Cursive X (Capital & Lowercase)

How to Write a Capital X in Cursive

1. Start with a hook at the top. Begin just below the top line on the left, make a small curl up to the top line and roll over to the right.
2. Slant down to the baseline. From the top of the curl, pull a long stroke down toward the center of the letter, following your usual slant.
3. Turn up at the foot. Round off on the baseline and swing up to the right in a short upturn. This is the end of the first stroke.
4. Lift for the cross stroke. Place your pencil on the top line to the right of the hook and draw one straight, slanted line down to the baseline on the left.
5. Cross near the middle. The straight line should cut through the curved stroke a little below the midline, so the X looks balanced.

How to Write a Lowercase x in Cursive

1. Make a small hump. From the previous letter or a short entry, arrive at the midline and roll over the top in a little hump, like the start of an n.
2. Slant down. Pull straight down from the hump to the baseline.
3. Exit from the foot. Curve up to the right off the baseline. This exit joins the next letter.
4. Finish the word first. Like a t, the x needs a second stroke. Many writers finish the word and come back to it.
5. Add the cross. Draw a short straight stroke from the midline on the right down to the baseline on the left, crossing the downstroke in the middle.

Common Mistakes With Cursive X

The x is rare in English, so most people get little practice with it. These are the usual problems.

• Writing two straight lines. A printed X looks stiff in cursive. The first stroke should be curved, with a hook at the top and a foot at the bottom.
• Crossing in the wrong direction. The cross stroke runs from top right to bottom left. Going the other way leaves it parallel to your slant and the letter loses its shape.
• Forgetting the cross. An uncrossed lowercase x looks like an n missing its second hump.
• Crossing too high. If the straight line meets the curve near the top, the x looks like a lopsided k or a y without a tail.
• Joining from the cross. The connection to the next letter comes from the foot of the curved stroke, not from the end of the straight line.
• A lowercase x that's too wide. Keep it about as wide as an n. Wide x's push the letters around them apart.

How Cursive X Connects to Other Letters

In this traditional style the capital X joins the next letter. The upturn at the foot of the curved stroke runs straight into the following letter, as in Xavier and Xena. Add the straight cross stroke before you move on, or come back to it at the end of the word.

The lowercase x joins on both sides through its curved stroke. The connecting stroke from the previous letter rises into the hump and the foot leads out of it, as in taxi. The straight cross is always a separate stroke.

After o, w, v and b the bridge arrives at the midline and goes straight into the hump of the x, as you can see in box. Keep that bridge level so the hump starts at the right height.

Copy and Paste Cursive X Symbols

These X symbols are Unicode script characters that look handwritten. They paste into almost any profile or chat, but each is its own character, so they won't link the way joined cursive does.

• 𝒳ℴ𝓍ℴCopy
• 𝒳𝒶𝓋𝒾ℯ𝓇Copy
• 𝒳ℯ𝓃𝒾𝒶Copy
• 𝒳 ℳ𝒶𝓇𝓀𝓈 𝒯𝒽ℯ 𝒮𝓅ℴ𝓉Copy

Words That Start With X

Very few English words start with x, so most of your cursive x practice will happen in the middle or at the end of words.

• Words that start with x: xylophone, xenon, xylem, x-ray, xenial
• Ending in x: box, fox, six, wax, mix, fix, relax, index
• Middle x: taxi, next, extra, exit, oxygen, mixer, texture, sixty
• Names and places: Xavier, Xena, Xander, Ximena, Xiamen, Max, Alex, Phoenix

Practice the capital X with names like Xavier. It's one of the few times you'll actually write it outside of a worksheet.