Experience the next generation in PCB Design. More than 40 years in the making OrCAD X is the design platform of choice for teams looking to maximize productivity and value.
OrCAD X is built to accelerate your PCB design process from schematic capture through PCB layout and simulation to seamless error-free manufacture.
Design entry powered by the world’s most used schematic capture solution, OrCAD X Capture. Used on countless designs across all industries and levels of complexity, OrCAD X Capture provides the perfect mix of ease of use and functionality to support your design requirements.
Quickly create clear and concise multi-page, hierarchical schematics with ease. Compare versions, generate bill of materials (BOM), and create PDF documentation at the touch of a button.
Always know what changed with seamless sync of data between logical and physical. Integrated simulation engines let you perform analysis inside your schematic design environment, preventing rework and data loss.
Say goodbye to late-stage design changes with instant design feedback. Easily define and validate your design intent with real-time design rules checks, constraint definition, and pre-layout SI analysis. Then, seamlessly pass this data along to implementation—setting you up for design success right from the start.
Be productive immediately with access to millions of popular CAD symbols footprints, and 3D models directly within the software. Libraries are the last thing you want to worry about and with OrCAD X, you no longer have to.
Over half of PCB design cycle time can be spent in placement and routing. Complete even your most complex designs with accuracy and speed using the industry’s leading PCB implementation solution and see how PCB design is meant to be.
Built on the Allegro X PCB Editor architecture results in an unmatched placement and routing experience. 64-bit performance, real-time updates and feedback, intuitive interactive and automated routing, as well as comprehensive rules and route guidance support give you the tools needed to complete your designs fast and with confidence.
Don’t wait until the end of the project to find all the issues you need to fix and change. Get instant feedback as you design with on-canvas guidance and notifications, so you can solve issues before they have a chance to become an ECO.
View, manipulate, and evaluate your design in 3D right from within the PCB design platform. Identify collisions, see how your design performs during flex bends, and view the effects of mechanical elements such as heat sinks and enclosures in realistic 3D. Quickly adjust and see changes update instantly.
As your needs grow, so can your design tool. Our unique, scalable architecture allows you to seamlessly add capabilities like advanced routing and team design as needed, all leveraging the same data model eliminating any needs for translation. Maintain full data integrity and seamlessly share data with others using previous versions, OrCAD X, or Allegro X.
Know your design is ready for production with our complete set of analysis and simulation options. Run thousands of design scenarios, identify, and fix issues before the first physical prototype is ever produced.
Analyze your data where it is. Cadence analysis is deeply connected to the PCB design platform to provide quick and accurate analysis so you can easily take action. No clunky translation or time spent pushing data between tools.
Easily visualize and identify the impact of your analysis results. From improving yield and identifying parts likely to fail to displaying results of multi-gigabit simulations, you will have the guidance you need to make the right decision based on your simulations.
Analyze your design at all stages of the process. Identify optimizations and test design alternatives early where the cost of change is lowest. Then take advantage of our unmatched accuracy and capacity to perform final sign-off and verification, all in one platform.
Leverage a full suite of analysis engines and explore all aspects of your design from analog mixed-signal, signal integrity, power integrity, and even thermal affects. Mix and match engines easily to meet your design requirements and move to production with confidence.
Sending your design to production can be a tense experience. Many have come to expect manufacturing changes and issues to happen, slowing the design cycle and often leading to long nights and weekends for the engineering team. It doesn’t have to be that way. Go to manufacturing with confidence knowing you have been checking for manufacturing issues along the way with our real-time DFM checking and rules support.
If you can’t build it, you can’t release it. Leverage real-time DFx (manufacturing, test, fabrication, and assembly) checks as you design and get instant feedback if a potential manufacturing issue will occur. Easily bring your manufacturing partners’ design rules into your design and build a true, correct-by-construction flow by checking your design against your intended manufacturing line as you go.
Generating the correct files and providing accurate and clear documentation is critical for design success. With OrCAD X, ensure a smooth manufacturing process without manual effort by automatically generating your design documentation and manufacturing output files.
Ensure fit and function by seamlessly synchronizing your design with mechanical before you build. Easily communicate and track changes between ECAD and MCAD so everyone is on the same page and your project is on track for success. Managing the electrical requirements in the context of your mechanical constraints can be a significant challenge especially when you don’t always have a full or up-to-date picture of the mechanical enclosure and environment. MCADX enables on-demand collaboration between OrCAD X and SOLIDWORKS
Automate and enhance your documentation process with a real-time templated approach to artwork and drawings. With LiveDoc it’s easy to complete your manufacturing documentation quickly through pre-configured templates of common views, pre-populated fabrication and assembly drawings, efficient dimensioning, and access to frequently used objects such as revision blocks and drill charts. Any changes made in the PCB canvas are automatically updated in the manufacturing documentation in real-time, eliminating errors.
Keeping track of design revisions, managing part availability, compliance, and updating your PLM can seem like another job. OrCAD X provides automated capabilities to handle these necessary tasks quickly and efficiently without having to leave your CAD environment.Â
Effortlessly manage your libraries with access to OrCAD CIS library management either on premise or in the Cadence cloud. Enable your teams to seamlessly share, manage, and leverage a single source of truth for your part libraries. Get rid of the needless email chains and finger pointing to try and figure out who changed what when. Easily manage files, design revisions, and complete design version history at your fingertips.Â
When working in a team, ensuring everyone is on the same page is critical. Effectively collaborate with quick and easy definition of project responsibilities and access, and seamless communication among multiple team members with embedded design review and markup. Accelerate the PCB layout with Symphony in OrCAD X Presto. This cloud-based collaboration allows two users to simultaneously design in the same database. Both users are visible in the design and the PCB is updated in real-time, creating a concurrent team design environment to layout, route, analyze, and review the PCB efficiently.
Reduce errors and remove redundancy through a shared library that can be accessed by your entire engineering team. Augment component library data with part pricing, availability and lead times, and automatically update your projects as data changes. Make your part library a competitive advantage not a design challenge. Identify supply chain risks early in the design process with access to up-to-date data on regulatory compliance, lead times, costs, risk predictions, lifecycle, and more for millions of parts. Ensure your products will breeze through manufacturing and be able to stand the test of time with built-in supply chain insights.
Your design is often part of a whole and as such, will need to be managed in a company PLM system or similar. Easily synchronize your design data with PLM and surface contextual data from PLM such as corporate-approved part numbers directly in your CAD tool and ensure a smooth transition to production.
Solve your tough design challenges with the advanced features and flows in OrCAD X
OrCAD X is consistently being improved with major new features added every year.
Get instant access to our library of training and how-to materials to help you get up to speed quickly.
Choose the OrCAD X PCB Suite that best fits your design needs today with the ability to seamlessly scale tomorrow for increased capability when you require it.
Need help choosing? Contact us and we would be happy to answer any questions.
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Over 30 years’ experience helping engineers design, validate, and build hardware successfully.
OrCAD X is the next generation of OrCAD and as such is built on and contains all that is OrCAD today and expands on it with entirely new user experiences and functionality geared to help designers tackle the next generation of design challenges with confidence. OrCAD X gives you access to all the tools you have with OrCAD now so that you can leverage what works best for you and make decisions on which capability and UX to use when for yourself. The goal is to provide you with truly game changing technology, but we do not want to assume on your ability or timelines for adopting these new tools.
You can visit our release history to get more details about the capabilities being added in this release. OrCAD X is on an annual major release cadence with patch releases pushed out throughout the year.
OrCAD users who are active on maintenance are able to seamlessly upgrade to OrCAD X! Please contact us and we will contact you to get the process started.
Yes! Unlike other vendors that require you to all have the same tier software regardless of your individual license and functionality needs OrCAD X allows you full freedom to select the combination of products and licenses you need all while maintaining full file and library compatibility for maximum collaboration and reuse. This also extends to Allegro X allowing for a wholistic design environment across your entire organization.Â
Yes! OrCAD X comes with importers for popular CAD formats making it easy to transition your designs and libraries should you choose to. We also offer migration services if you are looking for a white glove approach to your transition.
No. Cloud use is not required and is entirely optional. If you workflows or security requirements do not allow usage of an external cloud environment you can leverage OrCAD X without any cloud connection at all. If you are able and do want to leverage the cloud to help speed up workflows and collaboration you can learn more about the cloud solutions here.
Yes! Since OrCAD is fully compatible and scalable to Allegro and OrCAD X is fully compatible with OrCAD, you can seamlessly share designs and data with counterparts using the Allegro /Â Allegro XÂ platform.
Yes! You can request a free 30 day trial or contact us and we’d be happy to get you setup.
OrCAD X Supports Windows 10 and Windows 11. For full hardware specs you can view the current hardware requirements (link). If you are looking for Linux support, Allegro X offers both Windows and Linux support.
Yes. We offer multiple license types to help best match your needs. License options for OrCAD X can broken down in the following categories:
License Term | Access | Description |
Perpetual | Floating | Shared license that can be accessed by any user (1 user per license concurrently). License is valid for 99 years with the option to purchase support annually for technical support and product updates. |
Time-Based | Floating | Shared license that can be accessed by any user (1 user per license concurrently). License is valid for a specified period (usually 1-3 years) with support and product updates included during the term the license is active. |
Time-Based | Single-User | Named user license that can be installed and accessed on up to 5 computers. License is authorized for use by specific user. |
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*Additional options are available for users wanting to share license access across regions (WAN).
While OrCAD X is designed to be intuitive and easy to use from the start, we offer a full set of training courses to help users get to up to speed quickly and effectively. From on-site instructor-led courses to free on-demand training we have what you need to make sure you are getting the most out of your software investment. Visit the EMA Academy to learn more about training and learning resources.
Yes, we do! Students are eligible to receive free access to OrCAD to use as part of their studies. We also offer free training, sample curriculum, and license for use in labs and classroom settings. You can learn more about our university and educational programs here.
Yes. We do have programs and offers to help startups and new business get access to the design tools they can grow with. Contact us for more details to see if you qualify.
Yes. You can always download and run older versions as needed as part of your license. Files are cross version compatible allowing to work with users on different revisions if needed as well.
Yes. We offer an extensive list of integrations to other tools, PLMs, and systems. You can also build your own with the extensive scripting environment available. Let us know if you have specific connections, you are looking for or would be interested in our team helping with custom integration services.
