NeoArc Studio is a model-first architecture platform built for architects, platform teams, and technical leaders who need architecture documentation that stays synchronised with reality.
At its core, NeoArc centres on a data model (model.neoarc) that serves as the single source of truth for your project. Define entities, properties, and relationships once, then derive ERD views, graph views, and search views from that model. Configure database profiles to map abstract types to vendor-specific database types. Configure search profiles to control how properties project into search engines. Every layer of the architecture, from persistence to API, traces back to the model.
Everything in NeoArc lives as files in your Git repository. Architecture diagrams, animated presentations, API specifications, graph database models, decision records, and structured documentation sit alongside your code, go through the same review process, and stay current because they are part of the same workflow.
The Problem We Solve
Architecture documentation has a trust problem. Design docs live in Confluence with three versions, all outdated. Decisions are buried in email threads. NFRs sit in spreadsheets nobody updates. When someone asks "how does the payment system work?", the answer is usually "ask Sarah, she knows."
This happens because documentation lives separately from code. Code changes happen in pull requests. Documentation changes happen whenever someone remembers. The two drift apart, trust erodes, and tribal knowledge takes over.
A Different Approach
NeoArc treats documentation as code. When you design a new service, you commit the architecture diagram in the same branch as the implementation. When you change an API, the documentation updates in the same pull request. Reviewers see both the code and the docs together.
The result: documentation that matches reality, because keeping it current is part of the development workflow rather than a separate activity that gets forgotten.
What You Can Create
Specialised tools cover the types of documentation architects actually need, from professional diagrams to structured governance documentation.
Central Data Model
Define entities, properties, and relationships in a single model.neoarc file. The data model is the foundation of the model-first workflow: define once, then derive ERD views, graph views, search views, database profiles, and search profiles. Each property projects to persistence, search, and API layers independently.
Model-Derived Views
Create ERD views that render model entities as tables with columns and foreign keys. Create graph views that display entities as force-directed nodes with relationship edges. Create search views that show how properties project into search indices. All views read from the model and stay synchronised automatically.
Database and Search Profiles
Database profiles map 12 abstract property types to vendor-specific database column types. Search profiles configure how properties are indexed, filtered, sorted, and retrieved in search engines such as Elasticsearch and Azure Cognitive Search. Switch profiles to see how the same model targets different infrastructure.
Project Reports
Governance reports analyse workspace health: model coverage, schema lineage completeness, orphaned entities, unused properties, naming convention violations, and more. Reports run against the live workspace and highlight areas that need attention.
Architecture Diagrams with Comprehensive Icon Libraries
A full diagram editor with icon libraries from Azure, AWS, Kubernetes, CNCF, Lucide, and brand and technology collections covering common architectural and technical concepts. Create ERD tables with foreign key auto-fill, swimlane process diagrams, C4 models, and network topologies. Auto-layout algorithms arrange complex diagrams automatically.
Animated Presentation Diagrams
Turn any diagram into a step-by-step animated presentation with audio narration. 4 visibility actions (appear, fade in, disappear, fade out) reveal and hide elements progressively. Viewport animation zooms into different areas of the diagram. Add speaker notes per step and present directly from NeoArc. Each diagram supports multiple standalone presentations.
Infographic Mode
Create fixed-canvas visual assets at 5 preset sizes (16:9, 4:3, square, A4 portrait, A4 landscape). Shape rotation, grouping, and a reusable component library. Export directly to SVG, PNG, JPEG, or PDF. Embed infographics in documentation pages at the correct aspect ratio.
Graph Database Modelling
Force-directed graph diagrams with three authoring modes: mindmap for brainstorming, conceptual for domain modelling, and graph-db for Neo4j-style schema design. Graph-db mode includes typed properties with key roles (PK, FK, NK, SK, composite), validation rules covering structural, semantic and domain categories, composite constraints, and Cypher DDL export.
API Documentation Types
REST (OpenAPI 3.1), GraphQL (queries, mutations, subscriptions), AsyncAPI (a range of protocols including Kafka, AMQP, MQTT, WebSocket and others), Webhooks (multiple verification methods), MCP servers (tools, resources, prompts for AI agents), and gRPC (services, methods, streaming). Each type has a dedicated editor with schema references, security schemes, and published API browsers.
Structured Content Blocks
Content Foundry provides a wide range of specialised content blocks covering layout, data, decisions, requirements, diagrams and more. Capture assumptions, constraints, principles, NFRs, risks, failure scenarios, component responsibilities, data lifecycles, trade-off matrices, user stories, test cases, deployment checklists, and more. Each block enforces structure while remaining flexible.
Schema Editor with Type Specialisations
Define data structures with four schema types (object, enum, union, scalar), field types covering strings, numbers, booleans, objects, arrays and more, type specialisations for fine-grained modelling, and validation rules covering type safety, cardinality, referential integrity and cross-field constraints. Schema inheritance with cycle detection. Map schema fields to ERD columns or graph properties for end-to-end data lineage.
Architecture Decision Records
Capture the "why" behind technical decisions using industry-standard ADR formats: Nygard, MADR (with option comparison), Structurizr, and Y-Statement. Status values track decisions from draft through to deprecated. Link decisions to the diagrams and components they affect.
Version History and Architecture Transitions
Create named version snapshots for diagrams, graph diagrams, and documentation pages. Manage entity lifecycles with active, planned, and deprecated states. Track architectural evolution with succession edges and auto-generated change explanations.
The Architectural Intent Graph
Beneath every page, diagram, and schema lies a semantic knowledge graph with node types covering pages, diagrams, schemas, API endpoints, projections and governance constructs, connected by semantic edges that capture lineage, derivation, governance and navigation relationships. Every content block you create becomes a node. Every reference, dependency, and lineage mapping becomes an edge. This enables automatic impact analysis with task board cards (Kanban and Gantt views), data lineage tracking, governance reports with PDF export, and the interactive Knowledge Map.
Architects and Technical Leaders
Solution architects, data architects, enterprise architects, and platform engineers who create and maintain technical documentation. NeoArc gives you tools designed for architecture work: ERD tables with foreign key navigation, graph database modelling with Cypher export, animated presentations for stakeholder communication, and structured content blocks covering decisions, risk, requirements, testing, operations and more.
Regulated Industries
Financial services, healthcare, government, legal, and other sectors with strict data governance requirements. NeoArc runs entirely offline. Your architecture documentation never leaves your environment. Audit trails come from Git history, with structured risk registers, compliance blocks, and decision records.
Air-Gapped and High-Security Environments
Defence contractors, critical infrastructure operators, and organisations that cannot use cloud-based tools. NeoArc requires no internet connection for any core functionality. Install it, point it at a folder, and start documenting.
Teams Practising Docs-as-Code
If you already believe documentation should live with code and go through pull request review, NeoArc gives you professional editors rather than writing Markdown by hand. Visual diagram editors, structured content types, animated presentations, and a full publishing system, all stored as JSON in Git.
How It Works
NeoArc Studio is a desktop application that works with a folder on your filesystem. That folder is typically a Git repository, though it does not have to be.
When you create diagrams, pages, schemas, or API definitions, NeoArc saves them as JSON files in that folder. The file formats are documented and stable, so you can inspect, diff, and merge them using standard tools.
When you are ready to share your documentation, NeoArc publishes it as a static website. Export to a local folder for self-hosting, or publish directly to Azure Static Web Apps or Azure Blob Storage with optional Cloudflare CDN cache purge.
Getting Started
The quickest path to getting started:
Features
NeoArc Studio is a model-first architecture platform combining a central data model, interactive Data Views with persistence and search modes, UI Views for model-projected wireframing with full-stack lineage, an Architectural Intent Graph that builds itself as you work, automatic impact analysis with a Kanban/Gantt task board, governance reports with PDF export, a diagram editor with icon libraries from Azure, AWS, Kubernetes, CNCF, Lucide and brand collections, step-by-step and scroll-driven presentations, D3-powered visualisation blocks, REST, GraphQL, AsyncAPI, Webhook, MCP, and gRPC API documentation, a wide range of structured content blocks across categories covering decisions, risk, requirements, testing, operations, planning and more, deep Git integration with semantic diff and baselines, professional PDF publishing, and three editions from connected to fully air-gapped.
