Alignment & distribution toolbar

This article explains how to use the alignment and distribution toolbar to line up and space layers precisely — without dragging anything by hand.

When the toolbar appears

The alignment toolbar appears automatically above the canvas whenever you have two or more layers selected. Select a single layer and the toolbar is hidden. To multi-select, click one layer then hold Shift and click others, or drag a marquee across them. You can also use Cmd/Ctrl + A to select all layers on the canvas.

The alignment toolbar showing Selection and Canvas alignment groups, the Distribute button, and Team Distribute controls

Align edges and centers

The toolbar is split into two groups: Selection and Canvas.

Selection-relative alignment

These three buttons align all selected layers relative to each other — the bounding box of the whole selection acts as the reference.

Align top — moves every selected layer so its top edge matches the topmost layer in the selection.
Align vertical center — centers all selected layers on the same horizontal midpoint.
Align bottom — moves every selected layer so its bottom edge matches the bottommost layer.

Canvas-relative alignment

These three buttons align layers to the canvas itself, regardless of where the selection sits.

Align top to canvas — snaps the top edge of every selected layer to the top of the canvas (y = 0).
Align center to canvas — centers each selected layer on the canvas's vertical midpoint.
Align bottom to canvas — snaps the bottom edge of every selected layer to the canvas bottom.

Canvas-relative alignment moves each layer individually, so all layers end up at the same canvas-relative position. Use selection-relative alignment when you want to move a group of layers together while keeping their spacing intact.

Distribute horizontally

The Distribute horizontally button spaces selected layers evenly from left to right. It requires at least three layers selected; the button is grayed out when fewer than three are selected.

Select three or more layers.
Click Distribute horizontally in the toolbar.

The leftmost and rightmost layers stay where they are; the layers between them are repositioned so the gaps between them are equal.

Selection is preserved after every operation

After any alignment or distribution operation, your selection stays active. You can chain multiple operations — for example, align top and then distribute horizontally — without re-selecting layers between steps. To deselect, click an empty area of the canvas.

Team Distribute and face-specific tools

The toolbar also includes Team Distribute (spaces player photos while applying a vertical arc), Face Align (lines up detected faces across photos), Arrange by height, and Normalize widths. These are covered in detail in Building a team photo layout, since they work specifically with photos that have detected faces.