How OwlCAD works

• Getting started — The whole workflow — place a shape, refine it, and export a printable file.
• Build a name keychain — Your name in raised 3D text on a plate with a ring loop — a printable keychain from scratch.
• Build a numbered die — A cube with recessed pips — boolean subtraction and a duplicated pattern in one quick project.
• Build a phone stand — A sloped stand with a lip and a charging notch — fuse, hollow, and cut in one project.
• Build a box with a lid that fits — A shelled tray and a plug lid — and the clearance that makes the difference.
• Build a wall hook — A screw-mounted J-hook — and the first project whose print check finds a real problem.
• Build a cookie cutter — Turn any shape into a cutter for dough, clay or fondant — traced from a model, or drawn by hand.
• Build a Gridfinity drawer insert — A baseplate and two bins, built by a generator instead of by hand.
• Build an enclosure for a dev board — A standoff plate and a vented project box — two generators composed into one assembly.
• Build a screw-top jar — A container and a lid whose threads mate because they were generated together.
• Build a hose adapter — Join two sizes nobody sells an adapter for — barbs, a hex grip, and a bore that is not a bottleneck.
• Carve a channel through a model — Run a tapering, curving tube through any shape and subtract it — dice towers, lamp cords, marble runs.
• Bolt a printed part to something — Screw holes, nut traps and heat-set inserts — cut the space the hardware needs, at the size the standard says.
• Vent a panel with slots or honeycomb — Slots, holes or honeycomb through any panel — and why bar width is the number that decides whether it prints.
• Loft a duct between two openings — Round at one end, rectangular at the other — a loft skins between outlines that have nothing in common.
• Edit an STL you downloaded — Import it, repair it, and add your own geometry — starting with the repair, because a broken mesh fails silently.
• Combine shapes (booleans) — Union, subtract, or intersect selected solids.
• Arrange overview — Align, mirror, pattern, and orient objects.
• Modify overview — Reshape a single solid with rounds and shells.
• Export for printing — Save print-ready files from the File menu.
• Re-order and re-parent in the scene tree — Change which shape a boolean keeps, or move a shape in or out of one.
• Select a shape inside a boolean — Reach the parts a Union or Subtract is built from, including the cutters.
• Adding shapes — Drop parametric primitives onto the build plate.
• Parts library — Reuse saved and built-in parts.
• Gears that mesh: module, teeth and backlash — The four gear shapes, and the three numbers that decide whether a printed pair actually turns.
• Move, rotate, and scale — Position objects with the gizmo and snapping.
• Transform space (world / local) — Switch the gizmo between world and object axes.
• Pivot point — Choose what the gizmo rotates and scales around.
• Union — Fuse selected shapes into one solid.
• Merge (bridge gap) — Union that fills the gap between parts so they print as one.
• Subtract (difference) — Cut later shapes out of the first.
• Intersect — Keep only the overlapping volume.
• Hull — Wrap the selected shapes in one convex skin.
• Ungroup — Break a boolean or group back into parts.
• Split into bodies — Separate disconnected lumps into objects.
• Round edges — Fillet a solid’s edges with a radius.
• Hollow — Shell a solid to a wall thickness, and open faces to make a tray or lid.
• Clearance / fit — Grow or shrink a part by a set gap so mating parts fit.
• Align — Line objects up on an axis.
• Mirror — Reflect a selection across a plane.
• Pattern (array) — Repeat a selection in a line or circle.
• Drop to plate — Seat a part down onto the build surface.
• Auto-orient — Rotate a part to a good print orientation.
• Split for printing — Cut a part that does not fit the bed into two halves that key back together.
• Duplicate and delete — Copy objects and remove them.
• Variables & configurations — Drive dimensions from named parameters and switch presets.
• History timeline — Scrub, retro-edit, and branch your edit history.
• Sketch, extrude, and revolve — Draw a 2D profile and turn it into a solid.
• Push / pull faces — Move a face to resize a solid.
• Move a face — Drag a face to push a boss or pocket, or click it and move / rotate / scale it with the gizmo.
• Move an edge — Click an edge, then move, rotate, or scale it with the gizmo — the adjacent faces follow.
• Move a vertex — Click a point, then drag it with the gizmo — the faces around it stretch to follow.
• Fillet / chamfer edges — Round or bevel individual edges.
• Work plane — Build on the face of another object.
• Lay flat — Rotate a part to rest on a chosen face.
• Measure — Distances, angles, radius, arc length, face area and the gap between two entities.
• Surface drag (cruise) — Slide objects along the surface beneath them.
• Components — Make reusable parts and place instances.
• Move & arrange panels — Dock, pin, reorder, or move editor panels between the two sidebars.
• Fit view — Frame everything in the viewport.
• 2D view — Switch to a flat, top-down drafting view.
• Datums — Save a plane, axis, or point to model against — and come back to it.
• Reference images — Model on top of a photo, sketch, or blueprint.
• X-ray view — See through solids to inner geometry.
• Snap, angle, and units — Set grid snap, angle snap, and display units.
• Printer & build volume — Pick a printer or set a custom volume.
• Print check — Validate the model prints cleanly.
• Print preview — Tint overhangs and thin walls live as you model.
• AI generate — Create a model from a text prompt.
• AI modify — Change the model you already have with a plain-language instruction.
• Choose an AI model — Pick what you are making first — then, if there is a real choice, the model behind it.
• Use your own AI key — Add your own provider API key and AI generation runs on your account — free of OwlCAD credits.
• AI credits — What a generation costs, how many you get, and what to do when they run out.
• Ask OwlCAD — Describe what you are trying to make, in your own words, and be told which tools to use.
• Access tokens for AI agents — Let an AI agent or a script work with your models on your behalf.
• Connect an AI agent to OwlCAD — Point Claude Code, Claude Desktop or Cursor at OwlCAD so it can build and check models for you.
• Enclosure (project box) — A shelled base and a matching lid, sized to your electronics.
• Snap-fit (cantilever) — A tapered spring arm with a tip barb, plus a catch to latch into.
• Annular snap-fit — A beaded plug and a grooved ring — the round snap joint.
• Gridfinity storage — Modular bins and baseplates on the 42 mm Gridfinity grid.
• Bolt & nut — A bolt or screw and the nut that threads onto it, from one standard size.
• Threaded jar / container — A shelled body with a neck thread plus a matching screw lid.
• Board mount plate — A standoff plate sized to a PCB’s mounting-hole pattern.
• Pulley / sprocket — A timing-belt pulley or a roller-chain sprocket.
• Ball bearing — A print-in-place bearing from a standard trade size.
• Timing belt — A closed toothed belt, sized to the two pulleys it runs on.
• Compression spring — A helical coil spring, wound to a length and coil count that will actually print.
• Living hinge — Two rigid panels joined by a thin web that flexes in place.
• Fit test coupon — One print that tells you your printer’s real clearance — then feed it back into every joint.
• Printer calibration block — One test print that measures your printer — and tells you which numbers OwlCAD takes and which belong in your slicer.
• Texture roller — Wrap a model’s relief around a barrel and roll the pattern into clay, dough or fondant.
• Casting mold — Turn a model into a printable mold for silicone, wax, resin, plaster or soap.
• Clamp — A printable C-clamp, or a two-plate clamp whose V-jaw is cut for a named pipe.
• Impeller (blower wheel) — A printable centrifugal blower wheel — straight, backward- or forward-curved blades on a bored hub.
• Axial fan (rotor) — A printable axial fan rotor — twisted blades at the pitch you set, on a bored hub.
• Fan frame and guard — A printable axial fan frame on a standard hole pattern, with an optional guard and motor boss.
• Plugs, caps and sleeves — Hole plugs, cable grommets, tube end caps, flanged bushings and bumper feet, sized from the hole, shaft or tube they fit.
• Pin hinge (print-in-place) — Two interleaving leaves and a captive pin, printed pre-assembled.
• Ball-and-socket joint — A captive ball on a stem inside a socket, for multi-axis motion.
• Will my gear teeth print? — The Tooth tip figure, what it measures, and which control to reach for when it turns orange.
• Gear train — A line of involute gears that actually mesh, at the right spacing.
• Planetary gearbox — A sun gear, orbiting planets, and an internal ring.
• Herringbone gear — A chevron gear whose opposed helices cancel axial thrust.
• Herringbone gear train — A line of meshing chevron gears — the thrust-free gear train.
• Rack and pinion — A round pinion meshing a straight rack — rotary to linear.
• Worm drive — A worm screw driving a worm wheel at 90° — high reduction.
• Hose / thread adapter — Join two hose or thread sizes that were never meant to meet.
• Text sign — A nameplate, door sign or keychain, with the plate measured around your words.
• Image relief & lithophane — Turn a photo into a carved plaque — or invert it for a lithophane that lights up from behind.
• New project — Start a fresh model and pick a printer.
• Open a project — Switch to another saved project.
• Saving — How saving and autosave work.
• Import a model — Bring in STL, 3MF, OBJ, GLB, STEP, SVG, DXF, or OpenSCAD .scad/.csg.
• Repair an imported mesh — Fix a model that imports “not watertight” so it can be sliced and used in booleans.
• Version history — Browse and restore earlier versions.
• Share a project — Make a project public and share a link.
• STL — Universal mesh format for any slicer.
• 3MF — Modern format with units and color.
• OBJ — Mesh format for 3D modelling apps.
• GLB — glTF binary for AR and web viewers.
• STEP (beta) — Solid B-rep for CAD interchange.
• SVG — Outline or cross-section for 2D / laser.
• Mates — hold parts together — Relate two bodies so one follows the other, and scrub a hinge or slider through its travel.
• Parts list and exploded view — Count what an assembly is made of, and pull it apart to show how it goes together.
• DXF — Outline or cross-section for CAD, CNC and laser.
• Turn off cloud sync — Keep new work on the device you make it on, instead of saving it to your account.