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Altium Designer

Professional PCB design software for schematics, layout, simulation and team collaboration.

PaidElectronics design software
Visit Altium DesignerSee 3 alternatives
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About Altium Designer

Altium Designer is a long-established professional tool for designing printed circuit boards and is widely used in industry. It puts schematic capture, PCB layout, SPICE simulation, signal-integrity analysis and manufacturing output in one environment built on a single data model, and it's strong on complex work: high-speed routing, HDI and rigid-flex boards, multi-board systems, harness design and constraint management. Through Altium's cloud platform, teams get version history, shared component libraries with supply-chain data, in-design comments and reviews, and several engineers editing the same board at once. Altium is now part of Renesas, and the software is sold as a subscription inside its Agile Teams and Agile Enterprise platforms, priced through sales; students can get access for free. It runs only on 64-bit Windows. For hobbyists and small teams, the cost is hard to justify when KiCad covers most needs.

Best for: Professional hardware teams designing complex, high-speed or rigid-flex boards.

Pros and cons

What works

  • Handles complex high-speed, HDI and rigid-flex designs
  • Schematic, layout and simulation share one data model
  • Cloud collaboration with version history and shared libraries
  • Widely used, so experienced designers are easy to find

Why people leave

  • Expensive subscription, priced through sales
  • Windows only
  • Overkill for hobby and simple boards

Top Altium Designer alternatives

See all 3
  1. 1KiCad logo
    KiCad

    Free and open source on every desktop OS, and capable enough for most professional boards.

    66.5
  2. 2EasyEDA logo
    EasyEDA

    Free and browser-based, with built-in part sourcing and ordering from JLCPCB.

    62.6
  3. 3Autodesk Fusion logo
    Autodesk Fusion

    Cheaper subscription that pairs PCB design with mechanical CAD in one tool.

    39.8

Why people left Altium Designer

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Reviews

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Altium Designer: common questions

Is Altium Designer free?

No, Altium Designer is a paid product.

Is Altium Designer open source?

No, Altium Designer is not open source. Open-source alternatives include KiCad.

What platforms does Altium Designer run on?

Altium Designer is available for Windows.

What are the best alternatives to Altium Designer?

The highest-ranked Altium Designer alternatives right now are KiCad, EasyEDA and Autodesk Fusion. See the full ranked list for pricing, platforms and verified facts.

See all 3 Altium Designer alternatives