by Perspective drawing tools are a short list. The ones below are grouped by what they solve, from the pencil and straightedge every beginner already owns, through the rolling rulers and ellipse guides that draughtsmen used for a century, to the digital perspective drawing tools that replace most of the rest.
The basics
Pencil. An HB or 2H mechanical pencil (0.5 mm) keeps construction lines light and consistent. Construction lines should be barely visible; you erase most of them.
Paper. Printer paper is fine for practice. Tracing paper or vellum is the secret weapon: put it over a grid or a rough block-in and draw the clean version on top, so you never erase a good line to fix a bad one.
Eraser. A kneaded eraser lightens construction lines without removing them; a plastic eraser removes them.
Straightedge. Long is better than short. A 45 cm ruler reaches vanishing points that a 15 cm one cannot.
Drafting instruments
T-square and triangles. A T-square keeps horizontals true (the horizon must be dead level); 30/60 and 45 triangles give reliable verticals and standard angles. This is the classical architecture-school kit and still the fastest way to draw clean construction on a board.
Rolling ruler. A ruler on a roller that stays parallel as it moves. Superb for verticals in one- and two-point perspective and for hatching. Not useful for lines that converge.
Ellipse guides. Circles in perspective are ellipses. A set of ellipse templates (10° to 60°) lets you draw wheels, cups and arches cleanly. Match the ellipse angle to how far the circle is from your eye level.
French curves and flexible curves. For arcs that are not ellipses, including the curves of a curvilinear grid drawn by hand.
Solving the off-page vanishing point
Two-point perspective at a normal lens puts the vanishing points well outside the paper. Three ways to handle it:
Extend the desk. Tape the drawing to a larger sheet and mark the vanishing points on that. Simple, and what most students do.
The string method. Push a pin into the desk where the vanishing point would be and tie a thread to it. Stretch the thread across the drawing and rule along it. Two pins give you two-point perspective anywhere on the sheet.
A printed grid. Print a grid from the 2-point generator at the rotation and lens you want and put it under tracing paper. The vanishing points are already accounted for, even when they are metres away.
Purpose-made perspective tools
Adjustable perspective rulers, perspective grid boards and "perspective machines" exist, and some are lovely objects. In practice they do the same job as a grid under tracing paper, with less flexibility about lens and angle. Buy one if you enjoy it; you do not need one.
Digital tools
Every major drawing app has a perspective feature, and they are covered in their own lessons: Photoshop's perspective tools, Illustrator's perspective grid, Clip Studio's perspective ruler, Affinity's perspective correction and Procreate's drawing guides. Plugins such as Perspective Tools 2 add camera-style grids to Photoshop; see the free alternative.
The grids on this site sit underneath all of them. Generate a grid with a real lens and rotation, export a transparent PNG or SVG, and use it in whatever app or on whatever paper you already have.
Tools are not techniques
The word "tools" in perspective also gets used for the visual cues that create depth without any construction: overlap, diminishing size, convergence, atmospheric fading, sharper detail up close. Those are worth learning separately, because they work in loose sketches where you would never draw a grid. Start with the basics lesson for the construction side.
Questions
What is the minimum kit for perspective drawing?
A pencil, paper, an eraser and a long straightedge. Everything else speeds things up but changes nothing about the drawing.
How do I draw lines to a vanishing point that is off the page?
Tape extra paper beside the drawing, or use the string method: pin a thread at the vanishing point's position on the desk and use the stretched thread as a ruler. Digitally, a grid generator draws the lines for you.
Are perspective rulers worth buying?
A rolling ruler is worth it if you draw a lot of parallel lines by hand. Purpose-made perspective rulers are rarely better than a printed grid under tracing paper, which costs nothing.