Supported CAD Files

A supported CAD file is a file format that can be imported or exported in Visual Components Professional 5.0.

Name Version Extension Import Export
3D Manufacturing Format

1.2.3

 .3mf ✔ ✔
3D Studio All .3ds ✔ ✔
ACIS Up to 2023 .sat, .sab ✔ ❌
ASCII Point Cloud file* All .xyz, .pts, .xyzrgb ✔ ❌

Autodesk FBX*

 FBX ASCII: 7100 to 7500. Binary: all.

.fbx

✔

❌
Autodesk Inventor Up to 2026 .ipt, .iam ✔ ❌
Autodesk Naviswork Version 2012 to 2026 *.nwd ✔ ❌
Autodesk RealDWG* AutoCAD 2000-2019 .dwg, .dxf ✔ ✔
Binary point cloud file* All .bxyz ✔ ❌
CATIA V4 Up to 4.2.5 .session, .dlv, .exp ✔ ❌
CATIA V5 Up to V5_6R2025 .CATDrawing, .CATPart, .CATProduct,  .CATShape, .cgr ✔ ❌
CATIA V6 3DXML 4.3 .3dxml ✔ ❌
COLLADA All .dae ✔ ❌
Creo Pro/Engineer 19.0 to Creo  12.4.0.0 .asm, .neu, .prt, .xas, .xpr ✔ ❌
E57 1.0 .e57 ✔ ❌
GL Transmission Format Version 2.0 only .gltf, .glb ✔ ❌
I-deas Up to 13.x (NX5) and NX I-deas 6 .mf1, .arc, .unv, .pkg ✔ ❌
IFC IFC2 up to 2.3.0.1, IFC4 up to 4.3 .ifc, .iczip ✔ ❌
IGES 5.1 to 5.3 .igs, .iges ✔ ❌
Igrip/Quest/VNC All .pdb ✔ ✔
JT* Up to 10.9 .jt ✔ ✔
Parasolid Up to v37.1 .x_b, .x_t, .xmt, .xmt_txt ✔ ❌
PRC All .prc ✔ ✔
Revit 2015 to 2025 .rvt ✔ ❌
Robface All .rf ✔ ❌
Rhino From 4 to 8 .3dm ✔ ❌
Solid Edge 1 to 20, ST1 to ST10, 2019 to 2025 .asm, .par, .pwd, .psm ✔ ❌
SolidWorks From 97 up to 2025 .sldasm, .sldprt ✔ ❌
STEP* Up to AP 203 ed1/ed2, AP 214 and AP 242 ed1/ed2/ed3 .stp, .step ✔ ✔
Stereo Lithography (ASCII and Binary) All .stl ✔ ✔
U3D ECMA-363 1st, 2nd and 3rd editions .u3d ✔ ✔
Unigraphics (Siemens PLM software NX) UG11 to UG18, UG NX, NX5 to NX12, and NX1847 to NX2506 .u3d ✔ ✔
VDA-FS 1.0 and 2.0 .vda ✔ ❌
VRML* 1.0 and 2.0 .wrl, .vrml ✔ ✔
Wavefront* All .obj ✔ ✔
  • Autodesk FBX exporting requires Visual Components Premium 5.0.
  • When exporting to DWG 2013, a layer is assigned to each object based on component name or if the object has a LayerName property. A color is assigned to geometry based on the color of their material, which is a diffusion vector or RGB color. If geometry has a null or black material, it is not assigned any color, so its color is defined by its layer. The resulting format is DWG, so any DWG reader (CAD software) should be able to access those layers and assign color to them. These layers are visible, for example, in Autodesk DWG TrueView. When importing a DWG, geometry with no color are assigned a black material because RGB values of (0,0,0) equals black. To avoid these issues, set the Material property of a component to something other than null, for example orange.
  • Export to JT does not contain textures.
  • Export to STEP uses AP 242 edition 3 and exports tessellated data. It does not export mathematical data. Be aware when importing an exported STEP file in other CAD systems you might encounter some issues. For example, some CAD systems like Solid Edge try to import STEP files using mathematical data. And some CAD systems do not support or partially support AP 242.
  • Export to VRML does not contain materials
  • Export to OBJ does contain textures.
  • When importing a .xyz point cloud data file, the coordinates should be separated by either an empty space " " or a TAB character.