WPF — June 2025 Roadmap (v25.1)

Drag & Drop & Clipboard Operations in .NET 9

.NET Upgrade Assistant Integration for Project Upgrades (Discussion)

We expect to ship a new plugin (VSIX) for Microsoft's .NET Upgrade Assistant. We expect this plugin to ultimately replace the DevExpress Project Converter for .NET 8+ projects. Benefits will include the following:

• The .NET Upgrade Assistant allows us to support more IDEs and operating systems, as it is available in Visual Studio Code for Windows, Mac, and Linux. The upgrade process is simpler and streamlined because we will maintain less code across versions (in the future, we will only offer the DevExpress Project Converter for .NET Framework projects).
• Unlike our Project Converter, the new plugin will have access to NuGet, Roslyn, MEF, and other IDE services. With the .NET Upgrade Assistant's auto–fix capabilities, we can automatically detect and safely resolve breaking changes in DevExpress code. This includes but is not limited to obsolete code replacements (such as, Font > DXFont, DxPivotGrid > DxPivotTable, etc.).
• We will deliver the new plugin for minor and major DevExpress versions. The plugin will include the most recent Directory.Packages.props file updates (with DevExpress–compatible 3rd party dependencies for CPM). You will be able to update all project dependencies and resolve security vulnerabilities with a single click.​

Our Unified Component Installer will automatically install the new plug–in. The plugin will also be able for download from the Visual Studio Marketplace, nuget.org, and nuget.devexpress.com.

DevExpress Template Kit (Discussion)

Our new Template Kit will make it easier to create projects for a variety of usage scenarios. With v25.1, you will be able to configure new projects by selecting navigation type and a set of pre-designed views. Here’s an image demonstrating our implementation in .NET MAUI:

You’ll also be able to add view templates to existing projects.

Currently, the DevExpress Template Kit is available for Visual Studio and VS Code.

Avalonia XPF (Discussion)

Accessibility Enhancements (Discussion)

Keyboard Navigation

We continue to enhance accessibility across all DevExpress UI controls. In v25.1, we expect to improve accessibility for our Property Grid, Backstage View, and Editors.

Screen Reader & UI Automation

We expect to enhance the UI Automation tree for Screen readers (Narrator, NVDA) and UI Automation tests. You will be able to retrieve more information about element state and structure (such as selection status and node levels). This will make it easier for visually impaired users to interact with your applications. 

AI Enhancements (Discussion)

New AI Chat Control

At present, you can incorporate the DevExpress Blazor AI Chat into your WPF application as follows: Blazor AI Chat - How to add the DevExpress Blazor AI Chat component to your next Blazor, MAUI, WPF, and WinForms application.

Smart Paste (Data Grid & Layout Control)

With v25.1, we will add Smart Paste operations to our WPF Data Grid and Layout Control. Smart Paste is an AI-ready feature that transforms traditional copy-paste operations. Designed to improve productivity, Smart Paste analyses copied content and intelligently assigns correct values to appropriate fields/row cells in the DevExpress Data Grid and Layout Control-powered forms.

When Smart Paste is activated, the "Smart Paste" command will be automatically added to a control's popup menu. When a user copies data from a source (such as a spreadsheet, document, or web page) and pastes it into a Data Grid or Layout Control-powered form, Smart Paste will automatically interpret content and map data to correct data fields or cells.

Smart Search (Ribbon & Accordion)

DevExpress WPF Ribbon and Accordion controls will support AI-powered search. Smart Search will work alongside traditional search algorithms to deliver a more powerful and user-friendly search experience.

When a user pauses text entry in the search field (within the Ribbon or Accordion control), the control will send the current search query to an AI service that understands context, synonyms, and user intent beyond exact keyword matches. Once the AI service returns results, the control filters items accordingly.

Semantic Search (Data Grid)

We will implement Semantic Search in our WPF Data Grid to help you locate items based on meaning rather than an exact match. For instance, if your Data Grid contains CV info, and users search for "developers with AI experience", Semantic Search will include results for terms such as "machine learning", "deep learning" or "neural networks" (even if "AI" isn’t explicitly mentioned).

Smart Actions (PDF Viewer)

We will integrate AI-powered features into our WPF PDF Viewer component. These enhancements will allow users to quickly understand the underlying essence of individual documents via Generative AI summaries and translate documents to a preferred language using AI-powered translations.
Additionally, users will be able to interact with an AI-powered assistant directly within their applications and ask questions about PDF documents.

Note: Our implementation is based on the functionality provided by the Microsoft.Extensions.AI library. To access these features, you will need to register the IChatClient implementation in your app (based on the desired AI services provider: OpenAI, Azure Open AI, Google Gemini or local open-source models powered by Ollama). 

Performance in Demos

Data Grid Enhancements (Discussion)

Grid Column Print Width

You will be able to set the width of printed/exported columns with dedicated properties. This will allow you to control printed column width without changing column width in your actual Data Grid.

Tree View Customization Settings

We're adding more APIs to simplify configuration of the internal TreeListView used in our TreeViewControl. Based on your feedback in the Support Center, we’ll introduce new APIs at the TreeViewControl level to streamline customization.

Column-Specific Button Visibility and Posting Mode

• Editor button visibility - Always visible, in a focused cell/row, or only in an active editor (EditorButtonShowMode).
• Data posting behavior - Update the data source when a user leaves a cell or as they type (EnableImmediatePosting).

Reporting

Improved Label and Table Cell Text Formatting (Discussion)

Our next release will allow users to define line spacing for displayed text/values within the DevExpress Report Designer. This feature will enhance readability and provide greater control over individual report layouts. Users can directly modify line spacing for basic report controls to improve multi-line text clarity and reduce the memory footprint associated with the XRRichText control.

Time Zone Conversion (Discussion)

With v25.1, DevExpress Reports will be able to convert UTC date and time values to the viewer's local time zone. This feature is essential for applications with a global user base, as it ensures that all users analyze report data in their respective local time zones.

Spreadsheet Control

OLE Objects

Spreadsheet components will support embedded and linked objects (OLE objects) within Excel documents. You will be able to import and save documents with OLE Objects to supported Excel formats without content loss. OLE Object icons will be properly displayed when you preview the document, print, or export it to PDF.
Additionally, we’ll introduce APIs to create, remove, and manage OLE objects in code.

New Excel Functions Support

We will enhance our Spreadsheet calculation engine by adding support for modern, dynamic array-based Excel functions. In v25.1, we will introduce functions like:

• XLOOKUP
• XMATCH
• UNIQUE
• And more

These functions will improve data lookup, filtering, and transformation capabilities across our Spreadsheet components.

Rich Text Editor

CJK (Chinese, Japanese and Korean) Text Wrapping

To enhance document rendering and readability, our Word Processing library and Rich Text Editors will support CJK text wrapping and line breaking rules. This feature applies correct line breaks between characters for Chinese, Japanese, and Korean (CJK) text. Documents using these wrapping rules will be displayed, printed, and exported to PDF with appropriate formatting. 

RTL (Right-to-Left) Engine Enhancements

In our mid-year release v25.1, we will extend our RTL rendering engine for Rich Text components. This functionality will ensure correct rendering and PDF export for document paragraphs, tables and shapes containing bi-directional text (mixed Right-to-Left and Left-to-Right text blocks).

Export Word Content Controls to PDF AcroForm Fields

We will enhance our Word-to-PDF export engine and support the conversion of Word content controls into PDF AcroForm fields. With this capability, you'll be able to import or generate Word documents with content controls in our Rich Text document editing tools, export these documents to PDF, and automatically generate corresponding AcroForm fields in PDF output. This feature will apply to the following content control types:

• Plain Text Boxes
• Check Boxes
• Popupfds

New PowerPoint API Presentation Library

We expect to extend the capabilities of the DevExpress Office File API library with a new Presentation library for .NET.

This non-visual library will allow developers to generate, modify, print, and export PowerPoint presentations to different formats in code. We expect to support the following PowerPoint-related usage scenarios programmatically:

• Create new presentations from scratch.
• Save presentations using the PPTX (OpenXml) document format.
• Merge multiple presentations into a single file.
• Add, remove, and extract presentation slides; modify slide settings.
• Add, remove, and customize slide elements (shapes, texts, tables and more).
• Apply formatting to slide elements.
• Print and export presentations to PDF.

Note: The CTP (Community Technology Preview) version of our PowerPoint Presentation Library is expected mid-year. As in any CTP, functional limitations will apply. 

*Usage requires one of the following subscriptions: Office File API, Universal

PDF Document API

PDF Document Compression

To reduce file size when saving PDF documents using DevExpress PDF Document APIs, we will introduce a compression engine for the PDF object streams. This engine will optimize PDFs for more efficient storage/sharing options. New compression mechanisms will apply to various document structures, including PDF forms, fonts, and graphics.

*Usage requires one of the following subscriptions: Office File API, Universal

Redaction API

We’ll introduce a new Redaction API that allows users to secure PDF documents and permanently remove sensitive information. This feature will allow you to:

• Erase personal or confidential data from a PDF document and prevent end-users from accessing, viewing or copying it.
• Apply overlays with custom text or graphics over redacted areas.

*Usage requires one of the following subscriptions: Office File API, Universal

Word Processing Document API

Compare Word Documents

We will introduce new APIs to compare Word documents. This capability will allow you to:

• Identify changes between two document versions.
• Generate revision-based output highlighting.

Note: These new APIs will focus on detecting changes and making revisions for the visible document content only.  

*Usage requires one of the following subscriptions: Office File API, Universal

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