When you just want to make a copy of an object within Inkscape, you can also use duplicate (Ctrl-D) rather than copy/paste (Ctrl-C/Ctrl-V) - Duplicate does not interact with the X11/OSX clipboards. It will not prevent copying text from OS X to X11. However, this will also prevent copying text from any X11 application to Mac OS X ones. You need to deactivate this functionality in X11 preferences > Pasteboard: uncheck “Update Pasteboard when CLIPBOARD changes”. It currently does not know how to deal with vector images, so it just captures the screen, i.e., creates a bitmap copy, and then pastes that. Starting with XQuartz 2.3.2, X11 has some functionality to exchange the content of the clipboard with OS X. Sure enough, a quick search took me to the inkscape FAQ, and this section in particular: After beating my head against a wall trying to create a pattern-on-path effect, I realized that there must be something wrong with the clipboard implementation on the mac.

I’ve always just resigned to use clone (ctrl-D) instead of copy/paste since on the mac, the copy/paste cycle results in a pixelated image being pasted into the document. Inkscape is my go-to vector editing program and I’ve done many publication figures, exam questions, and other general work in inkscape on both mac and linux.

Inkscape for mac osx