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ADS 2026 Product Release
Highlights
The Advanced Design System (ADS) 2026 product release includes new capabilities and enhancements for:
- Design and Technology Management
- Design Editing and Layout
- Design Import/Export
- Layout and Schematic Verification
- Data Display
- Circuit Simulation
- EM Simulation
- Electrothermal Simulation
- High Speed Digital (HSD)
- Power Electronics
- Quantum Electronics
- Silicon Photonics
- Keysight EDA Help AI Chatbot
- Licensing
- Documentation
- Integration with Modulation Explorer in ADS
ADS 2026 is available now!
ADS 2026 continues to offer the industry’s most demanding RF & Microwave, High-Speed Digital, Power Electronics, Quantum Electronics and Photonics designs- helping you innovate faster and with greater confidence. This release introduces several powerful new capabilities, including:
- Advanced features for RF/MW, High-Speed Digital, Power, and Quantum Electronics applications
- Major improvements in Python automation, electromagnetic simulation, layout, design verification, and electro-thermal simulation
- Enhanced circuit simulation models, data/design management, and optimized high-performance computing (HPC) support
Circuit Simulation Enhancements
- New model support BSIMIMG 103.1.0
- More robust & accurate DC convergence, especially for SOI process
EM Simulation
- FEM nodal waveguide port solver supports conductors with internal meshing for improved accuracy
- Momentum engine speedup up to 30%
- Accurate 'Delta Gap' & 'Closed-Loop' feeds now supported for multi-pin components
- RFPro Python automation added for metal bias and export of .iffo far field data.
Design and Technology Management
- Open Access update to ver 22.61p022
- Keysight Caranu Dark Mode theme
- Export Designs, Libraries and Workspaces as Python code
Design Editing and Layout
- Smart Mount Show Physical Connectivity
- Enhanced layout editing functions with multi-layer keepouts for RF traces on a layer
Design Import/Export
- AEL APIs for automating design import/export of GDSII, DXF/DWG, & Gerber formats
- More accurate ODB++ importer with 10,000 pts/mm resolution
Layout and Schematic Verification
Design Rule Check (DRC)
- DRC link via PuTTY for Assura, PVS and Calibre to run DRC remotely
- Enhanced area, angle error detection
- Improved usability and error/warning reporting
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· Data Display
- Dedicated Python equation editor with traversal of variable dependency hierarchy
- ·Plot Python data to view expressions and equations directly
Electrothermal (ETH) Simulation
- Auto generation of ETH technology file when active ETH substrate is present to quickly enable ETH simulation
High Speed Digital (HSD)
DDR/Memory
- Memory Designer supports LPDDR6/7 and HBM3 standards
SerDes/Chiplet
- System Designer for Ethernet 802.3df, PCIe Gen7 & USB
- AMI model builder for PCIe Gen7 & Mueller-Muller Phase detector
- Via Designer new coax differential feeds
- S-parameter Toolkit auto differential pair matching based on port name
Power Electronics
- PE Transformer Designer creates accurate transformer model from datasheets for simulation
- Frequency-dependent magnetic core model
- Palette to consolidate all PE power sources
Quantum Electronics
- Time dynamics analysis from extracted quantum parameters
- Dilution fridge input line designer
- Flux & Zero-Pi qubits added to Hamiltonian anaylysis
- Superconducting CPW models in circuit environment
- Anisotropic dielectric substrate in EM environment
Silicon Photonics
ADS 2026 enhances the Photonic Designer that includes photonic schematics, models and layout. It is the industry’s complete silicon photonics chip design workflow integrated into a single design environment to accelerate the development of Photonics IC (PIC). It cuts the tedious and error prone manual integration of multi-vendor tools and data. PIC designers can now productively focus on the design and validation of optical, electrical-optical (EO) and optical-electrical (OE) circuit layouts to meet performance, yield and reliability specs
Keysight EDA Help AI Chatbot
- The new AI-powered Keysight EDA Chat (Beta) is designed to answer a wide range of ADS product-related questions.
- Valuable tool for both new and infrequent users.
- Primarily relies on ADS documentation, technical support articles, Python API reference, and ADS Knowledge Base.
Keysight EDA Help AI Chatbot.
Licensing
- FlexNet Licensing Module: Version v11.19.7
- Keysight EDA Licensing Software: Version 2025.04
- License Codeword Version: 2025.02 or higher
- Refer to the codeword compatibility table here:
- MAC Address Requirements: Licenses must now be tied to the physical MAC address of the PC, Licenses can no longer be bound to aliased, virtual, or removable Ethernet devices, such as USB network adapters or docking stations.
If your current license configuration is impacted by these changes, we encourage you to contact Keysight EDA Business Support at: [email protected] or get in touch with your local Keysight EDA Field Representative. They will assist you in initiating a License Transfer Agreement to transition your license to one tied to a physical MAC address.
Documentation
Offline documentation is now available in HTML5 format with new features:
- Enhanced search
- Syntax highlighting
- Copy code samples
- PDF generation (internet required)
- Image zoom-in
- Responsive design
