Drawing Circles with set radius using QGIS

As commented by @Roy:

Drop a point (x,y), buffer the point 5km.

i.e. you could make a point in layer and then buffer it into a new layer.

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The workflow I have recently been using is to create the point in a Memory Layer, create the buffer into a shapefile saved in a temporary location, then copy and paste the polygon into the final layer. A bit long but works OK.

With mmqgis plugin you can convert your geometry type to centroids :

Plugins > mmqgis > modify > convert geometry type

And then just create buffers on shapes (through Vector > Geoprocessing tools) and precise the desired radius.

You got it

I did something similar - need to draw 5km circles around a set of points meeting some criteria. I solved the problem using styles:

1. Create a Symbology rule for the layer (in my case ": "field" is not null

2. For the symbol, define a 'Simple Marker"

   • Size 10000.0 (the size is diameter, not radius
   • Units, select "Meters at Scale"
   • Fill color: Transparent

Voila! A range ring at true map scale.

I'm using QGis 3.10, which is much newer than when this question was originally asked.