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Adobe XD August 2018 Update

over 5 years ago from , Design Product Marketing @ Adobe

Hi Everyone,

As follow up to the July release, we have a new update to XD with the following requested features from the community:

● Reorder Elements in the Assets panel

● Asset Extraction in design specs

● @mention support when commenting on prototypes and design specs

● Browser invite of user to prototypes and design specs

● Design Spec support for stroke types

To get the details on what’s new, check out the release post here. Also be sure to check out the latest features in action on AdobeLive starting today through August 23 from 9 AM - 5:00 PM PDT!

We’d love to hear what you think about this update! Please leave questions, comments, or suggestions below.

Thank you,

Mike from the XD Team

27 comments

  • Cristian MoiseiCristian Moisei, over 5 years ago

    Is there anything actually interesting on the roadmap? This product will be 2 years old soon and realistically, it's not doing much that Sketch or PS (in one way or another) can't do. I still use it for wireframes though.

    10 points
    • Vince SchwidderVince Schwidder, over 5 years ago

      Adobe XD has some advantages compared other tools, one of which is performance (yeah, I know you wouldn't expect this from an Adobe product). Their prototyping is also much better than Sketch's imo. They're catching up I guess.

      1 point
      • Cristian MoiseiCristian Moisei, over 5 years ago

        The performance does indeed blow Sketch and PS out the water, but if it can't do much, that's not of much use. Catching up is probably the right word here since that's all they seem to do, but there isn't really anything noticeable or unique that they added since the repeat grid in my opinion, and that was there since the beta.

        1 point
      • Max K, over 5 years ago

        Agree! Surprisingly, XD provides a smoother and snappier experience comparing to Sketch/Figma. I'm not sure if it really works quicker or if it's just my subjective feeling, but I did a couple of projects in XD, working in Sketch in parallel, and it made me believe that XD is a more refined and robust product performance-wise. At the same time, XD is still missing a lot of tiny, simple and (I thought) obvious features. It neutralizes any performance gain that I may have from the app speed.

        0 points
        • Mike ChambersMike Chambers, over 5 years ago

          Max,

          If you dont mind, what are some of the tiny / simple features you miss? We are working hard to take care of these.

          1 point
          • Quentin Lo Castro, over 5 years ago

            Hello Mike! For me it's little things like more options for text editing (All caps for exemple) , being able to flip an object, or having some blending option like in Photoshop or Sketch. Maybe some more vector editing option (Combine, substract two forms).

            It's getting there for me, and I find XD more and more pleasant to use, it's just missing those little quality of life things.

            0 points
            • Alex Hazel, over 5 years ago

              I figured out how to flip an object!!! It's cumbersome and terrible and it should be a built in feature that handles this but you can do it!

              Select the object. Grab a corner handle while holding shift, shrink the object to a H and W of 0x0 by dragging the handle to the other drag handle diagonally adjacent to it. BUT DON'T STOP THERE...Keep going! (into negative values) That should give you a vertical flip. Now play with dragging the side handle into negative values and that should give you a horizontal flip

              You're welcome :)

              1 point
              • Quentin Lo Castro, over 5 years ago

                Oh yeah, thanks for the tip Alex! It works for vector based objects and text but not for pixel images unfortunately. It would be nice to have this feature in the contextual menu indeed.

                0 points
          • Satheesh sSatheesh s, over 5 years ago
            • Cmd + Select objects from different groups
            1 point
  • Brian HintonBrian Hinton, over 5 years ago

    All I want is to not pay a subscription. That's the main reason I don't use Adobe products. I don't always want to upgrade. Sometimes I want to decide if I go with the new version.

    Why?

    • Things break or change between versions that I don't want to step into because of a current project.
    • I want to own my software. If I want to not upgrade to the next three versions. I want to make that choice.
    • I want to vote with my wallet. If an update doesn't contain relevant features then Adobe needs to know that from the users by them not upgrading. Now they can put whatever they want in yearly updates, and we can't vote with our wallets.

    I moved on from Adobe. If they brought back a yearly purchasing model I'd be in. Keep the subscription for those that want it, but allow me to buy.

    5 points
    • Account deleted over 5 years ago

      That's one of the reasons I ditched Adobe. They got greedy and complacent, and now their competition has caught up to and in many cases, surpassed them.

      0 points
    • Stuart McCoyStuart McCoy, over 5 years ago

      You aren't forced to upgrade just because you have a subscription. The Creative Cloud app notifies you when updates are available but doesn't push them on you.

      2 points
    • Dean HaydenDean Hayden, over 5 years ago

      You never own software, you buy a license to use it.

      0 points
      • Brian HintonBrian Hinton, over 5 years ago

        Key word....buy. I want to buy a license. Anyway. You can simply not agree with me. And that is fine. But I don't agree with a pure subscription model. Framer does it properly.

        2 points
    • Alex Hazel, over 5 years ago

      Xd is free.....soooo....?

      2 points
      • Sven LoskillSven Loskill, over 5 years ago

        Still needs the CC installer-junk (with all the nagging) … soooo … “free” comes with the burden of having malware-esque software running for no compelling reason.

        Yeah, I’m an old fart, maybe that’s why I don’t like that.

        0 points
        • Alex Hazel, over 5 years ago

          Well, doesn't change the fact that it's still free.

          Sketch isn't multiplatform. Not all designers have Macs. Sketch is a non-starter for many people that don't have Macs.

          Photoshop has a completely different workflow that isn't focused on UI design at all. And I dunno about you, but once you get a ton of artboards with tons of elements, the file slows down dramatically. Launch times are painfully slow, and quickly zooming and panning can be excruciating.

          XD has its perks. Just because you don't see them doesn't mean they aren't there.

          But the reason why we have 100's of tools on the market is because everyone's needs are different. XD is a great tool that works for a ton of people and in many areas is better than PS and Sketch. Especially when it comes to specs, collaboration, dev handoff, performance, and prototyping.

          5 points
  • Ivan KutskirIvan Kutskir, over 5 years ago

    Hi guys, I am developing www.Photopea.com , which lets you open XD files anywhere (in a browser). You can also export the document (or its parts) as SVG, PDF or PSD :)

    4 points
    • Parvez SParvez S, over 5 years ago

      That's so cool. Good luck mate :)

      0 points
    • Alex Hazel, over 5 years ago

      That thing did not work well for XD documents....Maybe I'll try it again in a year...But keep developing it! I think it's a great tool in general!

      0 points
  • Dan Leahy, over 5 years ago

    Mike, did the spell checking functionality sneak into this release? Also any idea on hover states and guides?

    3 points
  • Parvez SParvez S, over 5 years ago

    Hey Mike, Any update on this? It'd be awesome to see some advance options in repeat grid.

    1 point
    • Mike Hu, over 5 years ago

      I'll let the product team know. Its I highly requested enhancement so that's a good sign :)

      1 point
  • Conner Sinclair, over 5 years ago

    Mike, Can I ask if there's any chance of being able to export SVGs as inline style? It's rather annoying having to take 20+ icons into illustrator to make them inline.

    Cheers!

    1 point