Updated: June 15, 2023
What we love about Adobe Character Animator is that you have full control over the character through sync. Instead of animating the mouth frame by frame, the puppet lip syncs your voice and follows your facial expression and movement. Additionally, you can move the puppet’s hands by mouse to make it perform hand gestures, and soon the highly requested full-body tracker will be also available. To celebrate the great news, today we collected the 63 best free Character Animator puppets 2021 that you can download, import into your software, and start animating like a pro.
We included our best picks from great creators like Okay Samurai, from Adobe themselves, as well as our exclusive for 2021 free puppets that were made for this collection article specifically.
Article overview:
- Free Puppets by Cartoons.co
- Exclusive Free Character Animator Puppets by Graphic Mama
- Graphic Mama’s Most Popular Free Character Animator Puppets
- Best Free Character Animator Puppets by Adobe
- Top Popular Free Puppets from Other Creators
- Other Free Adobe Character Animator Resources
Related: Do you know that you can officially get Adobe Character Animator for free? Learn more about the new, free version.
Best Free Character Animator Puppets by Cartoons.co
Cartoons.co is a new service focused on cartoon characters available in different formats and their Character Puppets section is outstanding. Designed in super high quality, their 100+ premade animated puppets will help you step up to the next level of professional animated videos. In addition, you will find over 20 puppets available for free personal use.
1. Free Plus Size Character Animator Puppet
This charming plus-size young girl puppet with sportswear can be used for free in your personal projects. The cute female character includes lip-syncing, triggers, and draggers to help you make animations easily in Character Animator.
Go to FREE DOWNLOAD2. Free Super Hero Boy Character Animator Puppet
A charming superhero boy puppet designed with lots of details and a fresh color scheme, that can easily grab the attention of your young audience. This inspirational character puppet can be used for free in personal projects.
Go to FREE DOWNLOAD3. Free Koala Character Animator Puppet
A charming furry cartoon koala coming right from Australia to enhance your Character Animator based videos. This cute little animal puppet is great for adventure animations and can be used freely in your personal projects.
Go to FREE DOWNLOAD4. Free Star Character Animator Puppet
This funny yellow star character is here to increase the stars in your animated videos. It is super charming and adorable and can’t wait to become part of your animations.
Go to FREE DOWNLOAD5. Free African-American Superhero Kid Puppet
A cute young African-American girl child dressed as a superhero prepared as a fully-functional puppet for Adobe Character Animator. Including lip-sync, draggers, and triggers, this puppet is ready to be animated right away.
Go to FREE DOWNLOAD6. Free Mechanic Car Character Animator Puppet
There aren’t many cars prepared as puppets for Adobe Character Animator, and with that being said, this car puppet couldn’t be missed. Free for personal usage and rigged with triggers, draggers, and lip-sync functions, you can make unique animations from now on.
Go to FREE DOWNLOAD7. Horse Adobe Character Animator Puppet Template
A funny blue horse animated puppet, that is rigged with all essential features and ready to be used for free in your personal projects.
Free Download8. Ghost Adobe Character Animator Puppet Template
Cute animated ghost puppet who loves to listen to music and have fun. This friendly ghost can be used for free in your personal animations.
Free Download9. Rocket Adobe Character Animator Puppet Template
A cool rocket character prepared as a ready-to-use animated puppet for Character Animator. On top of that, it is completely free to use for your personal projects.
Free Download10. Supervillain Adobe Character Animator Puppet Template
Every story needs a bad hero, and this villain puppet is here to add some plot twists to your video animations for free.
Free Download11. Fat Cat Adobe Character Animator Puppet Template
This fluffy orange cat is prepared as a fully-functional free Character Animator puppet with included draggers, triggers and lip-sync functions.
Free Download12. Bomb Adobe Character Animator Puppet Template
For people who love more explosive action videos, here is a bomb character that will add suspense to your creative stories.
Free Download
Top Exclusive Free Puppets 2021 by Graphic Mama
Let’s start with these free puppets by Graphic Mama that you won’t find on our website but we still want to share with you.
You can directly download each character puppet you like (or all of them) and import them into Character Animator. They are base puppets, which means they come with pre-made gestures – waving, thumbs up, pointing, pre-built emotions, face-tracking, and lipsyncing function. They are prepared in vector format using Adobe Illustrator, and they are suitable for diverse, projects, and intuitive to work with.
- License: Standard /Free for Personal and Commercial Use
13. Free Business Boy Puppet
Base business boy free puppet with stylish office attire and glasses. He offers trigger actions for waving, pointing, thumbs-up, and one for a lightbulb that appears when he has a good idea.
Free Download14. Free Caveman Puppet
A very detailed basic free cartoon caveman character puppet with an epic unibrow that will bring a lot of fun to your videos. One of the triggers gives him a stone bat to wave around fiercely.
Free Download15. Free Cute Bear Puppet
Here we have a charming stylish sports-elegant bear character made into a free puppet with triggers for waving, thumbs-up, pointing, and for being indignant. Can’t bear the awesomeness. 🙂
Free Download16. Free Cute Tiger Puppet
A powerful-looking but quite friendly tiger cartoon character. This free puppet is quite diverse in terms of projects you can use it for. He has the hand triggers for waving, thumbs up, and pointing.
Free Download17. Free Fierce Viking Girl Puppet
We made this Viking puppet for the reason we love Vikings as much as everyone else. This fierce female warrior is equipped as a free basic puppet with all you need to rock your presentation.
Free Download18. Free Big Viking Puppet
With the female Viking, we also have the big boy as her sidekick. he’s big, strong and very friendly and will hold any project effortlessly. As usual, triggers for waving, pointing, and thumbs up.
Free Download19. Free Green Witch Puppet
This witchy basic puppet is animated to float on her broom to show constant movement while tracking your face and lipsyncing. She moves only one of her hands, so she wouldn’t fall off her ride.
Free Download20. Free Mighty Superhero Puppet
Sometimes, what a concept needs is a mighty superhero with a cool cape. So, here’s a powerful crime-fighter with a hidden identity behind a mask with laser eyes. This free basic puppet has everything packed.
Free Download21. Free Monk Character Puppet
The next free puppet is an Eastern monk that has special triggers relevant to his concept. For example, the monk has triggers for meditation and drawing out a cup of delicious tea.
Free Download22. Free Shark Puppet
Here’s Sharkboy. The lovable, friendly goofy free shark puppet will make you fall in love with him immediately. He floats, imitates underwater movement, and has thumbs up, waving, and pointing triggers for his fins.
Free Download23. Free Vintage Robot Puppet
This is a very cute, shy vintage robot puppet that rocks the retro-futuristic style as a character coming straight out of a SciFi movie from the 60s. Ideal for video presentations and streams about technology.
Free Download24. Free Businesswoman Puppet
This charming lady is a business strategist puppet and has rolled her sleeves to do some winning. Ideal for marketing presentations and explainer videos.
Free Download25. Free Superhero Girl Puppet
This female superhero, a free puppet packs beauty and power in one character. She floats in the air while performing her puppet duties to track your face and speech.
Free Download26. Free Octoberfest Waitress Puppet
And the last one of the exclusive free puppets we wanted to share is this Octoberfest-style waitress character with special triggers for pulling a menu and desserts.
Free Download
Graphic Mama’s Top Popular Free Character Animator Puppets 2021
In this section, you will find the most popular free puppets from our arsenal. Some have more advanced features like head turn and walking, so you’ll be able to make more versatile animations for your videos.
- License: Standard /Free for Personal and Commercial Use
27. Free Alex The Businessman Puppet
Alex the Businessman is a free puppet of an elegant young businessman character. Our most popular puppet for animations, explainer videos, and more. He has triggers for pointing, showcasing, giving thumbs-up, and waving. Alex can also hold a Notepad, Pointer, Pen, and an Envelope. Walking left/right and advanced head movements included.
Free Download
28. Free Business Lady Puppet
Business Lady is a stylish black businesswoman character, prepared as a puppet with additional features such as head turn and walking in from left and right The file is ready to import and use in Adobe Character Animator.
Free Download
29. Free Brad The Gingerbread Puppet
Brad the Gingerbread is the favorite of many. This very merry, free puppet template is ready to go with pre-made triggers. He can point, wave, give thumbs up, express emotions, and lip sync your holiday songs.
Free Download
30. Free Happy Chubby Fish Puppet
Happy Chubby Fish is a freebie cheerful and colorful fish character, you can use for animations, explainer videos, etc. He can make bubbles, flip his fin, show a sign, and talk.
Free Download
31. Free Papple The Penguin Puppet
Papple the Penguin can point, wave, give thumbs up, express emotions, and lip-sync your words. The sweet cubby puppet can also hold snowballs, so be careful!
Free Download
32. Free Mr. Geekson Puppet
Mr.Geekson is our geeky businessman character with glasses and a tie. He can point, showcase, give thumbs up and wave; he shows a variety of emotions and comes with accessories such as a pen, a notepad, and a pointer stick.
Free Download
33. Free Christmas Elf Puppet
This jolly fella, amongst all other obligatory triggers and emotions, has a list and a pencil… So, were you good this year?
Free Download
Best Free Character Animator Puppets 2021 by Adobe
Now we’ll go to the source and dig out the best free puppets Adobe has to offer. All are free to use however you want — no credit needed! Puppet files combine original artwork and animation rigging into one file.
34. Free Aerial Al Drone Flying Character Puppet
Created by Konee Rok, Aerial Al is a drone flying character sitting on a park bench. He comes with a beautiful, colorful background.
Free Download35. Free Platter Pirate Floating DJ Puppet
Again by Konee Rok, the next free puppet is a floating DJ character with audio triggers. His stuff is so much fire, they had to put him in the water.
Free Download36. Free Brooklyn Friends: Frenchie Puppet
A part of the Brooklin Buddies set, the Frenchie is a low-poly character, a free puppet with cycle-based head turns, walking, and background.
Free Download37. Free Al the Handy and Friendly Alien Puppet
An absolute classic by Look Creative Studios, Al the Alien is an expressive character with complex key triggers, worthy to check out.
Free Download38. Free Headless Horseman Puppet
The Headless Horseman is a free puppet with interesting triggers and mannerisms, part of the horror characters set by Ryan Boyle.
Free Download39. Free Stop Motion Style Maddie Puppet
Maddie by Athena Studios is a stop motion style character with a 3-view walk and dangle. Very realistic and beautiful free puppet.
Free Download40. Free Krognar The Viking Puppet
Back to the Vikings. Zookeper blesses us with this vector character turned into a puppet with breath, rotation dial arms, and cycle layers axe spins.
Free Download41. Free Neon Nikki Puppet
This unique puppet by Konee Rok is a girl-shaped neon sign character with flashing lights and glass-shattering animations to enjoy. Definitely check Niki out.
Free Download42. Free Sam the Superhero Girl Puppet
Here we have a flat-style little supergirl character called Sam. This free puppet by Keith Negley is equipped with a mask, dangling cape, and walking behavior.
Free Download43. Free Drumbot Character Puppet
The drumming robot from Okay Samurai’s Triggerable Audio tutorial can play sound effects when he hits parts of the drumset. His lights are also animated.
Free Download
Popular Free Character Animator Puppets 2021 from Other Creators
Here you will find amazing free puppets by other creators. Okay Samurai offers his puppets as free to use and edit these however you want – no credit needed. Make sure to check his entire collection. Please note that the download links lead directly to Okay Samurai’s direct download links and not from Graphic Mama. Now, with this out of the way, let’s enjoy some more cool puppets.
44. Free Little Lamby Puppet
A photographed stuffed animal turned into a simple puppet with a few replay poses.
Free Download45. Free Limb IK Pack Puppet
A multi-character pack showing what’s possible with Limb IK that includes 4 puppets.
Free Download46. Free Clay Stop Motion Character Puppet
Clay is a mesmerizing stop-motion character made from photographed modeling clay.
Free Download47. Free Eliza Watercolor Puppet
Made in watercolor, Eliza is a little girl with simple and three-view walking animations.
Free Download48. Free Narrator Dave Puppet
Dave is a character, perfect for streams, with parallax, eye, and mouth triggers.
Free Download49. Free Martin Guitarist Puppet
This musician character with hands you can move around the guitar is for your music videos.
Free Download50. Free Heller Puppet
Heller is a little kid with hair physics and triggered pupils, eyelids, and poses. Includes background.
Free Download51. Free Willy Puppet
Willy is an expressive bearded character with tons of triggers: arms, pupils, eyelids, eyebrows, and mouth.
Free Download52. Free Leeta Puppet
A dreamy papercraft-style character with face parallax, a physics hair system, and clipping masks.
Free Download53. Free Turner Bros Puppet
This puppet gives two examples of how to turn your characters’ heads: one with the Head Turner behavior, one using the Face behavior’s parallax.
Free Download54. Free Epic Hackbot Puppet
Can’t deny we’re very fond of robot characters, so we had to include this classic. It’s a pivoting nutcracker jaw robot hack bot with a great design.
Free Download55. Free Charlie the Dog Puppet
Charlie is a cartoon puppy character made into a puppet. He’s completely free, it requires registration and you will receive the pupper in the email.
Free Download56. Free Ethan Stick Figure Puppet
Ethan is a charming and playful stick figure puppet with different facial elements, 18 hand gestures, different accessories you can have fun with.
Free Download57. Free BucketJo Character Puppet
BucketJo can walk and perform different gestures. He comes with different facial elements, 18 hand gestures, and other accessories.
Free Download58. Nelson Character Free Puppet
Nelson comes with 5 premade facial expressions, 17 hand gestures, a set of glasses you can turn on and off with a keyboard click.
Free Download59. Drama at the Cookies Free Puppets
Have some fun and dramatic stop-motion-style cookies with epic clay months. Free to edit and use, require attribution by tag #dimitrithecookie.
Free Download60. Cute Free Magic Crayon Puppet with a Twist
The sweet free puppet crayon has a magic trick on its sleeve. You can use triggers to activate his flying sparkles and to change to different colors.
Free Download61. Free Space Robot Puppet
A free robot puppet with blinking eyes, draggable arms, and a customizable chest screen. You can add your own text to adapt it to your videos.
Free Download62. Free Generic Man Character Puppet
This free puppet template of a male character additionally has an editable shirt where you can put your logo or text remove it entirely.
Free Download63. Free Tutorial Puppet
This is a tutorial puppet with both the template man and the rabbit created in a tutorial by its creators, which you can check on the download page.
Free Download
Before we proceed with the additional free Character Animator resources, there are a few things we need to point out when working with puppets.
📝 NOTE: Since most of the downloads are .puppet files, you can still easily access the .psd or .ai source files, by selecting the free puppet and going to Edit / Edit Original .
📝 NOTE: Every puppet has a unique set of triggers for different hand positions (to point, wave, give thumbs up), and for the different emotions. Since there isn’t a specific standard, you can check each puppet’s triggers directly in Character Animator in the menu below the imported puppet.
Now, let’s jump right back to the good stuff.
Other Free Adobe Character Animator Resources
- Free Backgrounds for Your Adobe Character Animator Puppets
Another important detail of creating your videos with Character animator puppets is to find the perfect backgrounds for each scene. Here we collected editable vector backgrounds for Character Animator to suit your puppets and give an atmosphere to your videos. Most of the backgrounds are for free personal and commercial use.
- Free Mouth Shapes Sets
Everybody agrees with how important it is that the characters are expressive. If you’re in the process of creating your own animated character or editing an existing one, you can download these free mouth shape sets for Adobe Character Animator made by GraphicMama for achieving a well-animated lipsync function.
Final Words
We hope you picked a handful of awesome free puppets for your next project in 2021. Give them life, have fun and create epic videos and presentations.
In the meantime, you might be also interested in reading some of these related articles.
- 16 Tutorials to Master Adobe Character Animator
- What Can You Do With Adobe Character Animator: 30 Amazing Examples
- Beginners Guide to Adobe Character Animator
