YOU CAN QUICKLY REVIEW THE TOP UPDATES:

COMPATIBILITY WITH AUTOCAD®

NEW START TAB & UI CONFIGURATION

ARES Commander continues to evolve, delivering an even smoother and more intuitive user experience. The new Start Tab simplifies workspace customization, allowing users to easily configure their ribbons, palettes, and settings to fit their workflow preferences.
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Additionally, the CAD General workspace — now enabled by default — provides a familiar environment for users transitioning from AutoCAD or similar CAD software.

CAD FEATURES

PERFORMANCE & STABILITY BOOSTS

This year, we prioritized performance and stability to enhance your workflow. These improvements have been successively released in recent service packs and in the new version 2026. Year over year, ARES Commander now delivers 10% faster file opening, 55% faster zooming, and 38% faster panning.
And our dedication to continually improving stability and reliability is yielding concrete results: 94% of users had ZERO crashes with version 2025 (vs. 91% with version 2024), and more than 99% of sessions had ZERO crashes with version 2025 (vs. more than 97% with version 2024).

CUSTOM BLOCKS WITH MULTIPLE VISIBILITY STATES

ARES Commander supports both AutoCAD®-compatible dynamic blocks and its own custom blocks, offering a powerful alternative. This year, custom blocks gained full support for multiple visibility states, making them functionally equivalent to dynamic blocks.
The Trinity Block Library, which was enriched last year with 450+ dynamic block examples, has now been further improved with more intuitive tools for adding blocks to your online libraries, making block sharing even easier.

ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE

AI ASSISTANCE FOR SELECTIONS AND MODIFICATIONS

First introduced in the previous version, ARES AI Assist (A3) now enables users to make selections and modifications using natural language through its dedicated side palette. Simply enter commands such as “Select all lines longer than 5 on the layer Windows” or “Move the selected entities to layer 0” to execute actions instantly. You can also modify properties effortlessly, via requests like “Change the color of all circles to red.”

​AI-DRIVEN TEXT TOOLS & MTEXT IMPROVEMENTS

ARES Commander’s AI assistant, A3, now extends its capabilities to text editing. The MTEXT editor has been enhanced with AI-driven tools to translate, refine writing, check spelling, and summarize text, streamlining documentation tasks. Additionally, users can now format text into columns, improving readability and layout flexibility.

MAPS FEATURES

ECW FORMAT SUPPORT & FASTER LOADING OF ONLINE MAPS

ARES Commander now supports the ECW file format, allowing users to work seamlessly with highly compressed orthophotos, such as aerial images. This enhances ARES Commander’s Maps service, which lets users search and insert satellite or street maps with real-world coordinates. Additionally, the Maps service has been optimized for faster loading, ensuring a smoother experience when zooming and panning in the drawing.

3D FEATURES

3D RENDERING WITH TWINMOTION

ARES Commander now supports exporting DWG drawings to the Datasmith format, enabling users to create photo-realistic renderings and walkthrough videos in Twinmotion. This integration allows for material and lighting assignments, helping users produce high-quality visualizations of their 3D projects. Plus, Twinmotion is free for small and medium businesses with revenues up to $1 million USD.

INTEROPERABILITY

STEP IMPORT

The STEP format is a widely used standard for exchanging 3D geometry with software like SOLIDWORKS, CATIA, Autodesk Inventor, PTC Creo, and Onshape. With the new STEP Import feature, users can easily bring STEP models into their drawings as editable 3D solid DWG entities. These models can then be modified using ARES Commander’s 3D solid modeling tools, or sectioned to generate precise 2D drawings.

CONVERT DWG TO SKETCHUP

The new Export to SketchUp feature allows users to convert DWG files to the SKP format, which is widely used in 3D architectural design. This export supports both 2D drawings and 3D geometry, preserving essential elements while optimizing them for SketchUp. Depending on the view mode, users can export either a 2D plan view or full 3D models from their current drawing

DRAWINGS AUTOMATION FOR BIM

DRAWINGS AUTOMATION IMPROVEMENTS & BIM MATERIAL MAPPER

ARES Commander streamlines BIM-to-DWG workflows, enabling users to import Revit or IFC files and instantly generate 2D DWG drawings — including floorplans, sections, and elevations — with automatic dimensions and labels. New features include support for grid lines, stairs representation, automatic drawing splits, and more.
Additionally, the BIM Material Mapper allows users to customize BIM material representations in 2D drawings and save configurations as JSON files for easy sharing and reuse. This enhances standardization while enabling users to create and switch between different drawing styles (for example, one style for architecture, one for fire ratings, and another one for the sales department)