Guides/Drawing standards
Rename and Merge Layers Across Many Drawings to Your Company Layer Standard
Updated November 5, 2026
Made with LayerSync
Every consultant names layers their own way. The architect's walls are on A-WALL, the engineer's are on WALL, somebody added Walls-New, and one drawing has wall in lower case. Before the set can be plotted, checked against a standard or reused, they all have to become your layer names, in every drawing.
AutoCAD has LAYMRG and the Layer Translator for this, but both work on the drawing that is open, so forty drawings means repeating the same mapping forty times, or writing a script. What you want is the mapping typed once and applied to the whole set.
This guide uses LayerSync, part of CADXChange Toolkit. It reads the layers of every drawing into one grid, or one Excel sheet, where you type the layer each stray layer should merge into. It shows what will move before anything is written, then writes all the drawings in one run with a backup first. The example is four drawings from different sources with 33 layers between them.
1. Read every layer of every drawing
Open LayerSync in Drawings → Excel mode and add the drawings with Add Files… or Add Folder…. The Layers tab lists one row per layer per drawing, with the number of objects on it and its color, linetype and lineweight. Here the four drawings have 33 layers between them.
The Search box takes * and ? wildcards, which makes the mess visible: *wall* shows every spelling of the wall layer across the set. Each drawing has the standard A-WALL, and next to it WALL, Walls-New, wall, WALLS or A-WALL-2.
2. Export to Excel and fill in MergeInto
Clear the search box and click Export to Excel…. The workbook's Layers sheet has the same rows, and two columns are yours to edit: NewName renames the layer, and MergeInto moves every object on the layer onto another layer and then removes the emptied layer. Type the standard layer's name in MergeInto for each stray layer; filter the sheet by layer name and fill down.
In this example 14 rows get a MergeInto value: WALL, wall, WALLS, Walls-New and A-WALL-2 go to A-WALL, DOOR and DOORS to A-DOOR, NOTES and TEXT to A-ANNO-TEXT, and DIMENSION to A-ANNO-DIMS. A layer that has no standard twin in its own drawing needs a rename instead: Level2-Plan has DIMS but no A-ANNO-DIMS, so its NewName becomes A-ANNO-DIMS. Save the workbook next to the drawings.
3. Preview before anything is written
Switch to Excel → Drawings and pick the workbook. The DWG folder defaults to the workbook's folder. The preview lists each drawing with its number of changes: here 15 changes across four drawings, none blocked.
Click a drawing to see its Layers tab. A Merge preview panel regroups the merges by target, for example A-WALL ← WALL, Walls-New: 2 layer(s) merging in, and the row-by-row list sits below it. A row that cannot be written is marked blocked, with the reason, instead of being skipped silently. Leave Automatic backup on.
4. Write all the drawings in one run
Tick the drawings and click Write Selected Files, then confirm. Each drawing is copied to the backup folder first, then written: the objects of every merged layer are moved to the target layer, including objects inside block definitions, and the emptied layer is removed. If a layer being merged away is the drawing's current layer, the target becomes current so that it can go. LayerSync then reopens each saved file and compares what is stored with what was intended.
The recording shows the whole step, from the preview of two drawings to the finished report.
5. Read the report
The Write Report shows every drawing succeeded: 10, 8, 6 and 9 layer rows written, no failures and no mismatches, and the backup folder of the run. Rollback All restores all four drawings from those backups.
The drawings had 10, 8, 6 and 9 layers; they now have 5, 5, 4 and 5, so the set has 19 layers instead of 33.
6. Spot-check the wall layers
Go back to Drawings → Excel and add the drawings again. The *wall* filter that showed nine rows in step 1 now shows four, one A-WALL per drawing. Their object counts are the standard layer's own objects plus everything merged into it: 11, 9, 6 and 7. For Level1-Plan that is 6 + 3 on WALL + 2 on Walls-New, for Level2-Plan 5 + 4 on wall, for Roof-Plan 4 + 2 on WALLS, and for Sections 5 + 2 on A-WALL-2.
A few rules worth knowing. The layer named in MergeInto has to exist in that drawing already; a drawing with none of your standard layers needs two runs: rename one layer to the standard name first, then merge the rest into it. A row can rename or merge, not both. Layer 0 and layers that come from an xref cannot be merged away, and a layer cannot be merged into itself. Merging changes which layer the objects are on, so objects drawn ByLayer take on the target layer's color, linetype and lineweight (the merged walls above turn from grey to the cyan of A-WALL). If the standard layer is new to a drawing, set those properties on it in the same workbook.
The same workbook also changes layer colors, linetypes and states, and the Clean Up mode removes unused layers left behind. CADXChange Toolkit comes with a 30-day full trial, so you can run this on a copy of a real set first.
Try it on your own drawings
CADXChange Toolkit does this for a whole folder of drawings, with a preview and a backup first. The 30-day trial has every feature.
Start the free trial →Before you start — common questions
- How do I merge and rename layers to my company standard across many drawings?
- LayerSync reads the layers of every drawing into one grid, or one Excel sheet, where you type the layer each stray layer should merge into. It shows what will move in a preview, then writes all the drawings in one run with a backup taken first.
- Why not use LAYMRG or the Layer Translator?
- Both work on the drawing that is open, so forty drawings means repeating the same mapping forty times, or writing a script. With LayerSync the mapping is typed once and applied to the whole set.
- What do NewName and MergeInto do?
- NewName renames the layer. MergeInto moves every object on the layer onto another layer and then removes the emptied layer. A row can rename or merge, not both. The layer named in MergeInto has to exist in that drawing already, so a drawing with none of your standard layers needs two runs: rename one layer to the standard name first, then merge the rest into it.
- Which layers cannot be merged?
- Layer 0, layers that come from an xref, and a layer into a copy of itself. A merge whose target layer does not exist in that drawing is not written either. The preview shows such rows as blocked, with the reason, so nothing is skipped silently.
- What happens to the objects' color and linetype after a merge?
- Objects drawn ByLayer take on the target layer's color, linetype and lineweight, because they now sit on that layer. Objects with their own color or linetype keep it. If the standard layer is new to a drawing, set its properties in the same workbook.
- Can I undo it?
- Yes. With Automatic backup ticked, every drawing is copied to the backup folder before it is written. Rollback All on the report restores the originals, and Restore Backup does the same for earlier runs.