Crochet Stitch Diagram Chart
Motif, doily, and granny square patterns are often drawn as diagrams instead of written row by row. Here's what each symbol actually means.
Symbol key
| Symbol | Stitch | Abbr. |
|---|---|---|
| Chain | ch | |
| Slip stitch | sl st | |
| Single crochet | sc | |
| Half double crochet | hdc | |
| Double crochet | dc | |
| Treble (triple) crochet | tr | |
| Double treble crochet | dtr |
Why the symbols look the way they do
The system is built around one visual rule: the taller the stitch, the more crossbars its symbol gets. A double crochet's symbol is a vertical line with one crossbar, treble gets two, double treble gets three — matching the "yarn over N times before inserting the hook" rule that also governs how each of those stitches is actually worked. Once that pattern clicks, you can often guess an unfamiliar tall stitch's symbol correctly before ever looking it up, just by counting crossbars. Chain and slip stitch break the pattern because they don't have height in the same sense — chain is drawn as an oval because that's roughly the shape a chain stitch actually makes lying flat, and slip stitch is a simple dot because it's the smallest, flattest stitch of all.
Reading direction in a diagram
A round worked in the round (a granny square, a doily, an amigurumi base) is read the same direction the stitches were worked — typically counterclockwise for right-handed crocheters, starting from the center and moving outward round by round. Flat diagrams worked in rows are read the same way written patterns alternate: right to left for a right-side row, left to right for the next row, mirroring how you'd actually turn your work at the end of each row.
Where diagrams shine over written instructions
A written pattern for a complex doily or lace motif can run to dozens of lines of repeats-within-repeats that are genuinely hard to hold in your head; a diagram shows the whole repeat visually in one glance, including exactly which stitches share a base stitch (a common source of confusion in written shell or cluster patterns). Once you're comfortable with the symbol key above, many crocheters find diagrams easier to follow for exactly that reason — even though every diagram symbol maps to one of the same stitches in our Crochet Stitch Guide.