Welcome to the Onshape forum! Ask questions and join in the discussions about everything Onshape.
First time visiting? Here are some places to start:- Looking for a certain topic? Check out the categories filter or use Search (upper right).
- Need support? Ask a question to our Community Support category.
- Please submit support tickets for bugs but you can request improvements in the Product Feedback category.
- Be respectful, on topic and if you see a problem, Flag it.
If you would like to contact our Community Manager personally, feel free to send a private message or an email.
How is Surfacing in Onshape vs. SolidWorks in 2026?
Chris_Beckett
Member Posts: 4 ✭
in General
I have done a fair bit of surface modeling in SolidWorks over the years.
Now considering Onshape and I'm wondering:
- How is the quality of Onshape’s surfacing tools compared to SolidWorks?
- Does Onshape have all the same surfacing functionality as SolidWorks?
- If not, what's missing?
- If so, is it just as easy to use in Onshape? (ie not any more difficult).
- How is the quality of the surfaces that Onshape creates compared to SolidWorks?
The only answers I found in Google were from years ago. Onshape may have changed quite a bit since then (it seems).
What has been your experience, experienced surface modelers?
Tagged:
0
Comments
Personally, I much prefer Onshape to Solidworks these days. There's a bit more control of most things, although a true 3D sketcher is missing. You can do just about everything you'd need with the other curve tools (routing curve, bridging curve, edit curve, etc), but there's no 3D solver. The 3D solver in Solidworks was always pretty brittle/buggy and stuff would blow up in weird ways.
Surface quality is as good or better. The surface analysis tools are more capable. Both are Parasolid based, as you probably know. In theory anything that can be represented in NX, Solidworks, Shaper3D, Plasticity, etc can be modeled in Onshape since it's all the same kernel.
There are a lot of a little quality of life things that could be improved here and there, but overall I'd rather work in Onshape.
The CAD for these below was all done in Onshape:
Simon Gatrall | Product Development Specialist | Open For Work