Altera Quartus Prime – FPGA Design & Development Software

Altera Quartus Prime Design Software is a comprehensive FPGA and SoC FPGA development environment for designing, compiling, optimizing, analyzing, debugging, and programming supported Altera programmable devices.

Quartus Prime provides an integrated toolchain covering the FPGA development workflow from design entry and IP integration through synthesis, place-and-route, timing analysis, verification, and device programming.

Core Capabilities

• FPGA Design Entry – Create and integrate FPGA designs using supported hardware description languages, schematic tools, and IP.
• Synthesis – Convert RTL designs into optimized logic implementations for supported Altera devices.
• Place & Route – Map and fit designs onto available FPGA resources.
• Timing Analysis – Analyze timing performance and verify design constraints.
• Design Optimization – Optimize FPGA designs for performance, area, power, and routing.
• Device Programming – Generate programming files and configure supported Altera FPGA and programmable logic devices.

Quartus Prime Editions

Altera provides multiple Quartus Prime editions to address different FPGA device families, project requirements, and development environments.

• Quartus Prime Pro Edition – Advanced FPGA design environment for supported high-performance and newer Altera FPGA and SoC FPGA families.
• Quartus Prime Standard Edition – FPGA development environment supporting selected established Altera device families.
• Quartus Prime Lite Edition – Entry-level edition available for supported devices and FPGA development requirements.

Quartus Prime Pro Edition

Quartus Prime Pro Edition provides Altera's advanced FPGA design environment for developing systems based on supported modern FPGA and SoC FPGA devices.

• Advanced synthesis and place-and-route
• Design optimization
• Timing closure tools
• Incremental compilation capabilities
• Advanced device support
• IP integration
• Design analysis and debugging

Quartus Prime Standard Edition

Quartus Prime Standard Edition supports development with selected established FPGA and SoC FPGA families and provides the core tools required for FPGA design, compilation, analysis, and programming.

Quartus Prime Lite Edition

Quartus Prime Lite Edition provides an accessible FPGA development environment for supported Altera devices. It is suitable for learning, evaluation, education, and development projects that use supported device families.

FPGA Design Entry

Quartus Prime provides multiple methods for creating and integrating FPGA designs.

• VHDL
• Verilog HDL
• SystemVerilog
• Block and schematic-based design
• Altera IP integration
• Platform Designer system integration

Platform Designer

Platform Designer helps developers integrate processors, interfaces, memory controllers, peripherals, and other IP blocks into FPGA-based systems.

It automates portions of system interconnect generation and simplifies the development of complex FPGA and SoC FPGA architectures.

FPGA Synthesis & Compilation

Quartus Prime transforms HDL and IP-based designs into implementations optimized for the target Altera programmable device.

• Logic synthesis
• Device fitting
• Place-and-route
• Resource optimization
• Programming file generation

Timing Analysis

Quartus Prime includes Timing Analyzer capabilities for analyzing design timing and verifying that FPGA implementations meet defined timing requirements.

• Static timing analysis
• Clock analysis
• Timing constraint management
• Setup and hold analysis
• Timing reports
• Timing closure workflows

Design Debugging

Quartus Prime provides debugging and analysis tools that help engineers investigate FPGA behavior and diagnose design issues.

• Signal Tap Logic Analyzer
• System Console
• Transceiver Toolkit
• Chip Planner
• In-system debugging
• Device programming and configuration tools

Signal Tap Logic Analyzer

Signal Tap Logic Analyzer provides embedded logic analysis capabilities that allow engineers to monitor internal FPGA signals while a design operates on the target hardware.

FPGA IP Integration

Quartus Prime integrates with Altera's FPGA IP portfolio, allowing developers to incorporate pre-designed functions into FPGA projects and reduce development time.

• PCI Express IP
• Ethernet IP
• Memory interface IP
• DSP functions
• High-speed transceiver IP
• Video and image processing IP
• Processor and embedded system IP

Power & Thermal Analysis

Quartus Prime works with Altera power-analysis tools to help engineers estimate and analyze FPGA power consumption and thermal requirements during system development.

Device Programming

Quartus Prime includes programming tools for configuring supported Altera FPGA, SoC FPGA, and programmable logic devices using compatible programming hardware.

• FPGA configuration
• Programming file generation
• JTAG programming
• Configuration device programming
• Production programming workflows

Supported Device Families

Device support varies according to the selected Quartus Prime edition and software version. Supported Altera programmable device families include selected products from:

• Agilex
• Stratix
• Arria
• Cyclone
• MAX

Typical Use Cases

• FPGA hardware development
• SoC FPGA development
• Embedded system design
• Digital signal processing
• High-speed communications
• Industrial automation
• Machine vision and video processing
• Edge computing and AI acceleration
• Networking and telecommunications
• FPGA prototyping and verification

Benefits

• Integrated FPGA development workflow
• Supports design entry through device programming
• Advanced synthesis and optimization capabilities
• Comprehensive timing analysis tools
• Integrated FPGA debugging capabilities
• Access to Altera FPGA IP
• Supports multiple FPGA and SoC FPGA families

Ideal For

• FPGA engineers
• Embedded system developers
• Electronics engineers
• Hardware development teams
• Industrial automation developers
• Telecommunications engineers
• AI and edge computing developers
• Research and development organizations
• Universities and educational institutions

Licensing

• Quartus Prime Pro Edition licensing
• Quartus Prime Standard Edition licensing
• Quartus Prime Lite Edition available for supported development requirements
• Fixed-node and floating/network licensing options are available for applicable paid editions
• Device and feature support varies by Quartus Prime edition and software version

Get Altera Quartus Prime Design Software