Xara Designer Pro+
Vector Illustration Germany
Windows vector illustration and print layout in one application. Alternative to Adobe Illustrator.
Details
Xara Designer Pro+ is a Windows application that does vector illustration and page layout in the same file. The drawing side covers what the job needs: a shape tool with independent Bezier control handles and both cusp and smooth joins, type converted to editable shapes, transparency and blends, and photo editing in the same canvas. For print it works in CMYK with mixed colour models in one document, supports spot colours, outputs CMYK and spot colour separations, and exports PDF/X with font embedding, image resampling and a commercial-printing preset.
The half Illustrator has no direct answer for is multi-page layout. Text flows across columns and pages, page numbering is automatic, headers and footers repeat, a table of contents generates, and an A3 document resizes to A4 with the content reflowing. For a designer who produces brochures and reports as well as marks and diagrams, that removes the second application.
The current version is 25.1, released 17 February 2026. It costs USD 16 a month billed annually, a single payment of USD 192, or USD 22 billed monthly, both plus VAT, after a 14-day free trial; checkout is self-service through Chargebee with card, SEPA and PayPal. A separate perpetual licence at USD 299 exists but covers the older Designer Pro v20, not this version.
Three limits are worth stating plainly. It runs on 64-bit Windows 10 and 11 only, with no macOS or iPad build. SVG is import-only: the export list runs to bitmaps, the EPS family, PDF, AVI, XAR, WEB and WMF, and SVG is not on it. And the .ai round-trip is lossy — Xara’s own documentation says unsupported fills and transparency are substituted as bitmaps, and recommends PDF as the route into Illustrator.
About Xara
Xara GmbH is at Quedlinburger Strasse 1, 10589 Berlin, Amtsgericht Charlottenburg HRB 117581 B, VAT DE815053023. The company was formerly MAGIX Online Services GmbH and took the Xara name in 2016. Its sole shareholder is Bellevue Investments GmbH & Co. KGaA (Berlin, HRB 168182 B), the former MAGIX AG — listed in 2006, delisted in 2014, converted to a KGaA in 2015 — which is in turn majority-held by BELLEVUE Holding GmbH in Brandenburg. GLEIF records Bellevue’s direct and ultimate consolidating parent as a reporting exception of “no known person”, so nothing sits above it. The May 2026 acquisition of Xara by ProvenExpert is an intra-group transfer: ProvenExpert is Expert Systems AG, a Bellevue subsidiary since 2011.
Two corrections worth stating, because both read as disqualifying and are not. MAGIX Software GmbH, named in Xara’s privacy policy, is a data recipient rather than an owner; it left Bellevue’s shareholder list in 2018 and now sits under RM Equity Partners in Liechtenstein. And the Boris FX acquisition of 30 March 2026 took the VEGAS Pro, Sound Forge and Acid Pro product lines from MAGIX, not equity in either company.
One caveat for evidence quality. The Designer Pro+ EULA names its licensor as “Xara Group Limited” of Hemel Hempstead under English law — but Companies House holds no company of that name, and the company that occupied that address, formerly Xara Limited, was dissolved on 7 January 2025. The live contracting entity is the Berlin GmbH, so the jurisdiction is not in doubt; the record simply rests on the imprint rather than on a governing-law clause.
