FreeCAD

Your own 3D Parametric Modeler

Website • Documentation • Forum • Bug tracker • Git repository • Blog

[Release] [Crowdin]

Overview

• Freedom to build what you want FreeCAD is an open-source parametric 3D modeler for designing real-life objects of any size. Parametric modeling lets you modify a design by changing parameters in its model history.

• Create 3D from 2D and back FreeCAD lets you sketch geometry-constrained 2D shapes and use them as a base to build other objects. It also provides tools to adjust dimensions and create high-quality production drawings from 3D models.

• Designed for your needs FreeCAD is designed to fit a wide range of uses including product design, mechanical engineering and architecture, whether you are a hobbyist, programmer, experienced CAD user, student or teacher.

• Cross platform FreeCAD runs on Windows, macOS and Linux operating systems.

• Underlying technology

  • OpenCASCADE A powerful geometry kernel, the most important component of FreeCAD
  • Coin3D library Open Inventor-compliant 3D scene representation model
  • Python FreeCAD offers a broad Python API
  • Qt Graphical user interface built with Qt

Installing

Precompiled packages for stable releases are available for Windows, macOS and Linux on the latest releases page.

On most Linux distributions, FreeCAD is also directly installable from the software center application.

For weekly development releases visit the releases page.

Other options are described on the wiki Download page.

Compiling

See the Developers Handbook – Getting Started for build instructions.

Reporting Issues

To report an issue please:

• Consider posting to the Forum, Discord channel, or Reddit to verify the issue;
• Search the existing issues for potential duplicates;
• Use the most updated stable or development versions of FreeCAD;
• Post version info from Help > About FreeCAD > Copy to clipboard;
• Restart FreeCAD in safe mode Help > Restart in safe mode and try to reproduce the issue again. If the issue is resolved it can be fixed by deleting the FreeCAD config files.
• Start recording a macro Macro > Macro recording... and repeat all steps. Stop recording after the issue occurs and upload the saved macro or copy the macro code in the issue;
• Post a Step-By-Step explanation on how to recreate the issue;
• Upload an example file (FCStd as ZIP file) to demonstrate the problem;

For more details see:

• Bug Tracker
• Reporting Issues and Requesting Features
• Contributing
• Help Forum

[!NOTE] The FPA offers developers the opportunity to apply for a grant to work on projects of their choosing. Check jobs and funding to know more.

Usage & Getting Help

The FreeCAD wiki contains documentation on general usage and Python scripting. View these pages for more information:

• Getting started
• Features list
• Frequent questions
• Workbenches
• Scripting
• Developers Handbook

The FreeCAD forum is a great place to find help and solve specific problems when learning to use FreeCAD.