New in Altium Designer
This page details the improvements included in the initial release of Altium Designer 25, as well as those added in subsequent updates. Along with delivering a range of improvements that develop and mature the existing technologies, each update also incorporates a large number of fixes and enhancements across the software based on feedback raised by customers through the AltiumLive Community's BugCrunch system, helping you continue to create cutting-edge electronics technology.
Altium Designer 25.0
Released: 12 November 2024 – Version 25.0.2 (build 28)
Release Notes for Altium Designer
PCB CoDesign Improvement
Added Ability to Revert Merged Changes
The 
control has been added to the PCB CoDesign panel. This control appears in the panel after performing a successful merge and allows you to revert merge results if needed.
For more information, refer to the PCB CoDesign page.
Constraint Manager Improvements
Updated Directive Import Process
The ability to import data from directives to the Constraint Manager has been made part of the refresh functionality. When clicking the 
button in the Constraint Manager, the Refresh Constraint Manager dialog with a summary of the import opens. Complete the import by clicking the 
button in the dialog.
Detecting Changes within Net Classes, Diff Pairs, and Diff Pair Classes
Changes within net classes, differential pairs, and differential pair classes (new/removed elements) imported from directives before are now detected, with an indication of any inconsistencies requiring synchronization (between schematics and Constraint Manager) with an orange bar at the left of the corresponding object name.
For more information, refer to the Defining Design Requirements Using the Constraint Manager page.
Wire Bonding Improvements
Enhanced Placement of Die Pads on Overlapped 3D Bodies
Die pads are now bound, by height, to the 3D body they are placed on instead of the highest 3D body in the die pad location. This allows die pads to remain on the surface of the correct 3D body when there are multiple 3D bodies in the same location (for example, when the PCB is covered by an enclosure).
If there is more than one 3D body in the die pad placement location, you can now select the required 3D body on which the pad needs to be placed from the set of overlapping bodies.
|
Placing a die pad in a location where multiple 3D bodies overlap. In this case, a popup selection dialog appears so you can choose a 3D body, to which the pad needs to be bound. In 3D, you can see that the die pad is on the surface of the chosen 3D body. |
For more information, refer to the Wire Bonding page.
Enhanced Sorting in a Wire Bonding Table Report
Sorting in a wire bonding table report has been enhanced. Now entries in the table are ordered as follows:
-
First, bond wires that start from component primitives are listed. Entries within this group are sorted alphabetically by component designators and then by pad designators.
-
Then, bond wires that start from free primitives and end on component primitives are listed. Entries within this group are sorted alphabetically by primitive names and/or designators.
-
Then, bond wires that start from and end on free primitives are listed. Entries within this group are also sorted alphabetically.
For more information, refer to the Wire Bonding page.
Multi-board Design Improvements
Support for External Peripherals/Components (Open Beta)
This release extends the functionality of the multi-board design arena to provide for external peripherals/components that are not part of the regular child PCB board assemblies (i.e. ‘non-PCB’ components). This could include, for example, external switches, sensors, and any other off-the-shelf, third-party electronic modules.
The multi-board schematic document (*.MbsDoc) facilitates this capability with support for two new object types:
-
Custom Part – a module-like entity that provides the ability to link one or more library components and that is added to the multi-board schematic document using the Place » Custom Part command from the main menus or the Custom Part command from the Active Bar. An entry is automatically added for each linked component.
-
Custom Connection – provides the ability to add a single library component to the multi-board schematic document by dragging and dropping the required component from the Components panel into free space on the sheet. An entry is automatically added for each pin of the component.
Note that you also have the ability to create a custom symbol for a component specifically for use with a multi-board schematic document. Adding comma-separated names to the Name field of a pin’s properties enables you to group multiple pins into entries, essentially creating visually cleaner symbols with fewer entries, making the connection of such components far more streamlined.
When editing a schematic symbol, add multiple comma-separated names to the Name field of a pin.
When the component is added to a custom part in a multi-board schematic, an entry for each component pin will be created instead of a single entry for the component, and entries with multiple pins will be created.
When the component is placed in a multi-board schematic as a custom connection, entries with multiple pins will be created.
Library components are those available from your connected Workspace and available local libraries. Once placed/defined, you can connect the components to your wider design, for example, using cable and harness connections.
The result is that all elements of the overall system are accounted for and their connections are properly documented. This provides a complete ‘system diagram’ within the single location of your multi-board schematic document, making the previous time-consuming workaround of making ‘dummy’ child PCBs to attain such functionality a thing of the past.
For more information, refer to the Capturing the Logical System Design page.
Add Comments to Draftsman Documents
The ability to add comments to a Multi-board Draftsman document (*.MbDwf) has been added. Comments can be added using the controls as in other document types (e.g., Place menu, 
button, etc.).
For more information, refer to the Document Commenting page.
Harness Design Improvement
Override Calculated Wire Length
You can now override the calculated length for a wire on the Layout Drawing (*.LdrDoc). Enter the required Offset Length in the Properties panel, or choose Manual in the drop-down in Length Type to manually define the required absolute length.
For wires whose length was defined in an MCAD tool and then pulled into Altium Designer using the MCAD CoDesigner, the MCAD CoDesigner entry will be shown in the Length Type entry. In this case, the Offset Length cannot be defined but you can override the length value by selecting Manual from the drop-down (
).
For more information, refer to the Creating the Layout Drawing page.
Data Management Improvements
Open Project Dialog Enhancements for non-Altium Designer Projects
In this release, the Open Project dialog has been enhanced to provide better support for non-Altium Designer projects uploaded to the connected Altium 365 Workspace (OrCAD, KiCad, and EAGLE projects).
-
Non-Altium Designer project entries in the dialog's main grid area are now accompanied by corresponding icons and labeled with the Web Viewer Only text.
-
When a non-Altium Designer project entry is selected, the right-hand side pane of the dialog now shows a message that this project can only be opened in the Web Viewer, which can be done using a new
button at the bottom of the dialog.
For more information, refer to the Opening Projects and Documents page.
Propagating Variant Parameters to Released Assembly Data
When releasing a PCB project using the Project Releaser, parameters defined for project variants are now included in the corresponding revisions of assembly data sets. These parameters can be browsed using the Explorer panel. When viewing a project in the Classic View, select the required assembly data set revision and switch to the Parameters aspect view tab to see the variant parameters.
|
The variant When viewing the assembly data set revision for this variant in the Explorer panel, this parameter is shown on the Parameters aspect view tab. |
For more information, refer to the Releasing to a Workspace page.
Features Made Fully Public in Altium Designer 25.0
The following features are now officially Public with this release:
-
Project Releaser for Harness Designs - available from 24.9
-
Single Layer PCB Support - available from 24.8
-
Predefined Donut Pad Shapes - available from 24.8
-
Updated License Management UI - available from 23.8