MATLAB

Desktop:

• Live Editor: Create live functions with richly formatted documentation, including equations and images
• Live Editor: Debug live functions and scripts
• Live Editor: Add sliders and drop-down lists to control variable values in a live script
• Live Editor: Sort table data interactively
• Live Editor: Create a table of contents and add formatted code examples​
• Live Editor: Select and edit a rectangular area of code
• Add-Ons Explorer: Browse by category to discover convenient, helpful add-ons
• Comparison Tool: Find differences in live scripts and functions
• Favorites: Rerun favorite commands
• Toolbox Packaging: Specify portability information for custom toolboxes

Language and Programming:

• Empty Arrays: Create complex empty arrays using functions such as zeros and ones
• Code Compatibility Report: Generate compatibility report from Current Folder browser
• timer Object: Access properties with multilevel indexing

Mathematics:

• Graph and digraph Objects: Work with multigraphs that have multiple edges between two nodes
• Graph and digraph Objects: Calculate component sizes and weighted adjacency matrices
• GraphPlot Object: Visualize graphs with additional options for 'force', 'force3', and 'circle' layouts
• Polyshape Objects: Analyze polygons with turningdist, nearestvertex, and overlaps functions
• Polyshape Objects: Return vertex map and accept arrays with compatible sizes for intersect, subtract, union, and xor functions
• Polybuffer Function: Create buffer around points or lines
• Triangulation Objects: Find neighboring vertices and locations of query points with improved performance
• ode45 Function: Solve nonstiff differential equations faster

Graphics:

• Axes Object: View axes at small size with improved layout, limit selection, and font scaling
• Axes Object: Map data values to colormap using linear or logarithmic scale
• Legend Object: Create legends with multiple columns
• heatmap Function: Zoom and pan data, display data tips, and sort rows and columns interactively
• geobubble Function: Explore with interactive data tips and a scale bar​ ​
• Axes Toolbar: Add toolbars to your axes for quick access to pan, zoom, and other data exploration tools
• Property Inspector: Modify graphics interactively with an improved property inspector
• Polygon Object: Control color and transparency of hole edges

Data Import and Export:

• Readtable Function: Specify the number of rows to read from a text file using import options
• Readtable Function: Easily manage prefixes and suffixes from data using import options
• Preview Function: Preview first 8 rows of a table in a file without importing the full table
• imageDatastore Function: Work with millions of images with improved memory usage and performance
• Datastore Functions: Seamlessly work with datasets stored on cloud and local machines
• Datastore Functions: Read HDFS data more easily when using Hortonworks or Cloudera
• Readtable, detectImportOptions, datastore, and tabularTextDatastore Functions: Automatically detect and return duration data in text files
• detectImportOptions Function: Control import properties of duration data
• VideoReader Function: Read video files faster on all platforms
• VideoWriter Function: Write video files faster on all platforms
• openDiskFile Function: Read data files in FITS (Flexible Image Transport System) data format
• Webwrite Function: Support for NTLM authentication

Data Analysis:

• groupsummary Function: Group and discretize data for summary operations on table and timetable variables
• Table and Timetable Variables: Add, delete, and rearrange column-oriented variables with the functions addvars, removevars, movevars, splitvars, mergevars, rows2vars, and inner2outer
• Preallocated Tables and Timetables: Initialize table and timetable variables so that they have specified sizes and data types
• Regular Timetables: Create regularly spaced timetables using a time step or sampling rate
• retime and synchronize Functions: Synchronize timetables to a time step or sampling rate that you specify
• duration Arrays: Create duration arrays from text that represents elapsed times
• normalize Function: Normalize array, table, and timetable data
• tall Arrays: Operate on tall arrays with more functions, including smoothdata, find, and isoutlier
• tall Array Indexing: Use tall numeric arrays to index the first dimension
• tall Arrays: Solve linear systems Ax = b
• tall Arrays: Return group labels with findgroups
• tall Arrays: Set date and time components of tall datetime and tall duration arrays
• tall Arrays: Set properties of tall tables and tall timetables

App Building:

• App Designer: Create deployed web apps using MATLAB Compiler
• App Designer: Add and configure tree components on the App Designer canvas
• App Designer: Select from recently used argument sets when running apps with input arguments
• App Designer: Edit axes title and label directly in the canvas
• GUIDE: Migrate GUIDE apps to App Designer
• App Testing Framework: Author automated tests for App Designer apps
• Figure Objects: Maximize and minimize figures programmatically
• uitable Function: Specify data as table array
• uidatepicker Function: Add date selection controls to apps
• uiprogressdlg Function: Create modal in-app progress dialog boxes to apps
• uitree Function: Create trees with editable node text in the running app
• Component Text Alignment: Improved text alignment for labels, check boxes, and radio buttons

Performance:

• Startup: Increased speed of MATLAB startup time
• Execution Engine: Execute tight loops with scalar math faster
• Execution Engine: Improved performance for common programming patterns
• App Designer: Starting, loading, and layout tasks are faster

Hardware Support:

• Raspberry Pi: Support for Raspberry Pi Zero W board
• MATLAB Online: Acquire live images from USB webcams in MATLAB Online

Advanced Software Development:

• Tab Completion: Describe your function syntaxes for custom tab completion and other contextual suggestions
• Unit Testing Framework: Run tests from the MATLAB Editor toolstrip
• App Testing Framework: Author automated tests for App Designer apps
• Unit Testing Framework: Rerun failed tests with one click
• Unit Testing Framework: Test if values point to existing files or folders with IsFile and IsFolder constraints
• Unit Testing Framework: Test if two sets are the same with IsSameSetAs constraint
• Unit Testing Framework: Select tests by test class hierarchy
• Unit Testing Framework: Direct output stream to unique files for plugins
• Unit Testing Framework: Increased access to parameterized testing properties
• Unit Testing Framework: Compare cell arrays of character arrays using StringComparator
• Unit Testing Framework: Comparison method for objects changed
• Performance Testing Framework: Define multiple, labeled measurement boundaries in test methods
• Mocking Framework: Specify default property values on mock object
• Mocking Framework: Obtain interaction history for mock object
• Mocking Framework: Construct mocks for classes that have Abstract properties with other attributes
• matlab.net.http Package: Stream data to and from a web service and handle forms and multipart messages
• C++ MEX Interface: Access MATLAB data and objects easier from C++
• Class Constructors: Author subclass without implementing a constructor solely to pass arguments through to a superclass constructor
• Property Validation: Get information about property validation
• Property Validation: Define validation for abstract properties
• Functions: Call numArgumentsFromSubscript for object dot method from overloaded subsref
• Classes: Concatenate matlab.lang.OnOffSwitchState enumeration members with nonmember char and string
• Python Version 3.4: Support discontinued
• Source Control Integration: View changes, save revisions, and manage repository locks
• MATLAB Engine API for C++: Set and get a property value on an object in an object array
• MATLAB Data API: Applications built with R2018a API do not run in MATLAB R2017b
• MEX Functions: Build C MEX Files with Interleaved Complex API
• MEX Functions: Release-specific build options
• Version Embedded in MEX Files
• Perl 5.26.1: MATLAB support
• System objects: Create System Objects in MATLAB
• System object support for strings
• .NET: Supports string data type
• Compiler support changed for building MEX files and standalone MATLAB engine and MAT-file applications