Free online 3D viewer

Open the model in the viewer above, click Share in the top-right corner, and choose Copy a review link or Send it by email. You'll create a free MeshMarkup account on the way (it takes a few seconds), and the model you have open comes with you.

Your client gets one link. It opens the actual 3D model in their browser, not a render or a screenshot, and they click the exact spot they want to talk about to leave a note. Each note remembers the camera angle it was written from, so when you open it you see precisely what they saw. No more "the bit on the left, near the top".

You can also do this from inside MeshMarkup: upload the model, open it, and use Share to make a link or email it. Every link records whether it has been opened.

No. A review link opens in any modern browser on a computer, tablet or phone. Your client types their name once so you know who said what, and that's it: no sign-up, no password, no plugin, no download. They never count as a seat on your plan.

Drop a file onto the box above, or click it to choose one. The model opens straight away, framed to fit. Then:

• Rotate: drag with the left mouse button (one finger on a touchscreen)
• Pan: drag with the right mouse button (two fingers on a touchscreen)
• Zoom: scroll the mouse wheel, or pinch
• Jump to a standard view: press 1 for isometric, 2 front, 3 side, 4 top
• Wireframe: press W to see the mesh topology over the surface
• Grid: press G to show a floor grid for scale and orientation
• Part names: hover over any part to read its name from the file (press N to switch names off and on)
• Measure: click measure, then click two points on the model

Nothing you do here changes the file. Click Open another to load a different model.

GLB and glTF open directly. These also open by converting them in your browser first, with nothing sent anywhere:

• FBX (Autodesk)
• OBJ, with its MTL materials when zipped together
• STL (3D printing and CAD)
• STEP / STP and IGES / IGS (CAD: SolidWorks, Fusion, Inventor, CATIA, Onshape, FreeCAD)
• 3DM (Rhino)
• 3MF (3D printing)
• PLY (scans and point-based meshes)
• DAE (Collada)
• 3DS (legacy 3ds Max)

You can also drop a .zip containing a model with its textures (for example an OBJ with its .mtl and image files, or a .gltf with its .bin), and they're put back together.

Native files from Blender (.blend), 3ds Max (.max), Maya (.ma/.mb), Cinema 4D (.c4d) and SketchUp (.skp) can't be read outside their own programs. Export to GLB, FBX or OBJ first — if you drop one in, the viewer tells you which menu to use.

Yes, STEP (.step, .stp) and IGES (.iges, .igs) open here. The exact CAD surfaces are turned into a mesh in your browser with OpenCascade, the open-source CAD kernel. Assemblies keep their part names and colours, and the model comes in at its real size, so measurements read true.

SolidWorks (.sldprt, .sldasm), Inventor (.ipt, .iam), Fusion (.f3d) and CATIA files are closed formats that only their own programs can read, so save or export them as STEP first. In SolidWorks that's File → Save As → STEP, and it keeps the assembly.

Very large assemblies can take several seconds to convert and need a fair amount of memory. A desktop browser is the better place for those.

Not by the viewer. The file is read directly in your browser, and any conversion (FBX, STEP, Rhino and the rest) happens on your own computer too. Nothing is sent to a server, so nothing is stored and there's nothing to delete afterwards. That's why it's safe to use for a client's unreleased product.

The model is only uploaded if you choose to share it, and then only to your own MeshMarkup account, where it's private. Review links are unlisted, are never indexed by search engines, and can be switched off at any time.

Open it here and look under the viewer: it shows the file size and the number of triangles, meshes, materials and nodes in the model. Press W for wireframe to see where the density is — useful before sending a model to a game engine, a web configurator or an AR app, where the triangle budget matters.

Click measure (top of the viewer), then click two points on the surface. The straight-line distance between them is shown on the model. Click clear to start again.

Distances assume the file is in metres, which is the glTF standard. STEP and IGES files are converted to metres for you, so they read correctly. STL and OBJ files carry no units and are often modelled in millimetres, so a 40 mm part may read as 40 m. The proportions are right; only the unit is off.

Usually because the textures are separate files the viewer hasn't been given. OBJ, FBX, DAE and .gltf files often point to images next to them. Zip the model together with its texture folder (and the .mtl, for an OBJ) and drop the zip in — or export a GLB, which carries everything in one file.

Some formats have no materials at all: STL and most PLY files are geometry only, so they show in a neutral grey. STEP files keep the colours set in CAD, but not rendering materials.

GLB is the most reliable format to share, because the model, materials and textures travel in one file:

• Blender: File → Export → glTF 2.0, with Format set to glTF Binary (.glb)
• 3ds Max: the Babylon.js exporter or the built-in glTF exporter (2023 and later)
• Maya: File → Export All → glTF Binary, with the Babylon or Maya glTF exporter
• Cinema 4D: File → Export → glTF (.glb)
• SketchUp: File → Export → 3D Model → glTF, or export as FBX or OBJ
• Any CAD package: save as STEP, which opens here directly

The viewer itself has no fixed limit: because the file stays on your computer, the limit is your device's memory. Models of a few hundred megabytes open fine on a desktop. On a phone or tablet it works the same way with touch controls, but very heavy models are better opened on a computer.

When you share a model through MeshMarkup, your plan's storage applies. The free plan includes 50 MB, enough for most models sent for review.

Yes. The viewer is free with no account, no watermark and no limit on how many files you open.

Sharing a model for feedback needs a free MeshMarkup account. The free plan covers one project and three new models every 30 days, and paid plans have no limit on new models, and add version history with side-by-side comparison, client sign-off and a team. You only pay if you outgrow it.

Mark each note as you fix it, then upload the new version to the same model. Notes still open move across to the new version with their replies, and nothing said about the old one is lost. Share the new version with a fresh link, and you can overlay the two versions so your client sees exactly what moved. (Several versions per model come with the paid plans; the free plan keeps one.)