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so I know that I cannot export as indd or idml but I want to export to a file format that will open on adobe indesign because I am in a team and they all use indesign so are there any free software that will convert affinity publisher files to indesign files were they can edit it. or can I use one of the file formats to export it.

How can I open an Indesign .indd or .idml graphics file with Affinity Designer? I have been able to open PSD files and save for Photoshop. I do not use Adobe products, but I work with designers that do.

Because .idml is a documented and is constantly updated as to new InDesign features. .indd is not documented and so is a blackbox file format. There is at least one application that can open an .indd, VivaDesigner.

I use Adobe Creative Cloud apps, and to import an InDesign file to Affinity Publisher, you first have to convert it from .indd to .idml while in InDesign. Affinity Publisher cannot handle an .indd file format, but there are other non-Adobe apps that can. What I find curious is that the .idml format is so old: it was used in the Adobe CS4 suite and dates from 2008.

I'll add more info about what I've learned since my post above. Opening the IDML in V2 gives the same result. The placed INDD file info is actually in the IDML file. InDesign opens the IDML file and everything's there. I sent a test file to Markzware to see if their INDD/IDML conversion was any different - no luck. So, I think I've confirmed that the problem is the way Publisher opens an IDML file that's made from an INDD file that contains other, linked INDD files. The issue is important for me because I have hundreds of files like this (some of them hundreds of pages) that need occasional updates (I do rural water systems). I would love to convert them all to AFPUB. I already use Publisher for all new documents. Thank you to all the Affinity folk for making great software.

Would be a great feature to be able to open indd in Publisher.

I would pay Affinity for an INDD converter rather than pay Markzware.

Hi Podge, Welcome to the forums I'd imagine this by design as our app can't interpret INDD files at all only IDML files and when the file is imported it can't read the embedded or linked INDD file as thus replaces it with the X you are seeing. The only way I can imagine you'd be able to get around this would be to convert the INDD files to IDML prior to placing them into your IDML document. Thanks C

(Moments later) Ahhh, HAH. Seems AFpub took all the items in the old .indd document layer called "content" and made them a Group named "content" in which all the subitems — text frames, graphics — were locked, even though the Layer list palette showed all layers as unlocked. I had to look really hard to spot the little right-pointing caret which I click on to pop down the subparts in the Group. Besides that momentary hitch — a really sweet, clean job of converting several simple and multi-page CS6 .indd documents with no issues.

If I cannot open them, does anyone know of a free converter? I'd like to convert .indd to .png I've tried a couple of free converters but both gave error messages. Thanks

Because I got work done that was due this afternoon last night and I'm somewhat bored, I made this little comparison. I grabbed an InDesign sample brochure and packaged it along with an .idml file. The sample filed used a certain free font. For ID, the font doesn't actually need to be installed if these fonts reside in a folder named Document Fonts. The Viva Designer sample opened the InDesign file (versus the .idml, but the results are the same as opening the .indd version in this case). The main font used was reported as missing. VD handles these missing, uninstalled fonts different than ID or QXP (more on QXP's handling later). With VD, one can just drag and drop such fonts onto the open file and they become available for that publication. Neat feature, but I would prefer the folder method of ID and QXP. VD handled this publication better than either APub and QXP. Mainly for one reason: VD can/does include ID's method of using the custom underline property as a text highlight method. With APub or QXP, the white text that should be highlighted shows with a normal underline whereas VD has the colored background with the white text. In order to display this properly in QXP or APub, one would need to know, firstly that this text is suppose to a background of a certain color and size--what this highlighted text is suppose to look like--and secondly, replicate it using their respective methods for this effect. This highlighted text is used three places in the brochure using different color each time. But all QXP and APub display is white text with a white underline versus the brochure using yellow, red and green highlight via the underline property. As with QXP, VD properly displays the shadow PDF used. I've hidden the image that sits on top of this PDF shadow to demonstrate that VD and QXP, neither having a document DPI (as ID also) the shadow is full size whereas APub shrinks it due to the use of having a document DPI. VD also handled the overridden space after and the line spacing for the headline at the top of the column versus APub and QXP requiring adjusting the height of the text box for the heading to display. As regards the font issue, APub would need for the fonts to be installed. QXP requires a slightly font folder naming, so I copied the Documents folder and renamed the copy Fonts. However, both ID and QXP can use a master fonts folder place where these document specific fonts are available for the application to use for any publication without the need to install them. While not shown, the first page of this brochure has a map as a graphic. APub properly used the map image box's run-around property, pushing a column's text over to its right side. VD and QXP requires wrap-around image boxes to be higher in the layer order it is suppose to affect. This map in VD/QXP needed moved to the Tex layer and above the text in the layer order for the text wrap to work. In addition, I had to play with the run-around properties in VD. Once moved, the values were reset to zero so those values needed re-entered. In short, there were differing issues in all three applications. However, I believe with this particular publication, VD handled it best. If I was more bored, I would have hunted down some of my other test publications that showed where APub was near perfect and QXP/VD fell short, or specific publications where QXP was the best versus APub/VD. Viva Designer: QuarkXPress: Affinity Publisher:

Conversion of indd files to idml file format Conversion of indd files to pdf file format 2 Methods to Convert INDD to PDF (en) -- 2 Methoden zum Konvertieren von INDD in PDF (de) Convert INDD to PDF online For Free <-- *** try this out *** ... etc. ...

Hello, when I open an IDML with a linked PDF object in Publisher 2, the object is not scaled correctly. Please see the attached screenshot for a quick preview of the issue, which shows the IDML open in InDesign (above) and the file opened in Publisher 2 (below). I suspect it is related to the crop settings for the object, but I'm not positive. The INDD was created in InDesign 2022 (17.4), and the IDML was exported from there. The attached IDML and PDF should allow you to reproduce the issue, and the INDD file is provided for reference. Are you using the latest release version? Yes Can you reproduce it? Yes What is your operating system and version? macOS Ventura 13.0 Is hardware acceleration (in Preferences > Performance) ON or OFF ? ON Happy to provide more info if needed, but hopefully the attached files provide enough to track down the issue. Thank you. link-square.idml link-square.indd luya.pdf

Both .indd and .idml are proprietary formats. There used to be a book/PDF (IDML Cookbook) that Adobe had on their site that explained the .idml format. That was back when CS6 was current and I don't know if they ever updated it. Can't be found now on Adobe's site, but can be found elsewhere on the web. The .idml format is basically XML so that should be not terribly difficult for programmers familiar with XML to sort out and make work with their own applications, as Serif and Quark have both done. The .indd format would be harder to figure out. I would guess that if you have the same file in .indd and .idml, one might be able to figure it out. And, the more files for comparison, the better. Still, it wouldn't be as easy to "read" as XML. Anyway, I would tend to think that if you can figure out how to import an .idml file, it should be possible to figure out how to export it as well. Then again, there are apps that can open .ai files but not export .ai files. So, I don't know there.

The paid version of OmniMarkz will convert .indd, .qxp and .pdf files to .idml files which can be opened in QuarkXpress, InDesign or Affinity Publisher. I haven't used OmniMarkz, but I've used ID2Q and/or IDMarkz to convert .indd files to .idml files to be opened in QuarkXpress so I know it converts the files. Affinity Publisher (1.8 and later?) can open .idml files too. So, if you just need to convert .indd files to .idml, all you need is IDMarkz. If you need to convert QuarkXPress files to .idml, then you need QXPMarkz. If you need both, probably OmniMarkz is the better deal. If you're using Affinity Publisher or QuarkXPress, there's probably not much need to convert PDF to .idml when you can just import the PDF and have it converted to native objects. Maybe someday Markzware will figure out how to convert Publisher files to IDML so we'd have that option as well.

Hi @RolWg People don't normally send INDD files to others. As a workaround it might be worth trying the free version of Viva Designer. It can open indd files. Then export as IDML or make a PDF and open in AfPublisher. Obviously you might have missing fonts and images and you certainly won't have text styles etc.

Hi @RolWg, first off, Affinity Publisher is the only one of the three Affinity applications that can deal with InDesign content. This means you'll have no luck whatsoever with both Photo and Designer. Second thing is, Publisher can import IDML files from Adobe InDesign, but not native .indd files. You'll have to convert your .indd documents to .idml with Adobe InDesign before you can import them with Affinity Publisher. Cheers kaffeeundsalz

WIn 10 / Pub 663 Hi, I exported formatted text from Indesign into RTF files. The exported text did not contain linked paragraph formatting styles (paragraph formatting was detached before exporting). But character styles from INDD are exported. 1. After importing the RTF into Publisher (placing the RTF file), many words are doubled now !?! 2. Opening this RTF with Libri Office and save it again (without any changement) and place it into Puiblisher, doubling of words is gone? Rather strange !?! Attached the sample RTF file. laser test.rtf

And QuarkXPress continually manages to shoot themselves in the foot. When Adobe moved to subscriptions, Quark had their first big opportunity. They kind of blew it. And, as time goes on, their only target appears to be their own feet and they keep shooting and not understanding why they keep missing the actual target and why their feet hurt and some toes are missing. The only thing that makes Adobe "irreplaceable" is when you have files locked in their formats. There are a wide variety of applications that will open PSD files without a problem. That makes Photoshop the easiest app to replace. With Illustrator files, I have only found CorelDraw and VectorStyler to be able to open the native .ai file and not just the PDF stream. And InDesign (.indd) files are even harder. There are a number of options for opening .idml files but what is really needed are options for opening .indd files because, if you have a large number of files, it is likely you will not be able to export them all to .idml before you no longer have access to InDesign. That's where, I think, some people get stuck. And that leaves out Fireworks. I don't know of anything that can open and edit a Fireworks .png file. And since Adobe killed off Fireworks, well, I don't think even a subscription will help you now. There are plenty of competitors in that space though. There are countless applications for doing simple graphics and with templates or pre-made options. AI is becoming common as well. But, it would be fun to watch Adobe lose the professional market and then crash and burn in a sea of inexpensive apps that provide shallow and simple tools. Yes. I switched from InDesign CS3 to InDesign CS6 back when CS6 was still current. And, really, I only switched because I was receiving files created in Illustrator versions after CS3 that InDesign CS3 could not import. That was really the only reason. Otherwise, InDesign CS3 did pretty much everything we needed it to do. I think there were a couple new features in CS6 that have been handy, but I can't remember what they are. I basically went from PageMaker 6.5 to InDesign CS3. We had PageMaker 7 but never really used it because 6.5 did everything we needed. And the switch to InDesign CS3 was done primarily because PageMaker didn't run on MacOS X. The sticky point now is that I have the means to open any PageMaker file or InDesign CS3 file we have and will continue to be able to do so as long as I have hardware capable of running those apps. But, I cannot activate InDesign CS6 on another machine so once the machine with the current install of InDesign CS6 becomes incapable of running, then I have no easy way to open all those .indd files that have accumulated over the years. And that's where Adobe has people over the barrel. And that's also why I avoid software that requires Internet activation.

Open Sans from Google fonts, downloaded to harddrive. Attached is the idml, indd and the afpub mcglaughlin_daniel_resume_withCoverletter_2023_retail.afpub mcglaughlin_daniel_resume_withCoverletter_2023.idml mcglaughlin_daniel_resume_withCoverletter_2023.indd

Hi @joe_l, Are you aware which program the file was originally created in? Affinity's PDF interpretation is not picking up the blanks/spaces whilst Acrobat is but I'm wondering if this relates to Ken's explanation in the thread linked below if tracking/kerning has been used to create the blanks in the PDF file originally, and Publisher is having to guess where it thinks the spaces should be during the interpret. Edit: Just checked the PDF properties and it looks like it originates from InDesign, I would be interested to see the original .INDD/IDML file where the text originates from.

So I have a file from Ingram Spark (Book Templet) that is Indesign .indd into Publisher. FYI, I use a Mac Computer. 9781737773306-Perfect.indd

Hey All, I thought Publisher was now able to open .indd files? Am I wrong? Are there multiple caveats to this? When I try and open it says unsupported file type. Cheers, Karl

A user on Twitter reporting Importing of InDesign files in Beta working well and achieved by simply selecting Open and then selecting an .indd file. I am unable to import as all .indd files are greyed out in the Open finder on Mac. I am using latest version of Beta. Has anyone else had this issue and, more importantly, how was it resolved!?

Windows 10, Affinity 1.8.2 - How do I load InDesign CS5 .indd files into Publisher?