.

By default, a zoom of 1 corresponds to one Inkscape pixel per screen pixel. If you would like to calibrate the zoom to a real physical measurement unit (like inches or centimeters), you can do so under the Interface section of the Inkscape Preferences dialog. You will find there a slider that can be dragged to set a Zoom correction factor. Simply hold up your ruler to the screen and drag until the onscreen ruler matches.