ChemDraw is a top chemistry software for drawing, editing, and sharing chemical structures and reactions. It is widely used by chemists, researchers, and students worldwide.
It allows for the quick creation of professional chemical drawings and the enhancement of research papers, presentations, and teaching materials. With intuitive menus and a vast collection of chemical symbols, ChemDraw simplifies drawing molecules and reactions, making it suitable for all chemistry fields.
Also, the new Signals ChemDraw sets a new standard for chemical drawing and chemistry communication. It transforms chemical drawings into chemical knowledge and facilitates chemistry research management, reporting and presentation.
ChemDraw helps you:
Info
Streamlined molecule and reaction data management, all the way from drawing to collaboration and reporting.
Turning drawings and ideas into knowledge
The next step in the Evolution of ChemDraw® allows you to easily turn your chemical drawings into chemical knowledge by facilitating the management, reporting, and presentation of your Chemistry research through a modern, intuitive Cloud-native tool.
Elevate your chemistry communication with Signals ChemDraw, the industry-standard suite that combines the robustness of the ChemDraw desktop with the agility of the cloud-native Signals research platform. Signals ChemDraw delivers market-leading efficiency, precision, and visual appeal to make your chemistry stand out while minimising time spent on mundane tasks with novel cloud apps.
Get the best of both worlds
Signals ChemDraw combines the Desktop software drawing capabilities with Cloud-native applications. Explore the power of:
Revolutionize your Chemistry with the industry-leading drawing application since 1985.
Expanded Sharing and Reporting
Signals ChemDraw Collections removes admin bottlenecks like aggregating data from Signals Notebook experiments, building lists of compounds, and generating reports.
Drawing and Visualization Power
Quickly render publication-quality drawings with specialized tools for 2D sketches, native PowerPoint 3D models, and stunning visuals tailored to chemistry.
Modern and Evergreen
The Signals Cloud architecture provides a common digital space to work synergistically without disruption. Feature updates and bug fixes are now delivered seamlessly.
Signals ChemDraw streamlines licencing, user management and software installers within the Signals Research Platform. It provides full access to ChemDraw desktop applications and introduces cloud-native applications like ChemDraw+, ChemDraw Collections and HELM Curation.
News
What’s new in ChemDraw 26.0
ChemDraw 26 lands with faster property math, smarter biopolymer drawing, and a desktop that finally keeps pace with antisense and RNA therapeutics.
Turn nucleic-acid drug design from a wrestling match into a clean drawing
ChemDraw 26.0 for the desktop shipped in May 2026 with the cloud-native ChemDraw+ picking up matching features across 4 Signals Research Platform releases between January and May 2026. The program now understands the molecules people are actually trying to make: siRNA duplexes, antisense oligos, hairpin constructs and the modified backbones that come with them.
Hairpins draw themselves now
The marquee feature in 26.0 is automatic hairpin formation. Draw hydrogen bonds between complementary bases inside a single oligonucleotide sequence, run cleanup, and ChemDraw folds the strand into the hairpin loop on its own. The monomers inside the loop expand and contract like any other part of the sequence, and pendant chemical or peptide attachments hang off the structure without breaking the layout.
This matters because hairpins are everywhere in modern nucleic-acid therapeutics. Short hairpin RNA, guide RNAs, self-complementary AAV constructs, structured aptamers. Before 26.0, a chemist building one of these in ChemDraw fought the canvas, dragging bases into a loop shape that the software treated as an accident rather than a structure. Now the geometry follows the chemistry.
Multiple complements, one sense strand
ChemDraw 26 now lets you draw several complementary RNA strands against a single sense strand. Create a set of hydrogen-bonded sequences, run cleanup, and ChemDraw detects each complement, places it beneath the sense strand according to where the hydrogen bonds sit, and stretches the sense backbone so the complements line up side by side without overlapping.
Anyone who has tried to diagram a gapmer, a tiled set of siRNAs, or a multi-target antisense design knows the old pain. Each complement landed on top of the last, and you spent ten minutes spacing them by hand before the figure was readable. The auto-layout removes the busywork.
ChemDraw also sharpened how crosslinks between sequences look. Bonds now align vertically where they can, which cuts down on the wrapping that used to tangle complex constructs, and selecting a routed bond between sequences highlights the whole bond instead of just the middle segment.
Property calculations stop fighting you
Chemical property math got two fixes that anyone working with large molecules will feel. First, calculations run more efficiently, so editing a big structure with the properties window open no longer drags the whole program to a crawl.
Second, the limits moved up. LogP now calculates for structures with up to 150 heavy atoms or 50 fluorine atoms, while other properties scale to 1,000 atoms. That’s enough headroom for most peptides and small biologics.
Atomic weights got a correction too. ChemDraw 26 updates gadolinium, lutetium, and zirconium to IUPAC 2024 standards. If you calculate exact mass for a gadolinium contrast agent or a zirconium catalyst, the number is now correct to the latest standard.
Stereo validation catches a common mistake
A new stereochemical warning fires when a stereo bond starts from a non-stereo atom. It’s a small guardrail against a mistake that slips into published figures more often than chemists like to admit.
ChemDraw 26 also cleaned up 3D viewing. When you drag a structure to rotate it, selection highlighting now switches off so the depth and perspective shading read clearly.
ChemScript jumps to Python 3.14
For the developers automating ChemDraw, ChemScript now supports Python 3.14. The prior release supported 3.13, 3.10, and 3.9, so teams running batch structure cleanup, format conversion, or property pipelines can move to the current Python without leaving ChemScript behind.
The cloud side
Predicted pKa arrived in the Analysis panel (February 2026), calculating from the current selection for structures under 100 heavy atoms and returning the value, the type (acid or base), and the atom label (26.2 release). It joins the LogP calculation that landed in ChemDraw+ in January (26.1 release).
Notebooks and drawings now have a dedicated properties page where you can view and edit name, description, and created or modified details in one place, with admin-configured custom properties editable from the same screen (May 2026 26.4 release). New column filters across Drawings, Notebooks, and Favorites let you narrow lists by name, creator, or date using options like exact match, this week, or a custom range.
The April release brought accessibility work toward WCAG 2.1 AA compliance. Better color contrast and focus states, wider keyboard support across toolbars and popovers, improved screen-reader labels, and updated zoom and reflow behavior (26.3 release). The same release added structure-based search to the HELM Monomer Curation app, so curators can find monomers by substructure, similarity, full, or exact match instead of guessing at text.
Frequently asked questions
ChemDraw 26.0 Desktop is the installed application (Windows and Mac, including ARM Macs) with the full feature set in one package. ChemDraw+ is the cloud-native version inside the Signals Research Platform, updated continuously through smaller releases (26.1 through 26.4). Desktop suits offline and heavy publication work, while ChemDraw+ suits browser-based collaboration and shared notebooks.
Yes. Draw hydrogen bonds between complementary bases within a single oligonucleotide sequence, then run cleanup, and ChemDraw 26 forms the hairpin loop automatically. Monomers inside the loop can be expanded or contracted, and pendant chemical or peptide attachments are supported.
LogP calculations support structures with up to 150 heavy atoms or up to 50 fluorine atoms. Other property calculations scale to 1,000 atoms. LogP and Molar Refractivity are powered by RDKit for consistent results, a change introduced in ChemDraw 25.5 and carried into 26.
Predicted pKa is available in the ChemDraw+ Analysis panel, introduced in the February 2026 Signals release. It calculates from your current selection for structures under 100 heavy atoms and returns the predicted value, whether the site is an acid or base, and the atom label. It is part of the cloud ChemDraw+ application.
ChemScript in ChemDraw 26 supports Python 3.14, up from the 3.13, 3.10, and 3.9 support in the prior release. This lets developers build automation and integration scripts on the current Python release.
ChemDraw Prime and Professional are available through the our Trial Download Center. Click here and submit your details to receive a free trial of ChemDraw.
New ChemDraw v25.0
ChemDraw 25.0 is here, delivering the most advanced suite yet across ChemDraw Prime, Professional, and Signals ChemDraw. This release takes molecular drawing to the next level, with powerful tools for complex biopolymers, enhanced chemical intelligence, and a modernised web editing experience in Signals ChemDraw.
ChemDraw Prime, ChemDraw Professional & Signals ChemDraw
ChemDraw 25.0 desktop introduces enhancements for drawing and representing large molecules, as well as complementary strands. This release also improves installation, system performance, and chemical intelligence while addressing various minor bugs.
Enhanced Chemical Intelligence
Installation and System Improvements
Available in ChemDraw Professional & Signals ChemDraw
Advanced Biopolymer (HELM) Improvements
ChemDraw+
ChemDraw+ is a cloud-native version of ChemDraw, allowing you to create, manage and curate your drawings in the web. ChemDraw+ is exclusive to Signals ChemDraw offering and is released continuously throughout the year in the Signals Platform.
New Modern Drawing Experience
Advanced Biopolymer (HELM) Improvements
Expanded Application Capabilities
Exclusive to Signals ChemDraw offering and released continuously throughout the year with the Signals Platform
HELM Monomer Curation Application
Product Compatibility
ChemDraw Prime and Professional are available through the Revvity Signals Download Centre. If you are an Alfasoft customer but do not have access to the Download Centre, please contact us.
Signals ChemDraw is available through the Signals Research Platform with an active license. If you are interested in purchasing, please do not hesitate to contact us.
New Signals ChemDraw v23.0
The newest release of ChemDraw Professional 23.0 software suite includes Signals ChemDraw, which delivers all the features of ChemOffice with integration within the Signals Research Platform. It will provide full access to ChemDraw desktop applications and new cloud-native ChemDraw applications within the new Signals ecosystem, all packed with new features for this release.
Licensing & User Management Improvements
Significant improvements have been made in the licensing and user management of Signals ChemDraw licenses, which will now be done in the Signals Research Platform. These improvements include:
ChemDraw Applications will be accessible in Signals Home
All licensed products with this license will be accessible within the Signals Home portal, allowing users to download and connect their desktop applications to their Signals tenant. Once installed and licensed, the applications will all be launchable from the Home portal and application switcher.
Signals Integrations in ChemDraw
Access to licensed Signals applications is now available from ChemDraw Desktop via menu and toolbar options.
Users can now easily Open and Save drawings to and from the Signals Platform for easy and quick access wherever they have a WIFI connection.
Automatic Update
Updates for ChemDraw will now be delivered to the application when released, allowing users to download and install the most recent release in real time without leaving the application. Users can choose whether to update now, later, or not at all.
ChemDraw+
ChemDraw+, a new, cloud-native ChemDraw version, is launched on the Signals Research Platform. Its modern user interface allows scientists to draw publication-quality drawings of small and large molecules quickly and easily. Scientists can access their information from anywhere, with the affordance of storage and organisation of their chemical drawings within the Signals platform.
ChemDraw Collections
Previously known as ChemOffice+, this cloud-native application is designed to help chemists better organise, manage, search, and share chemical structures and data.
HELM Monomer Curation
Available within the Signals Research platform, this application allows customers to manage and curate custom monomer libraries for building complex biopolymers and macromolecules. With a Signals ChemDraw license, users can access custom monomer libraries from the HELM editor in ChemDraw+.
Other new features that are included in all ChemDraw Desktop offerings
Product Compatibility
ChemDraw v23.0 is qualified against the following:
ChemDraw / ChemOffice 22.2 Release Announcement
It is my pleasure to announce the release of ChemDraw and ChemOffice 22.2. This release contains improvements and enhancements that support hydrogen bonding and HELM. The key new features include:
Other updates:
Tips & Tricks in ChemDraw
If you are one of the 1+ million people who love ChemDraw® from Revvity Signals, these hacks are for you. Make your chemical drawings faster and more beautiful.
ChemDraw Editions
ChemDraw Professional
1H and 13C NMR predictions, Name-to-Structure, Structure-to-Name, and integrations to scientific literature databases.
Chemistry you can be proud of!
ChemDraw Professional easily makes your chemistry stand out with unique atom, bond, and ring colouring options. With 3D clean-up and enhanced 3D display, visualization of complex molecules has never been so easy.
ChemDraw Professional includes 1H and 13C NMR predictions, Name-to-Structure and Structure-to-Name functions, and integrations to SciFinder, Reaxys, and SciFinder-n for quick and seamless access to important scientific literature databases. Peptide and nucleic acid chemists can also use the HELM Toolbar to represent biomolecules easily.
ChemDraw Prime
The most efficient chemical drawing application, ChemDraw Prime allows you to create publication-worthy drawings in minutes.
Efficiency at its best
Whether you’re an experienced chemist or an aspiring one, ChemDraw Prime allows you to draw organic chemistry without having to master drawing. The most efficient chemical drawing application, ChemDraw Prime enables you to create publication-worthy drawings in minutes.
Beyond a full set of chemical structure essentials such as rings, bonds, chains, atoms, and functional group tools, ChemDraw Prime also allows you to calculate properties, create chemical and lab equipment templates, and utilize handy TLC Plate drawing tools. User-favorited hotkeys and shortcuts enable you to draw faster than ever before.
Support
Resources
We recommend these online support pages and resources to make the most of your product.
Support
We offer technical support to all Alfasoft® customers. We recommend visiting our Help Center and Knowledge Base, where you will find helpful resources, including solutions to frequently encountered issues and a wealth of additional information.
If you cannot find the answer, please submit a support ticket at the Help Centre and Knowledgebase. When creating your ticket, please provide as much detail as possible. This will help us better understand the issue and provide a more accurate solution. Always remember to provide information about your product version and operating system.