About the ChemDraw License
The ChemDraw license is available for faculty, staff, researchers, graduate students, and undergraduate students affiliated with the School of Arts and Sciences and the Department of Chemistry.
Individuals not affiliated with the school and department can inquire about eligibility by contacting help@chem.upenn.edu.
SAS Chemistry has an annual Site License for Revvity Signal’s ChemOffice Professional for Windows and ChemDraw Professional for Mac. If you have not taken advantage of this resource yet, please follow the instructions below to request a license.
The license is for both the Windows and Mac versions of the Software. Please note that the Mac version does not contain some features that the Windows version has (most notably, Chem3D). Details about this software can be found here, and if you are interested in getting the license contact help@chem.upenn.edu.
ChemDraw Login
The current license is valid from March 1, 2025 to Nov 13, 2025. Revvity has changed the way licenses are distributed for now, and users will no longer go to the List Entitlements page. Instead, you will sign into a Signals ChemDraw account through ChemDraw and gain access that way.
Registering for a ChemDraw Account
If you do not have account you can follow the instructions below to create one.
- Contact the Chemistry Computing team at help@chem.upenn.edu. Provide your first and last names, your Pennkey username and Penn ID number, and your current PI/lab group.
- If you are eligible, the team will generate a Signals ChemDraw account for you. They will reach out to you as soon as possible.
- Once you have been contacted, you should receive an email to finish creating your account/set your password.
- It may take a few minutes to receive the email. Please be sure to check your spam and junk email folders if it does not arrive in your inbox.
Signals Notebook
Signals Notebook accounts are no longer created automatically when you register for a new ChemDraw account. If you need access to Signals Notebook, you may need to contact Chemistry Computing at help@chem.upenn.edu to request a Signals account.
Installing and Activating ChemDraw 23
- Log into your account on the Revvity Signals site. The Login ID is usually your SAS email account address. If you registered with a different email you can use that.
- Once you log in you should be greeted by a page with some boxes and you want to click the ChemDraw Desktop Suite installer.
- A new window should will appear with several steps. Follow Step 1 to Download ChemDraw’s newest version.
- When that’s installed, come back to that same installer window and follow Step 2 to Connect and license your version with your Signals account.
- You can also connect your Signals account when you open ChemDraw for the first time. Just select activate with a Signals Account and put in this URL when prompted: https://upenn.signalsresearch2.revvitycloud.com
- Please make sure that you are connected to the University Network or are connected to the University VPN if off campus when activating.
IMPORTANT NOTE! If you started up ChemDraw and were not prompted to change your license, it is because your old license is still tied to your account! Go into your ChemDraw application and head to Licensing. From there you can Deactivate the old one. That will cause it to prompt you for a Signals login and you should be good to go. If there is any confusion contact the Chemistry Computing team at help@chem.upenn.edu.
University VPN
If you are off campus and need the VPN for activation, you can find information on how to install and configure the VPN here.
Installation Instructions
If you have further questions, please email help@chem.upenn.edu or contact one of the computing facility staff.
Step by step installation instructions can be found below.
Installing ChemDraw on MacOS
1) Please make sure that you are either on campus, and connected to the network, or connected to the University VPN. This is required for the activation process.
2) Log into the website below. If you do not remember your password, you can use the forgot password function. This will reset your password, and a new temporary password will be sent via email.
https://upenn.signalsresearch2.revvitycloud.com/
3) Once you are logged in, you will see the installer page where you should be able to download ChemDraw.
4) You will want to find the box in the Installers section that says ChemDraw Desktop Suite.
5) You will see several steps come up and you want to follow Step 1 to Download ChemDraw.
8) Click allow when the prompt appears to allow the download.
9) When the download is complete, you can drag the .dmg file to your desktop.
10) Double-click on the file.
11) Agree to the terms of service and wait for the file to be verified and open.
12) In the window that opens, drag the Applications that you would like installed to the applications folder in the window. If you would like both ChemDraw and ChemDraw Office you can drag both to the folder. It can take a few minutes for the applications to be copied over. ChemDraw Office was replaced by ChemDraw Collections in version 23.
13) You can now navigate to the launchpad or your applications folder in finder, locate ChemDraw, and double click on it.
14) Click Open on the prompt, warning you that the app was downloaded from the internet.
15) This will open a window to activate the Software. Select Signals Account and hit Continue.
16) If the Activation is successful, you will get a popup saying as such. Click OK on the Prompt (if you get an error instead, please be sure to let us know).
17) A Window will appear asking for the install location, the default is usually fine so you can click install. You can choose a custom location if you wish.
19) The program should then open once you click install.
20) You can then right-click on The ChemDraw installer icon on your desktop and eject the installer.