Watermark on Prints and How to Remove It

Some VisionPlan prints carry a faint diagonal watermark — repeating text rotated about 30 degrees across the floor plan, light enough that the drawing stays usable but visible enough that anyone reading the sheet knows it's a draft from a free-tier account. This article covers who sees it, why, and the three paths to a clean print.

Who sees the watermark

The watermark is gated server-side. You see it only when your account state is free-tier with watermarks enabled — in practice, that's a small segment of users with legacy scraped accounts that haven't upgraded.

Most users never see the watermark. Specifically, you don't see it if:

• Your account has the $69 / year annual upgrade (covers every project).
• Your account has a $9.99 per-project unlock for the project you're printing.
• You signed in through a Construction Network membership.
• You're not signed in (the engine fails open — no watermark when entitlements can't be confirmed).

If you're seeing a watermark and aren't sure why, the Remove watermark row in the Print dialog tells you it's active on this project. If the row isn't there, you're already clean.

What the watermark looks like

The watermark is a brick-grid of repeating text labels:

• About 14 pt.
• Rotated -30°.
• Spaced roughly 110 mm apart on the sheet.
• Set at low opacity (server-controlled, around 7% by default for the Lucidchart-light calibration).
• The text comes from the server — typically "VisionPlan free tier" or, for users signed in through a network, the network's name folded in.

It covers only the floor plan section's drawing area — it doesn't repeat across the title block or the schedule sections. The watermark is visible enough that a contractor reading the print can tell at a glance it's from a free-tier account, and light enough that they can still read every dimension and label underneath.

How to remove it

The Print dialog is the entry point. When the watermark is active for the project you're printing, a Watermark row appears in the dialog with a Switch indicator. Tap the Switch to open a small prompt that lays out three paths:

Option 1 — Unlock this project for $9.99

A one-time per-project unlock. The watermark disappears from this specific project, on every device, forever. Future projects still carry the watermark unless you unlock them individually or upgrade the whole account.

This is the cheapest path and the right answer when you only want to ship one or two clean prints. Tap the option, the prompt closes, and your browser opens the upgrade page with the project context already passed through so the per-project unlock is the leading option.

Option 2 — Unlock the account for $69 / year

The annual subscription. Every project on your account becomes watermark-free for the year. This is the right path for active users who'll ship multiple plans over the year.

Option 3 — Construction Network membership

If you're a network member, the watermark is included in your membership — no extra purchase needed. Tap this option to confirm or learn more.

The prompt also has a Cancel button at the bottom that closes everything without sending you anywhere.

After you pay

The upgrade page handles the payment, then returns you to the editor. The next print pulls fresh entitlements from the server — the watermark drops from the Print dialog (the Watermark row disappears) and the next PDF you generate is clean.

You don't need to reload the page. The entitlements refresh is automatic at the end of each print run, so a successful upgrade lands in time for the next print.

If the watermark is still showing after an upgrade, close the dialog and reopen it — the freshest entitlements load when the dialog reopens.

Mode awareness

The watermark text is the same in both Customer and Contractor mode. It reflects your account state, not your current app mode. So switching modes doesn't change whether the watermark shows or how it reads.

The per-project unlock is also mode-agnostic — it's tied to the project, not to the mode you were in when you bought it.

Canvas vs print

The watermark also renders on the editor canvas as an overlay when it's active — same diagonal repeating pattern, same opacity, same gating logic. So you can see whether your account is watermarked just by looking at the canvas before you ever open the Print dialog.

The canvas overlay and the print watermark are driven from the same server flag — they turn on and off together.

What the watermark doesn't affect

• The accuracy of the drawing.
• The accuracy of dimensions, schedules, or the title block.
• Your ability to print or save as PDF (no feature gating beyond the watermark itself).
• Layer visibility, scale, paper size, or any other dialog setting.

Free-tier prints are full-functionality prints. The watermark is the only visible difference.

What's NOT a path to removing it

A few things you might try that won't work:

• Toggling the Switch in the dialog — the Switch doesn't actually flip off; tapping it opens the upgrade prompt instead. You'll see the Switch return to ON immediately. This is intentional — the only path to a clean print is through one of the three options.
• Turning off layers or sections — the watermark renders on the floor plan section regardless of which layers are visible. Hiding everything else doesn't hide the watermark.
• Saving as PDF instead of Print — both delivery paths use the same render pipeline; the watermark is in the PDF either way.
• Switching app mode — the watermark is gated on account state, not mode.

Tips

• For a one-off "let me ship this clean to a single client" job, the $9.99 per-project unlock is the right tool. It's permanent for that project — no expiry.
• The annual upgrade pays back in less than three projects. If you ship plans even occasionally, it's the cleaner ongoing answer.
• If you're already a Construction Network member and still seeing the watermark, sign out and sign back in so the entitlements refresh — the network gate is server-side, but the local entitlements cache may be stale.
• After upgrading, the entitlements refresh happens at the end of the print run that triggered it. So your first post-upgrade print may still carry the watermark; the second one will be clean. Some users prefer to make a deliberate throwaway print right after upgrading just to clear the entitlements state.
• The watermark is purely a print-output concern — it has no effect on saved project data, sharing, or any other workflow. Your underlying project is the same whether the watermark is on or off.

Related

• How to print a plan
• Print dialog sections
• Show business info on print