Choosing the Best 3D CAD Software: A Comprehensive Guide

Developer: CrossBrowser3D

Released: 2016

Platforms: All, in-browser

Ideal for: Education (middle/high school), 3D Printing

Price: $599 or a free simplified version

SelfCAD is a basic in-browser direct modeling environment for those wanting to get their feet wet in 3D. It offers multiple options for starting objects that the user can then modify, sculpt, or combine with other objects. SelfCAD allows some parametric control through sketching and extruding, revolving, or lofting these sketches. SVG images can be imported for custom extrusions. Details such as roundovers and chamfers can be added to individual edges in a fairly intuitive user interface with tutorial videos ready at hand.

The free version includes a basic set of modeling and sculpting tools, MyMiniFactory database integration, and a rendering engine for semi-professional visualizations. The paid version costs $140/year or $599 for a perpetual license and includes mesh modifiers, 3D sketching, file import/export, basic animation, ImageTo3D, and 3D printing support.

Developer: Autodesk

Released: 2011

Platforms: All WebGL-enabled browsers

Ideal for: Education (elementary/middle school), 3D Printing

Price: Free

The successor to Autodesk 123D, TinkerCAD is simple enough to teach even the youngest among us about 3D modeling. Start from a library of shapes and build upon them using standard primitives which can then be accurately rotated, moved, and rescaled before landing in their intended position. Granted, this virtual block-building approach results in simplistic shapes, but the upside is an easy-to-learn user interface that stimulates the creativity of young minds towards creating surprisingly refreshing results.

TinkerCAD works in-browser with cloud storage and is entirely free. Shape libraries include standard primitives, hinges and ball joints to make movable parts, as well as 3D printable fossils and pieces from the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History.

Developer: Robert McNeel & Associates

Released: 1998

Platforms: Windows, macOS with limited features

Ideal for: Part Design, Freeform Surfacing, Footwear, 3D Printing, Data-Driven Design, Jewelry

Price: $995, $195 for students

Rhinoceros is the best introduction kit for anyone intending to dive into the world of professional 3D modeling. Its tutorials are high-level right from the start as is its user interface. This is unavoidable given the unlimited modeling features and toolsets the program offers. As the user’s expertise grows, so will his or her familiarity with hotkeys and textual input methods which drastically speed up the workflow. Another nice feature is that Rhino has layers. This allows the grouping of specific selection sets, visualizing them in different colors, which altogether improves the level of organization.

Rhino3D is a freeform NURBS-based surface modeler especially suited for creating complex artwork or graphics using complex surface blends, two-rail sweeps, and dummy surface transitions. It is also used in the professional areas of product design, jewelry, footwear, and automotive surfacing. What makes the software unique is the active online community and availability of third-party plugins which extend its use towards fields like architecture, 3D printing, and landscaping.

The most notable Rhino plugin is Grasshopper3D. In a separate window, it has its own node-based flowchart interface in which complex models and patterns can be crafted, even simulated, by scripting. These can be transferred to the Rhino viewport in a process called ‘baking’. Grasshopper itself knows dozens of plugins for almost unlimited functionality. There are Matrix and Peacock for jewelry design, Weaverbird for mesh smoothening, HoopSnake and Anemone for iterative feedback loops, Kangaroo for physics-based simulation, Lunchbox for panelization, Millipede for structural analysis and optimization, and Nudibranch for vector field mapping. Grasshopper models are hardly ever watertight and will need substantial rework in Rhino before being 3D printable.

Rhinoceros can be purchased by students for just under two hundred dollars, whereas regular users will pay nearly a thousand. Grasshopper3D and most important plugins are free to download.

Developer: Autodesk

Released: 2013

Platforms: Windows (x64), macOS

Ideal for: Product/Part Design, Makerspaces, 3D Printing

Price: $495/year, free for students and startups

Fusion 360 is Autodesk’s cloud-based CAD solution that is entirely free for students and startups. Models can be parametrically defined and the program includes a simplified version of a history tree that can be disabled for direct modeling approaches. The modern user interface incorporates seven workspaces. In the Design workbench, parts are created using basic operators for solid and surface geometry. There are inspection and assembly design tools as with other software, even if the toolkit is somewhat reduced to the essentials. It is also possible to import standard components from the inventory of various suppliers such as McMaster-Carr, 3M, ABB, Bosch, Essentra, Fabory, Farnell, Lego, NXP, Mitsubishi, Panasonic, Philips, Siemens, and hundreds of others.

Parts can be tested on mechanical stress, vibrations, thermal properties, buckling loads, and impact events in the Simulation workbench. This also includes Shape Optimization where designers can employ the power of artificial intelligence for optimal shape finding given specific load cases. The output is a complex part that can be converted into a B-rep and further developed with polygonal modeling tools.

The Generative Design workbench is part of a paid subscription and akin to Shape Optimization. It allows for the incorporation not just of mechanical load cases, but of several different input parameters and the creation of several output variants targeted to specific materials and manufacturing techniques. Three additional workbenches are present for basic animations, renderings, and production drawings. The key advantage of being a cloud-based CAD platform is that resource-intensive operations happen on the network, independent of the local workstation’s processing power.

As you can read in our tutorial, Fusion 360 is very well suited for creating 3D printable parts and offers direct integration with Formlabs 3D printers.

Developer: Dassault Systèmes

Released: 1995

Platforms: Windows

Ideal for: Product Design & Engineering, University-level Education, Furniture, Medical

Price: $3,995+$1,295/year, $99/year for students

SolidWorks is the most widely used professional 3D CAD software worldwide. It is also notorious for being the antithesis of direct modeling. Nothing can be dragged, sculpted, or directly manipulated in any other way. With constraint-based modeling, all features are saved in a history tree along with their parameters. Right from the first sketch, the designer needs to input numbers to lock the sketch into its intended position, as well as its relationships to other elements of the design. The same goes for assemblies. Parts are tightly interconnected to other parts, and subassemblies to other assemblies. Where part constraints define product geometry and manufacturing intent, mating constraints determine how parts can move in an assembly.

The main advantage of this style of modeling is that in case of updates and revisions, the model will dynamically update as the design requirements change. Once this is mastered, it will become increasingly intuitive. This powerful way of modeling requires careful planning and a rigorously procedural working method as opposed to more exploratory approaches. One of the software’s downsides is that errors will happen in the feature tree when parts are not properly constrained or surfaces consist of multiple complex input curves. This can happen even on reloading the same part, causing the history tree to light up with red warnings as if it was a Christmas tree. In worst-case scenarios, error handling can take days for hefty assemblies.

SolidWorks offers both powerful solid modeling as well as surfacing tools, such as lofts, single-rail sweeps, boundary surfaces, fills, curvature fillets, shelling, and surface flattening. Besides part design modules, SolidWorks offers advanced assembly design, sheet metal design, mechanical simulation, mold flow analysis, 3D scan data import, and photorealistic rendering. Despite criticisms of not being able to modify mesh files for 3D printing, it does a good job in exporting STL files from solid or surface models, even if these need some post-optimization. For more information on its capabilities, read our SolidWorks tutorial for 3D printing.

Whereas the professional version of SolidWorks requires an upfront investment of several thousands of dollars and a yearly fee of well over one thousand dollars, for students the entire software package costs only a hundred dollars a year and is often available for free through educational institutions.

Developer: PTC

Released: 2012

Platforms: iOS, Android, Linux, macOS, Windows

Ideal for: Product and part design

Price: $1,500/year, free for students and teachers

Being cloud-based and originated by the co-founder of SolidWorks, Onshape aspires to become one of the game-changers in the world of 21st century CAD. It does not have the advanced surface modeling features of SolidWorks, Rhino, or Creo yet, but new features are being added with continuous updates. What Onshape does offer is a synchronous collaboration from multiple workstations including smartphones and browsers on Macs, task automation with FeatureScript, sheet metal tools, content libraries, a mold design wizard, analytics, version control, and the possibility to save selection sets.

Other than that, it is comparable to SolidWorks in being a constraint-based parametric modeler. Changing a feature consequently changes all related features downstream, even up to the production drawings. It excels in the way it organizes (potentially table-driven) inter-part relationships, which enables optimized multi-part design and sets a higher bar for how parametric design should be experienced.

Developer: Pixologic

Released: 1999

Platforms: Windows, macOS

Ideal for: Art, Game Design, 3D Printing, Jewelry

Price: free, US$895 or US$360/year

To make the intricate geometries 3D printing is renowned for, designers either turn to generative solutions like Grasshopper3D or sculpting environments. In the latter category, ZBrush remains the reigning champion. Its comprehensive set of tools ensures an enjoyable and efficient crafting process. If the designer wants to create a limb, there is a dedicated brush to pull one out of a body. Alternatively, he or she can add a ready-made one from the inbuilt libraries. Mesh topologies can be perfected towards just the right level of detail (LOD) for each specific area. Creasing and pinching tools can be attuned to gain just the right effect which is crucial in complex sculpts such as photorealistic portraits. Custom brushes can be created for rapid three-dimensional texturizing. Randomized scattering of objects and textures can be done with nanomesh.

ZBrush to some extent works with solids in that geometric primitives can be parametrically set up, for example, for different bracelet sizings. These are converted into sculptable meshes using the PolyMesh3D tool. With ZModeler, an essential subset of mesh editing tools, edges can be individually highlighted for making roundovers, bevels, selective creasing, or smoothening. The user can start with a wireframe skeleton and add clay to it, just like a real sculpt. Zspheres are another way of creating a base body instead of having to sculpt the proportions manually. Multiple bodies can be generated and sculpted in the same space, enabling the creation of environments rather than individual objects. Rulers and numerical input fields ensure accuracy where needed. Gem Cut Studio makes it possible to import gemstones and prong settings. Lastly, there is a direct bridge to Keyshot for instant photorealistic rendering. These flagship features set ZBrush apart from other sculpting engines and makes it suitable for a variety of industries. For an impression of ZBrush’s sculpting possibilities for hyperrealism, check out our story with Modern Life Workshop.

Developer: Dassault Systèmes

Released: 1982

Platforms: Windows, Unix

Ideal for: Automotive, Aerospace, Product Design, Engineering, Assembly Design

Price: approx. $12,000 + $2,000/year

CATIA is an acronym for Computer-Aided Three-Dimensional Interactive Application and at the same time the most advanced modeling system on the planet. CATIA is not just CAD but a fully-fledged digital infrastructure towards manufacturing of the most complex products such as cars at Ford, Honda, Tesla, and Renault, and aircraft at Airbus and Boeing.

It includes the same high-level control offered by history-based modeling as known from other parametric modelers, together with advanced integration for CAM and CAE. In addition, it has top-notch surfacing features in its Generative Shape Design and FreeStyle modules, while the Shape Sculptor allows freeform sculpting in virtual clay. Furthermore, there are modules for sheet metal design, composite parts, tooling, assembly design, drafting, rendering, part repair, weldments, tolerancing, reverse engineering from scan data, aerodynamics design, structural analysis, ergonomics evaluation, virtual reality with 3DExperience to explore styling variants, CNC machining, generative design, lattice designer for additive manufacturing, and file preparation for 3D printing. A drawback of CATIA is that it, being driven by a decades-old backbone, can result in longer waiting times for large assemblies.

Developer: PTC

Released: 1982

Platforms: Windows, Unix

Ideal for: Product Design & Engineering, Automotive, Virtual Reality

Price: $2,310

Formerly known as Pro/Engineer, Creo is a fully parametric modeling package. It is suitable for working for assemblies of over 1,000 parts and as such is used by corporations like Aston Martin, John Deere, Volkswagen, Toyota, and Amazon. It combines solid, surfacing, and polygonal modeling approaches plus an advanced generative design module for shape optimization. Surfacing tools such as blends and sweeps are somewhat more reliable than in some other competing software packages.

Engineers will benefit from investing in Creo’s Advanced Plus package which includes advanced surfacing, a 3D printing slicer, GD&T, mold design, and simulation. When combining Creo with PTC’s PLM solution Windchill, it offers the user high-level management of assemblies, part lists and vendors, access and revision control, and much more.

Developer: Siemens

Released: 1973

Platforms: Windows (x64)

Ideal for: Product Design & Engineering, Medical, Automotive, PLM

Price: $5,900 + $1,600/year

Until Siemens took over in 2007, NX was known as Unigraphics. Like its fellow contenders in the race for the best CAD package, NX offers advanced part design, assembling, and drafting functionalities as well as high-level solutions towards PLM, CAM, and CAE. This is why large companies like Apple, Tata, Mazda, Nissan, Daimler Mercedes, and SpaceX have adopted it, some even abandoning powerful systems such as CATIA for the migration to NX. Needless to say, it is a state-of-the-art system.

What sets it apart is its hybrid modeling approach with freeform mesh, solid, and Class-A surfacing methods part of the toolkit that approach the quality of CATIA. Without letting go completely of constraint-based modeling, NX’s so-called Synchronous Technology allows users to push and pull on certain features of the model for intelligent direct editing. Siemens NX is especially user-friendly and even has an adaptive UI that predicts commands that will be used most frequently in future projects. A disadvantage is that the old Unigraphics codebase still lingers on behind the scenes, causing some aspects of the program to run more slowly than expected.

Developer: Jürgen Riegel, Werner Mayer, Yorik van Havre

Released: 2002

Platforms: Linux, Unix, macOS, Windows

Ideal for: Concept and part design, 3D Printing

Price: free

For those looking for a free CAD solution beyond the levels of TinkerCAD, but at the same time without the professional prowess of Fusion360, there is FreeCAD. FreeCAD is parametric to some extent as designers build up parts from sketches with dimensional constraints. The engine works mainly with solids but offers some surface-based operations as well. These are by far not as diverse and advanced as with other players in the industry, but do the job to three-dimensionally visualize a concept. And there is the rare option for a two-rail sweep. Instead of a feature tree, there is an undo/redo stack the program keeps track of. In addition, sketches remain linked to surfaces so the model will update to some extent with post hoc changes.

FreeCAD is not perfect. Constraining sketches can become a bit messy, especially when adding mirror operations and multiple tangent curves. Trimming surfaces can get glitchy as well. Fortunately, though, there are workarounds for many of these cases. The icon-based user interface feels a bit outdated. Hotkeys are available for the most important commands, and overall, the tool takes a bit of a learning curve to master.

The most important additional features are a Mesh Design workbench with mesh repair and STL file export features for 3D printing, a ray trace rendering workbench, one for structural finite element analysis (FEA), and computational fluid dynamics (CFD). This is called OpenFoam and can be used for fluid flow and aerodynamics analysis. FreeCAD is open-source and parts of it, such as added animation features, can be scripted in Python or through a C++ API.

Developer: NeoGeo

Released: 1994

Platforms: Linux, macOS, Windows, Android, BSD

Ideal for: Visual FX, Character Design, Art, Animation, 3D Printing, Virtual Reality

Price: free

Blender has grown up to be a popular open-source alternative to all-encompassing animation studios such as Maya and 3D Studio Max. Its combination of advanced mesh modeling and sculpting renders it attractive for visual effects artists as well as 3D printing enthusiasts.

CG artists will enjoy the intuitive rendering engine, motion tracking capabilities, inverse kinematics for character rigging, and advanced simulation effects such as particle clouds, smoke, fluids, explosions, cloth, skin, and collisions. For beginners in 3D printing or those coming from a more engineering-minded CAD environment, the transition to Blender will entail a steep learning curve. It is probably better to stick to one modeling approach or the other. Nonetheless, once its toolsets have been mastered, the sky's the limit. Meshes can be carefully controlled to create the smallest and most complex of details. They can be deformed by bending, twisting, tapering, stretching, and much more. Blender is based on polygonal modeling yet it allows for some numerical input, for example in the new Geometry Nodes workspace which works much like Grasshopper. Also, mesh modifiers are saved in the modifier stack and can be changed at any point during the modeling process. A nice feature for 3D printing is converting a mesh to a wireframe. This can result in lattice-like structures with intricate patterning that are only realizable using a 3D printer.

Compared to the commercial giants in the marketplace that cost nearly US$2,000/year, Blender is a bit harder to learn, slightly more error-prone regarding features such as mesh booleans, a tad more limited in sculpting features, and overall better tailored to small projects. Nevertheless, it is a great start for those interested in mesh modeling for 3D printing.

Developer: Trimble Inc.

Released: 2000

Platforms: Windows, macOS

Ideal for: Concept layouts, Architecture, Landscaping Design

Price: Free, Pro $299/year, Studio $699/year, $55/year for students and teachers

SketchUp is one of the simplest entry points for those taking a first dive into the world of 3D modeling. In its ability to quickly set up layout drawings it is popular among architects for rough explorations and demonstrations at the front end of the development process. Paired with a rendering plug-in such as V-Ray, Thea, Maxwell, or the free Lumion LiveSync, as well as the inbuilt fly-through feature, it can be a powerful visualization tool.

Besides setting up a model from scratch it is possible to draw one of the thousands of models out of the 3D Warehouse. And where the possibilities for 3D modeling seem a bit restricted at first, there is the Extension Warehouse for hundreds of additional features. With the right plug-ins, users are empowered to draw complex curves, perform edge chamfers and fillets, do advanced vertex editing and mesh modifications, add project documentation, export STL files for 3D printing, STEP files for other CAD environments, or Keyshot files for external rendering, use Boolean operators, surface flattening, or add parametric modeling to the workflow. It has a bit of a learning curve and even though some modeling features will remain cumbersome or even non-existent, SketchUp is a worthwhile candidate for both the amateur and professional modeler.

SketchUp has a free in-browser app but to take full advantage of additional modules the Pro version is required. SketchUp Shop costs less than half of that and does not have plug-in support but adds the Augmented Reality viewer.

Developer: Autodesk

Released: 2009

Platforms: Windows, macOS

Ideal for: 3D Printing

Price: free

MeshMixer is the digital Swiss army knife for creating and preparing meshes for 3D printing. In its simplicity, it is to meshes what TinkerCAD is to solids. From a shape library, existing geometry can be imported and combined with the mesh. It is possible to extend the library with your own creations as well. When 3D scanning data is imported, it is possible to extract a partial surface and join it with new geometry for precisely fitting parts or wearables.

Mesh operations are limited to thickening, hollowing, bridging, plane cuts, smoothening, boolean operations, and extruding. Images can be projected for embossing or debossing. Equally interesting are the sculpting tools. Not as extensive as those of ZBrush or Mudbox, yet they are sufficient for developing simple 3D printable items. The mesh repair and support generation tools are among the best in its class, making MeshMixer one of the essential free tools to own for anyone with a 3D printer.

For more information, check out our MeshMixer tutorial with 15 tips to edit STL files for 3D printing.

Developer: Microsoft

Released: 2013

Platforms: Windows 10 with Creators Update + mobile

Ideal for: Education (elementary/middle school), 3D Printing

Price: Free

For those who are just getting started with 3D printing and have a 3D model downloaded and ready to print, there is no need to invest in any extraneous CAD software since Windows has a built-in solution. What seems like merely a viewer at first sight also offers some possibilities for texture painting, simple edits including boolean operations, and even three-dimensional engravings and embossings using text and images are part of its repertoire.

3D Builder is a compact application freely obtained from the Microsoft Store. It is compatible with the MS Scan app for importing 3D scan data. It uses the 3MF file format but exports STL and OBJ files as well.