Balsamiq for Desktop documentation
- Introduction to Balsamiq Wireframes for Desktop
- Editor overview
- Adding and arranging UI controls
- Editing controls
- Sharing and reviewing
- Using images, assets, and icons
- Symbols
- Markup
- Toggling markup on and off
- Markup toggling with keyboard shortcuts
- Making items markup and non-markup
- Exporting markup to PNG and PDF
- Linking wireframes together
- Full Screen Presentation Mode
- Alternates
- Exporting
- Importing
- Keeping projects clean and organized
- Keyboard shortcuts
- The BMPR file format
- Autosaving
- Backups and the Support folder
- Windows advanced installation instructions
- macOS advanced installation instructions
- Installing Balsamiq Wireframes on Linux
Markup
Markup is a special kind of component type in the UI Library that is used for adding annotations, comments, and explanatory notes.
Commonly used Markup items include: Arrow/Line, Callout, Comment, Red X, Scratch-Out and Curly Braces. The screenshot below shows markup items on the page.
Toggling markup on and off
When you're editing your wireframes, you will sometimes want to see what the wireframe looks like with Markup off. You can do this by using the Show/Hide Markup toggle button at the right end of the toolbar.
The screenshot below shows the previous page with Markup off.
Markup toggling with keyboard shortcuts
There are keyboard shortcuts for toggling visibility on and off. Press CTRL/⌘+K to toggle markup on and off.
In Full Screen presentation mode you can just press M (or K).
Making items markup and non-markup
Sometimes you will want Markup items to be treated as non-markup or vice-versa. For example, you could use the iPhone control as a guide for designing a mobile screen, but you might want to hide the iPhone itself when you export it and view it on a mobile device.
If you want to make a Markup item Non-Markup, right click on the component and select the "Do not Treat as Markup" option in the context menu. This will allow the component to be visible when the Markup visibility toggle is set to on or off.
You can use this "Treat as Markup/Do not Treat as Markup" feature on any component. If you right-click on a regular component, you can make it behave like Markup by selecting "Treat as Markup." It will be hidden when you toggle Markup visibility off.
The video below demonstrates this process:
Exporting markup to PNG and PDF
If you want your Markup components to appear or be hidden in your exported PNG images or your Exported PDF, toggle the Markup visibility as shown above, and Export.