From an empty sheet to a released cutlist
How Wiring Studio models a harness, what it derives from that model, and how each view feeds the bill of materials and the cutlist.
Chapters
Last updated 3 September 2026
The desktop app
The desktop app is the same Wiring Studio as the browser, with a few things a web page cannot do: project tabs, a real menu bar, automatic updates, and the ability to keep working with no connection at all. One account, one project format — a project opened in either place is identical.
Installing and signing in
Builds for macOS, Windows and Linux are on the downloads page. Install it, sign in with the account you already use in the browser, and your projects are there.
Nothing about your work is tied to one or the other. Projects, sheets, the parts library and your reusable components live in your workspace, not on a machine, and the desktop app and the browser app share one seat on your plan — they are not billed separately.
Project tabs
The desktop app opens each project in its own tab, and answers to the shortcuts a browser does.
- Middle-click a tab to close it.
- Double-click a tab to rename the project.
- Drag a tab to reorder it.
The full list of tab shortcuts is in Keyboard shortcuts.
The menu bar
There is a real application menu on all three platforms, and every command in it is the same command the canvas runs — the menu displays the shortcut beside it rather than claiming the key for itself, so a keystroke behaves identically whether you use the menu or not.
| Menu | What it holds |
|---|---|
| File | New project, close tab |
| Edit | Undo, redo, cut, copy, paste, select all, plus Duplicate and Delete Selection |
| View | The four views, zoom in and out, fit to screen, reset zoom, full screen |
| Sheet | Next and previous sheet, the first nine sheets by name, new sheet, rename, delete |
| Project | Insert component, save selection or sheet as a component, Auto-Scale Layout, Export, Project Properties |
| Help | Documentation, What's New, Check for Updates, About |
A menu item is enabled only when the current view can actually run it. If Duplicate is greyed out, nothing is selected; if the Sheet menu is empty, you are not in a project.
Updates
The app checks for a new version on launch and every six hours after that, and downloads it in the background. You are not interrupted while it happens — when the download is finished a toast says which version is ready, with a Restart button.
Dismissing that toast costs only the immediate restart. The update stays on disk and the next launch picks it up. Help ▸ Check for Updates… forces a check if you would rather not wait.
Working offline
The desktop app keeps a copy of your workspace on the machine, so losing the connection does not stop you. A banner appears along the top of the window to say you are offline and how many changes are waiting, and the changes are sent in order once you reconnect.
What keeps working
- Drawing, moving and deleting on both canvases.
- Pin configuration, cable properties, labels and extra parts.
- Auto Route, the design rule checks, the BOM and the cut list — all of these are computed on your own machine.
- PDF export.
- Adding and editing library parts, including choosing an image from disk. Images picked offline are uploaded when you reconnect.
What waits for a connection
- Excel import — the workbook is read by a model in the cloud, so the button explains itself and waits.
- Moving a project between workspaces — the same, for the same reason.
- Changing your plan — checkout and the billing portal open in your browser, and there is no route to them offline.
- The AI features in the parts library — image generation, image search and description generation.
Part images are cached on disk as well, so sheets look right offline rather than rendering as empty boxes. Nothing is ever removed from that cache, so a workspace you have opened once stays legible.
Sign-in itself needs a connection the first time on a given machine. Once you have signed in there, the app opens your workspace offline.
Differences from the browser
Two smaller differences are worth knowing. The desktop app is dark-themed only, and the Mobile image source in the parts library — the QR code you scan to upload a photo from your phone — is web only, because the code has to encode a web address. Everything else in Parts library works the same on both.
Related chapters
Where this chapter leads next, and what it assumes you have already read.
Keyboard shortcuts
Every shortcut and mouse control, grouped by whether it is canvas, view, sheet, project or tab scope.
Collaboration
Organisations: shared projects, a shared library, real-time editing, access control and per-seat billing.
Pricing and plans
What Free, Lite, Pro and Team each allow: limits, AI features, organisations and what happens at a limit.