Layerz 4.0: One Sidebar for Your Whole Project

Layerz 4.0 is the biggest change to the editor since we started. The vertical tab bar and its per-section lists are gone. In their place is one sidebar that holds your entire project, an inspector that lives where the system puts inspectors, and an editor that reads the same on iPad, Mac, and iPhone. Here's what changed, and why.

The whole project in one sidebar

Until now, moving between screens, data, APIs, and Action Flows meant switching tabs, and each tab had its own list. Version 4.0 replaces all of that with a single outline: App Info, Screens, User Components, Design System, Assets, Data, Data Schema, API, Services, and Action Flows, each with its items nested underneath. Data Schema shows your schemas alongside the built-in ones, enums, and transformers. API collections expand into tags, and tags into endpoints.

Select any row and it opens. The highlight follows what the editor is showing, so after you add, delete, or duplicate something, the sidebar still points at the right place. Reordering, swipe to delete, and the context menus (duplicate, make starting screen, make tab container) work right in the outline, and the + menu adds any kind of item from anywhere.

The document window is now a system split view, which means the sidebar behaves like every other sidebar on your device: collapse it, resize it, and it remembers.

An inspector column, and the Outline where you need it

On iPad and Mac, the Inspector moves into the system inspector column on the trailing edge. Toggle it from the navigation bar on iPad or the window toolbar on Mac, and it stays put as you move between screens.

While a screen is open, its Outline appears in the lower half of the sidebar under a draggable divider. Project on top, the current screen's view tree below, and the ratio between them is remembered. Switching sections no longer animates the panels in and out, so the editor feels like one surface rather than a series of transitions.

On Mac, the window toolbar gains sidebar and inspector toggles, the Library button shows and hides the docked Library panel, and windows can now be as narrow as you like. iPhone keeps its single-column editor: the sidebar button in the navigation bar opens the project as a sheet, and the outline button on the side toolbar opens the Outline.

Edit text right on the canvas

Double-tap a Label and type. The text is selected on entry, Return inserts a newline, Esc cancels, and tapping anywhere else commits. No trip to the inspector for a quick copy change.

The canvas also gained haptics: a tick when you pick something up, when an alignment guide snaps, and a firmer one when a constraint lands on zero. It works on the device and on Apple Pencil Pro.

A Chart component

Charts come to Layerz as a first-class component, backed by Swift Charts. Bar, line, area, point, and pie (or donut) marks, with interpolation, symbols, stacked or grouped series, and legend and axis options. Bind a number array or an array of your own schema, pick the x, y, and series fields, and the chart draws itself. Until it's bound, it shows sample data so you can style it first.

Data that flows where you expect

A tab container can now hand each of its pages their Screen Data at launch. Open Inspector → Container and bind fields per page, and the page starts with that data already in place.

Duplicated screens finally behave like copies should: their data bindings keep working, cell bindings included, and they get their own Action Flow and Service identities so nothing cross-wires with the original.

Inside For Each, the loop's Output now sits above the body actions where you bind it, and a Guard that fails inside the body exits the whole loop. Broken bindings show the same red mark everywhere.

A Quick Start Guide you can replay

The Tips section of the main screen is now a fixed Quick Start Guide plus a list we maintain on the server. The guide replays the onboarding's nine building blocks tour in place: tap any block in the overview to jump to it, Done brings you back. Read it once, or come back to it whenever a concept needs a refresher. The server rows open documentation and tutorials in an in-app web view, so we can point you to new material without shipping an update.

Get it

Layerz 4.0 is available now on the App Store for iPhone, iPad, and Mac. The documentation covers the new editor in depth. Start with The interface for the sidebar and inspector, and Components for Chart.

We'd love to hear what you build — support@layerz.app.