Every year, the SOLIDWORKS portfolio ships hundreds of enhancements — and the data management products are no exception. At our “Get the Latest: What’s New in Data Management and Governance” D2M webinar, we walked through the most useful 2026 updates for SOLIDWORKS PDM, SOLIDWORKS Manage, and the 3DEXPERIENCE platform.
These updates target the friction points administrators and end users have been quietly waiting on for years: recovering checked-out files when someone is unavailable, guiding external partners through complex vault structures, retiring obsolete workflows without losing history, and surfacing richer BOM context without forcing users to jump between tabs.
SOLIDWORKS’ shift to incrementally rolling out new features year-round means that sometimes even a service pack update will get you access to new features, rather than always having to wait for the next major version update.
Many of these features are already live, which means your team may already own them. Below is a practical walkthrough of the enhancements we think will pay back the fastest for engineering teams running PDM today, plus a preview of what’s coming in SOLIDWORKS Manage.
Rather listen? Catch the full recording of “Get the Latest: What’s New in Data Management and Governance,” our D2M Conference session covering PDM, Manage, and 3DEXPERIENCE — plus the live demos referenced in this article.
SOLIDWORKS PDM 2026: Smarter Ownership, Better Visibility, Cleaner Workflows
SOLIDWORKS PDM remains the workhorse vault and workflow engine for most engineering teams — controlling revisions, securing data, and enforcing release processes for SOLIDWORKS files and dozens of other formats. The 2026 release continues to focus on features that will improve the experience for both users and administrators of SOLIDWORKS Data Management tools.
Here are four enhancements worth turning on this quarter:
1. Transfer Ownership: Solving the “Out of Office” Dilemma
We’ve all experienced that moment of frustration when a colleague is unavailable, but you urgently need access to files they’ve checked out. Whether someone is on vacation, out sick, or has left the company, checked-out files can bring projects to a standstill.
The new Transfer Ownership feature in SOLIDWORKS PDM 2026 solves this problem. With a simple right-click, an authorized user can take ownership of a file checked out by someone else — and crucially, all of the original user’s local modifications are preserved instead of being thrown away.
“What happens if a file is checked out by somebody and they end up leaving the company?” is a question we hear frequently. Previously, administrators had limited options like undoing the checkout, which meant potentially losing valuable work. Now, ownership can be transferred to the manager or another team member, and the new owner can pick up the work, check it in, and the file’s history captures a clean timestamp of the handoff.
This works because vault views are automatically synchronized to the archive server, so even if the original user’s computer is unavailable, their local data can still be recovered. Two new folder/state permissions control the behavior:
- Can transfer ownership of files checked out by other users — can be used whether someone is no longer with the company or if they’re just on vacation.
- Can transfer ownership of files checked out by current user — for the user with files checked out on a different machine (e.g., a laptop at home) who needs to pick up where they left off on a workstation in the office, without remoting into the original machine.
2. Enhanced Folder Navigation: Creating Clear Pathways for Collaboration
A second persistent administrative headache: an external user (like a contract manufacturer) may only have read access to one deep subfolder, but they have no idea how to find it because they can’t see any of the folder structure leading up to it. The old workarounds were sharing the full path string or asking the user to search by filename.
The new folder permission “May see folders to navigate to this subfolder with read file contents” creates a guided pathway through the vault. Users see only the parent folders required to reach their authorized content, with no exposure to the sibling folders or files along the way. The same behavior carries through to the PDM Web2 web client, which is critical for external collaborators who don’t have the Windows client installed.
This enhancement is particularly valuable for contract manufacturers, suppliers, and reviewers who don’t need access to your entire design process but require specific released files. Instead of relying on searches or direct links, they can now navigate naturally through the vault to find exactly what they need.
3. Archive Workflows: Keeping Your Environment Clean and Organized
For PDM administrators, managing obsolete workflows has long been a challenge. Workflows that have been used by files can’t be deleted (the history has to be preserved), so vaults gradually fill up with outdated workflows renamed to Obsolete 1, Obsolete 2, and so on.
The new Archive Workflow action gives administrators a much cleaner option. Right-click the workflow, click Archive, confirm, and it moves into a dedicated archive section in the admin tool. Files in motion remain intact. Should you ever need to reinstate an archived workflow, unarchive is a single click away.
4. Expanded Image Previews: Faster Browsing Across More File Types
PDM’s embedded preview tab loads a quick image of a selected file directly in the file list. For SOLIDWORKS and DWG files, you could already enable a faster bitmap preview to speed up browsing through large folders (a tip many users don’t realize exists). In 2026, that bitmap preview support expands to eDrawings files, neutral CAD formats (STEP, Parasolid, and similar), and third-party CAD files.
For teams that work with a mix of native and imported geometry (which, increasingly, is everyone), this quality-of-life upgrade adds up across a typical day of clicking through assemblies.
Looking for the full list? The 2026 release includes far more PDM enhancements than fit in a 30-minute webinar. The full “What’s New in SOLIDWORKS PDM” documentation is available on the SOLIDWORKS website — there’s almost certainly something there that maps to a workflow you’ve been wishing was easier.
SOLIDWORKS Manage: Tighter Integration, Richer BOMs, Stronger API
SOLIDWORKS Manage layers PLM capabilities: project management, item-based BOMs (EBOM/MBOM), and process management on top of PDM Professional. You keep your PDM vault; Manage adds the cross-discipline visibility that growing teams typically need when they outgrow PDM. The 2026 release continues a clear development pattern: less context-switching for users.
Desktop Links to Records
Previously, when you built a dashboard widget, custom notification, or cross-reference that pointed to another Manage record, the link opened the web client. Useful, but it forced users to operate two interfaces in parallel. The new desktop links open the referenced record directly in the desktop Manage client — keeping the user in one environment and removing the “Wait, where am I now?” moment.
BOM Fly-Out Panel: eDrawings, Where-Used, and Process History
This one is genuinely powerful for anyone who lives in BOMs. Manage now offers a richer fly-out panel when viewing a bill of materials. As you click through line items in a BOM (CAD parts, packaging, shipping materials, the whole record), the panel can:
- Load an eDrawings preview of the selected CAD line item — including standard views, measure tools, and section navigation without leaving the BOM.
- Show preview images for non-CAD records placed in Manage.
- Display Where Used information for any line item — every BOM, project, or process the part belongs to.
- Surface related process records — every ECR or ECO that has revised the item.
In a typical “Where do we use this part, and how many times has it changed?” question, you no longer jump between three different views to answer it.
BOM Redline Comparison
Manage has offered BOM comparison tools for a while, but they opened in a separate window. The new comparison overlay redlines the BOM in place — visually highlighting additions, deletions, and modifications across versions.
API Expansions: Event Triggers and Thumbnail Capture
The Manage REST API introduced in the previous release continues to mature. Two new capabilities are worth flagging for integration teams:
- Event triggers for sending data downstream when records are created or change state — making it easier to push notifications, sync to ERP, or kick off external automations.
- Thumbnail capture when records are created or updated via the API — preserving the visual context that downstream consumers expect, even when the record was generated automatically.
If you’re feeding Manage from another system (a configurator, an ERP, a custom intake portal), these two additions cover the two most common gaps in API-driven workflows. Hawk Ridge Systems’ integration team can help scope and implement those connections if you don’t want to build them in-house.
Looking Ahead
These enhancements represent just a few highlights from the numerous improvements to SOLIDWORKS PDM and the broader data management stack. Worth mentioning alongside them: ongoing AI work in the 3DEXPERIENCE platform (AURA), cloud-side BOM/PLM attribute linking, and an improved Transition Assistant role specifically designed to migrate data from SOLIDWORKS PDM Professional and ENOVIA SmarTeam into 3DEXPERIENCE. If your team is currently scoping a move to cloud PLM, those updates change the cost/benefit math meaningfully.
We’re particularly excited about how these tools will help your team maintain better organization, recover from workflow disruptions, and create clearer collaboration pathways with both internal teams and external partners. As you explore these features, consider which specific frictions in your design and data management processes they might address first — small wins like enabling the expanded bitmap preview or archiving old workflows can be done in a few clicks.
Want Help Putting These Features to Work?
A few of these enhancements are quick wins your administrator can roll out today — Archive Workflow, Transfer Ownership permissions, and the expanded preview support. Others, like the Manage BOM fly-out panel or a move toward cloud PLM on 3DEXPERIENCE, deserve a short pilot and a conversation with your team about how they fit your existing processes.
If you’d like to dig deeper on any of the topics above or check whether you’re on the right platform for where your team is heading, reach out to a Hawk Ridge Systems engineer. For broader context on choosing between PDM Standard, PDM Professional, SOLIDWORKS Manage, and 3DEXPERIENCE, the PDM/PLM Buyer’s Guide and our data migration and integration services pages are great starting points.
Keep Learning
- SOLIDWORKS PDM — product overview, Standard vs. Professional, and when to outgrow PDM
- 3DEXPERIENCE Platform — cloud-native data management and PLM
- SOLIDWORKS Integration Services — custom integrations between your systems
- SOLIDWORKS Data Migration Services — move legacy CAD or PDM data with ease
- Data Management blog category on Hawk Ridge Systems
- How to Integrate SOLIDWORKS Electrical with PDM: A Practical, Informative Guide
