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I have a completed PCB design drawn by Altium Designer. I want to increase via sizes. But there are too much of them, and changing all of them one by one will be a very long and bothersome work. Is there any way that I can select and resize them all at once?

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  • \$\begingroup\$ As Hans says, you can filter out just about anything using a SQL like syntax, then change values in the inspector(s). The help goes into detail, press F1 when in the filter for info on each command (I think, been a while since I used Altium) There is also a "wizard" that builds the search term for you, although it's not as powerful. \$\endgroup\$
    – Oli Glaser
    Sep 3, 2011 at 2:31

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Use PCB Filter to filter for all objects by using the statement 'IsVia'.

Then you can use PCB Inspector to change values all at once. When Via's still need to be big (like for power), you could also add extra filters to only select via's with certain hole sizes, but you'd have to look up what parameter this is saved in.

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There are two ways to do this.

The PCB Filter Panel:

  1. Open the PCB Inspector panel ( Menu Bar -> View -> Workspace Panels -> PCB -> PCB )
    This opens PCB Filter panel.
  2. In the PCB Filter panel, select "Hole Size Editor". Make sure the "Select" checkbox is checked.

  3. Pick the via size you want to filter.

    • You can also filter by type (Via, pad), Ownership (part of a component, or not), hole type, pad shape, etc...

  4. All the vias of the size you picked are now selected, and you can now edit them using the PCB Inspector Panel. If you also applied a mask (every other component is greyed out), you can clear the mask by clicking the "Clear" button on the PCB Filter panel.

Alternatively, you can use the PCB List panel.

  1. Open the PCB List panel ( Menu Bar -> View -> Workspace Panels -> PCB -> PCB List )
    This opens PCB List panel.
  2. At the top of the panel, click the "All Types of Objects". In the popup window, select
    "Display Only: Via"
  3. If the very top-left of the window does not say "Edit", you are in view-only mode. Click the "View" label, and select "Edit" in the drop-down.
  4. The rest of the window will be populated by a list of every via on the board.
  5. You can shift-click or control-click to select individual vias or ranges of vias. Select a range of vias, and right-click on the hole size column, and hit edit. The new value you enter will be applied to every selected via.
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I think that you select one of the vias, select all similar ones with a right mouse click, then use the PCB Inspector to change them to the size you want.

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  • \$\begingroup\$ Can you please explain this in detail? \$\endgroup\$
    – hkBattousai
    Sep 2, 2011 at 20:52
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    \$\begingroup\$ Missing many steps. You can certainly select a via, build a "Find Similar Objects" filter with a right-click, and use the PCB filter panel to look up similar objects, but it's not a two-click to select all solution. \$\endgroup\$
    – Connor Wolf
    Sep 3, 2011 at 6:30
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The way I favor is the "Find Similar Objects" function.

  1. Select a via you want to change.
  2. Right click and select "Find Similar Objects" in the menu
  3. Setup the new dialog with the properties of the objects you want to change, like HoleSize etc.
  4. Activate "Select Matching" "Run Inspector" "Clear Existing"
  5. Click OK.
  6. The PCB Inspector will open up
  7. Now you can adjust everything as needed.

IMHO this is the fastest way to do such changes and also a very powerful one. But take care, with great power comes great responsibility. ;)

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