A new version of Xara Web Designer is now available. We are working on a review for a future blog post. Below is the press release describing the new features in this version.

Xara announces a new release of Xara Web Designer 10 Premium, a programming-free web design tool. This new release features an innovative new publishing technique called Xara Supersites and also supports Responsive Web Design, a technique to create multiple layout variations of the same website optimised for different devices such as mobile, tablets and desktop computers.

Supersites

Xara’s single page ‘Supersites’ are an alternative way of publishing a Web site; instead of just being a separate set of Web pages, with the typical ‘click-wait-load’ way to navigate a website, a ‘supersite’ provides instant navigation between pages, along with slick animated page transitions – all designed to make a Web site stand-out from the crowd. In addition, users can choose to have all Web pages, presented as a single scrolling list of pages, one below the other (ideal for pages to be viewed in a PDF style format), or arranged horizontally, one beside the other, with swipe actions (on touch devices) to navigate from page to page. The Web site can be set to ‘fit to screen’ so that it smoothly and automatically resizes to fit any browser window.

Responsive Web Design

With the surge in popularity of browsing on mobiles and tablets it is becoming essential to create Web sites that are tailored to the needs of these visitors. Xara has created a responsive Web design solution that allows users to create a single file of content containing multiple variants of their Web site at different widths, so that the Web site responds dynamically to the screen size of the viewer, presenting the design most appropriate to their device. Users have the ability to freely customize the layout of the variants to suit the target device size, eg. desktop, tablet and phone.

Web Designer 10 Premium exports a single HTML file that can dynamically change from one layout to another depending on the screen size of the viewer.

Smartshapes

Drawing something simple such as an arrow or a speech bubble on a website can be an extremely complex process for even the most skilled of designers. Xara SmartShapes are a new and innovative way to drawing aesthetically attractive shapes on your document, that require no knowledge of any drawing tools, and furthermore, they remain fully customizable. The library of SmartShapes will grow over time, but starts with text panels, speech bubbles, arrows and more.

This release also includes a new online content catalog, new templates and widgets, free 2GB of Web hosting for Premium users, presentation creation usability improvements and various other improvements.

Charles Moir, founder and Managing Director of Xara said “We realised that, with the use of the latest HTML5 and CSS3, we could create a new type of Web site using hardware accelerated animated transitions. Supersites are a great attention-grabbing way of creating a Web site, while still being compatible with all modern web browsers.”

“Creating Responsive Websites is normally a complex time consuming technical process. For the first time we have created a simple no-programming system where you can create alternative page arrangements for the same content. For example one layout can be for phones and another for tablets; even one for portrait and another for landscape arrangements. Web Designer 10 Premium does all the clever work to automatically show, and instantly switch (respond) to the changing browser size.”

Xara Web Designer is an ideal choice for novices as well as professional designers, in fact, anyone wanting a high quality Web site, without the need to know HTML coding, scripting or the usual technical jargon. The Web sites produced are compatible with all mobile and desktop browsers. The usual limitations of HTML Web authoring simply do not exist in Xara Web Designer. Users have the freedom to use any font, to place anything anywhere on the page with pixel precision, the freedom to automatically repel text around irregular shapes or alpha-channel images and the freedom to draw vector graphics on the page, with transparency.

Example Web Sites

• xaragroup.magix.net/vue2/ – A responsive website (the new Vue theme) with desktop, tablet and mobile variants
• xaragroup.magix.net/menu2/ – A print style Supersite, designed for tablets & desktop browsers including landscape and portrait variants
• xaragroup.magix.net/menu3/ – A scrolling version of the same Supersite
• xaragroup.magix.net/menu1/ – A version of this Supersite with transitions, responsive to browser width (includes a mobile version) and tablet orientation
• xaragroup.magix.net/islands1/ – A responsive Supersite with transitions and Scale to Fit
• xaragroup.magix.net/WD10releasenotes1/ – The V10 Release Notes as a scrolling Supersite
• xaragroup.magix.net/WD10releasenotes2/ – The V10 Release Notes as a Supersite with transitions

Xara Web Designer 10 Premium retails for £89.99, €99.99 and $99.99

An entry level (reduced feature) version, called simply Web Designer 10, is available for £39.99, €49.99 and $49.99, which is ideal for customers who are completely new to web design.

Existing Xara Web Designer users can upgrade for as little as £19.99, €29.99 and $29.99 (Web Designer 10) and £39.99, €49.99 and $49.99 (Premium version)

Xara Web Designer 10 operates on Windows XP, Vista, 7, 8 and 8.1 and requires a minimum 500MB of RAM and a minimum of 300MB hard-disk space.