Tinkercad feature requests/enhancements

This page is part of the 3Dsf.info review of Tinkercad.

My list of feature enhancements to make the product more useable are endless. Here are a few.

To be honest, I appreciate that some of my needs probably fall outside the general target market that Autodesk want to focus on. Tinkercad can't be the do-everything product for everybody.

But I do think that adding these features would wildly improve the usefulness of the product for a wide range of users! Many of my suggestions would be directly beneficial to the target audience of schoolkids.

I've marked the critical ones with stars. Though I have no way of contacting Autodesk with these ideas, so it's kind of a cry in the wilderness, I guess.

🌟 Bring back shape generators, something compatible, or a library of high-rez objects

Shape generators are beyond essential for Tinkercad's usability. If the legacy generators were to go it'd be a total disaster. I can't overstate this. None of the projects I've built would load or even be repairable. I would lose years of work.

It'd be really great if shape generators were to be properly brought back and supported, or something similar that maintains full compatibility with existing shape generators.

Like many people I don't use the shape generators for stuff like premade butterflies and snowflakes. It's the ability for shape generators to display more complex and more detailed geometric objects that's key.

One possible workaround would be to improve the default objects such that they supported up to 500 sides or so. And expand the library of shapes to a more useful basic set. For example, the main shape generators that my projects rely on are things like:

• hi-res sphere ii

• ellipse cone

• cylinder with defined smoothness

• Bent Pipe

• Parabolic Cone

• Tangent Ogive

• MetaFillet

• HD Torus (overlapping)

• Hi-Res Paraboloid

• Screw Threads

• Trapezoid

If an expanded library of higher resolution objects were available, and measures put in place to simplify conversions (eg: an option to convert all shape generator objects in a project to STLs and colour-code them) then a transition like that could be quite workable.

It would also be invaluable for older and more advanced kids, not just hobbyists! It wouldn't make Tinkercad any more complicated, and certainly wouldn't encroach on the turf of any other Autodesk product.

🌟 Increase maximum object sides

As above. Most Tinkercad default objects have a maximum of 64 sides, which does not look good on-screen and is inadequate for printing. There should be the option to increase the number of sides to all objects to, say, 500 sides.

I haven't noticed massive performance issues with high-resolution imported SVGs, so I wouldn't think that performance concerns would prohibit this sort of enhancement.

Remember default object resolution

Not only is the default object resolution really low - 20 sided cylinders out of 64, for example - but it always goes back to that when you create a new object. The default should be editable to be the maximum or whatever, or at least be the same as the last object you created.

🌟 Increase loading and grouping speed.

I've talked about this a fair bit already. It doesn't take much to create a simple project that takes quite a long time to load. In a time-pressed classroom with impatient kids, that can't be good!

Improved panning key shortcut

Panning on a Mac requires some contortions, especially on a laptop or other trackpad. The shift-control keyboard combination isn't very practical, and is unlikely to be discovered by novice users. When I first started using Tinkercad I presumed it lacked pan controls altogether as no obvious key combo worked. A better approach would be to use Adobe Illustrator's technique of enabling pan via the space bar. That works really well, the space bar is otherwise unused and easy to hit, and lets Illustrator users leverage their skill set and muscle memory.

There's also hand injury concerns. Having to hold down shift and ctrl all the time with one hand while using the trackpad is a really bad thing for the hand.

🌟 User-configurable nav controls

More generally, Tinkercad should give users the ability to change their navigation UI preferences. There is no one universal standard for how you zoom, pan, and orbit. Each app annoyingly has its own settings, making it a stupid pain switching from one app to another.

Accordingly every 3D program should permit the user to change these settings, so they can adjust them to whatever they like!

Support intersection operations

You can join or merge two solid objects to create one – a Boolean “union” operation. Or you can join a solid and a hole to subtract the hole – a “difference” operation.

What you can't really do is take two objects and merge them such that only the touching portions remain – an “intersection” operation. One messy way to simulate this is to take a hole object of the kind you want to cut things out with, group it with a solid object that's larger than the hole, then convert the finished solid object into a hole. You can then group this hole with a solid object to cut out the shape you want.

The problem with that is that it's fiddly and messy, plus adds two layers of grouping. But there are many times when this sort of thing is required.

Change the touching object face when in cruise mode

Add the ability to rotate an object, to select its touching face, when using cruise mode.

In other words, I can take an object and align it with another one in cruise mode. But it always aligns to one face. What if I want to align it to a different face on the object? I can't seem to find a way to change that, and I have to mess around rotating it, etc. I should be able to hit an arrow key or something to cycle through the contact faces.

🌟 Align and touch faces

Often you have to spend a lot of time making sure objects and groups touch properly. This involves making one side a hole, laboriously using the arrow key to move an object or group step by step, changing the hole back to a solid, etc. etc. A single tool that will align the closest faces of two objects or groups would be fantastic.

Spacer objects

Right now objects can be solid, or can be holes. But often you want to use an object as a kind of ruler or device for working out distances and alignments. A specific spacer object, which doesn't output to print, would be useful for this.

Like the notes feature there'd be a way of showing or hiding all spacer objects in one go.

🌟 Touching-surface checker

When making a 3D model for printing it's important to know if two surfaces are in contact or not. A tiny nearly invisible gap between two objects can be a real problem when printing.

This type of gap isn't always possible to tell this without flying around an object and looking from all angles when one object is an hole and the other is not.  Even then it's tricky if other objects obscure the view.

A tool for determining touching areas, or nearly touching areas, would be excellent. You'd switch to that mode, and groups of non-touching objects/groups would be colour-coded, making it easy to see what's separate and what's not.

Non-overlapping objects

At the moment there are no constraints on objects touching. This is obviously necessary for constructing groups. But it would be useful to be able to specify that an object or group cannot overlap. This would make it easier to assemble projects from groups of components, and test that they will print or otherwise function correctly.

Preflight checks

One of the most time consuming aspects to building a model is having to step out of the editor view, then go back to the list of projects, then click on the project, transfer the project to your print slicer/print program/Shapeways, finding that the transfer fails, downloading the STL, uploading it to printing tool, waiting, viewing the 3D info, only to find a piece of the project accidentally doesn't touch another part and so is considered its own unprintably small piece, etc. Then back to the Tinkercad editor...

A great solution would be a preflight test for basic 3D printing issues. The ideal would be one that can be prepopulated with the physical capabilities of each service and its print options. But even a really basic preflight mode that warns you of very small separate objects, of close and nearly touching surfaces (as above), of the total object count, of a colour preview of each object, etc. That would be a huge time saver. Naturally it could be pre-populated with the characteristics of popular printers, print bureaus, etc.

🌟 Layers

This one is huge. You can hide individual objects and groups, and you can make groups. But being able to select multiple objects/groups in a layer would be a massive time saver. I fear it may be overcomplicating things beyond the scope of what Autodesk want Tinkercad to do, but it would be just great!

The basic problem with Tinkercad at the moment is that you can specify object visibility through direct manipulation only. You have to click on a thing to hide it. You can also then only render the objects visible again only en masse. So there's no way of working on something and going in and viewing and hiding stuff selectively.

🌟 Object linking

An alternative to object layers could be object linking. Right now you can combine a set of objects together into a single group, which is useful. But what if you want a relationship between two groups, but you don't want to combine them all into a large group? Since that's really slow to do, because all the objects are combined into a single shape.

It would be really handy to be able to link objects or groups together so that moving one moves the whole linked set. That will preserve the spatial relationship between the groups, but doesn't combine them mathematically into a single group. This ability would make it much easier to maintain structure in a model.

Change or remove outline colour

The default outline for all individual or grouped objects is a dark blue. But it'd be great to be able to change that colour, or remove it altogether, for certain projects.

Zoom-specific new object sizing

The size of a newly created primitive should be contextual, related to the current view magnification. A cube 20x20x20mm doesn't make sense when you're zoomed so far in that the object extends beyond the screen, or so far out that the handles are larger than the object in view.

User-configurable handle/control point sizes

The little tiny handles or control points that appear when you click on an object are very small. They can also be difficult to see, particularly handles like the rotation handle that's very thin and jumps around.

To assist people with visual issues there should be a preferences option to make the handles larger, or a user-specified colour.

Obscured handles/control points

The tiny hovering size info popups, while useful, frequently obscure an object's handles, especially when zoomed into small objects. Or they may be drawn off-screen, which helps no-one.

Adjusting object parameters is fiddly

You have to click on the object, then click on various hovering size popups as above, one by one. The object parameters should also be accessible in a single info pane that appears when you click on it or hit the “I” key or whatever, making it easy to adjust various settings quickly. You can tab from size popup to size popup, but an info pane would be much simpler.

New object origin problems

I don't understand how the origin point of new objects is supposed to work. I often make a new object and resize it, only to find it’s miles off in the distance; perhaps not even on the workspace. If I rotate the view, the object vanishes. I then end up cutting it, selecting a foreground object, and pasting it back so that it's closer to my working object. Or if you click on a new shape icon and select an area on the workspace the new object often appears off-screen. Tinkercad offers a reminder to use cruise mode to attach the new object to something, and I guess that's one workaround.

This problem is probably really confusing for kids and newcomers who end up with multiple objects all over, as they recreate new ones thinking the old ones never were created.

Increase maximum zoom

I work a lot with extremely small physical models that I 3D print. And I can't zoom in quite close enough. It'd be great if the maximum zoom in point were to be increased, unless that starts bumping up against rounding errors. Otherwise you have to work with large models and then scale them down - an error-prone and time-consuming process.

Mark the Groupable Zone

May 12 2025 update: see the next section.

As noted earlier in this review, the Groupable Zone must be more clearly demarcated with an optional dotted line, since it's extremely confusing for new users.

Or even better - the next suggestion!

🌟 Increase maximum working area and eliminate the Groupable Zone

Ideally the Groupable Zone should be eliminated. Basically the entire working area should permit groups to be made, for ease of building larger objects. I'm constantly bumping up against this one.

May 12 2025 update:

Tinkercad has, to everyone’s delight, increased the size of the working area! The area has doubled in length, making it vastly more usable. They’ve also added various scaling options, which is also fantastic.

https://www.tinkercad.com/blog/build-bigger

Distribute objects

The align feature is a really good one, and I think it has an excellent and intuitive UI. Kudos for that! But the ability to distribute multiple objects evenly would be as helpful as well. I frequently need to distribute multiple objects in a line or arc, and it's time consuming and difficult to do manually and accurately. I can totally see this being popular with kids - make the buttons on your snowman equally distributed, add text in an arc, or whatever.

You can use smart duplicate, but only upon initial object creation.

Make a scrapbook

Copying between projects works surprisingly well. But a drag and drop scratchpad or personal scrapbook of common components would be awesome. Something that appears on the righthand sidebar. So you can develop a catalogue of personally created and used parts. A link to sharing a folder of them with the community would also increase adoption of the community tools.

The “Your Creations” section is kind of like this, but is more complicated, involving various steps. I think a simple drag and drop UI would help adoption.

Sweep an object

Rotate a flat item around an axis, or sweep, commands would be very useful. Also useful as an educational tool to get kids and newbies thinking in three dimensions. The rotate SVG shape generator is supposed to do this, but doesn't work very well.

Convert to STL within the program

It's possible to export a complex object as a single STL and re-import it, to reduce object grouping. But it'd be great to do so within the program to simplify the tools. Call it a “freeze group” function.

Alternatively a kind of permanent "slice" or "cut" feature, the way you can approximate with grouping. For this to be useful the max resolution of the STL should also be increased.

🌟 Improve imported STL resolution

Tinkercad has limits to how big an imported STL can be, and also reduces the complexity of the import, often losing features in the process. It'd be great to be able to preserve an imported STL file's details and size.

Simple 2D draw editor

Drawing tools to make 2D objects. It's great to be able to import SVGs, but simple bezier spline tools would be really useful. Tinkercad as it stands is not great for natural shapes, and this would be a baby step.

🌟 An object editor that lets you draw object curvature in all three axes

This would be amazing. An object editor that lets you draw in a simple spline to define the curvature of a shape, but you could then rotate the object and edit the curvature in three separate axes.

This would be easy to understand, and give the user the ability to make compound curves and more complex shapes.

Import .ai files as well as .svg

That'd save me a step every time. I don't see this being added, though. AI is Adobe Illustrator, not AI, incidentally.

Import object art 2D files with curves at a higher resolution

If I import an SVG with straight edges it's fine. But anything with curved lines gets converted to a few low-rez straight segments, which frankly looks pretty bad. The solution right now is to add a bunch of points to the curve in the 2D program prior to exporting it.

You can increase the “quality” setting in the SVG pane that appears when you click on an imported object. But even at the highest setting that doesn't make a massive difference in object smoothness.

Paste pastes right alongside

Sometimes it's hard to manipulate the pasted object since they usually end up overlapping. I guess we're supposed to use duplicate or alt/option drag. Paste at the click point would be useful though.

Group management

The ability to double-click to temporarily edit the members of a group is great, if occasionally unreliable and unresponsive. Not to mention painfully slow for larger groups.

A graphical way of presenting grouped objects to make it easier to go down more than one group deep would be even better!

Expand the information in the info field

If you click on a project in the dashboard you can see the last edited and created dates. No time information is available. Nor is much else, such as number of objects, number of groups, number of imported objects, etc.

Improve chamfering

No way of filleting and chamfering groups, or objects that don’t have chamfer settings. I understand there are technical reasons, related to the way Tinkercard implements objects, that make this difficult. But still a bummer from a user perpective.

Improve corner chamfering controls

Chamfering/filleting of primitives, when it's possible, is symmetrical. For example, let’s say you want to put chamfered edges onto a cube. You can do so, but only at a 45 degree angle. But if you stretch the cube to a longer shape then the chamfer will be narrow on the long sides and long on the short sides. The only away around this is to make your box out of two or more cubes – see the bit in the tips section.

Chamfer settings etc are also totally arbitrary numeric values relative to the object itself only, not to any absolute measurement values.

Rotation UI blocks objects

When shift-clicking multiple small objects the rotation angle wheel usually appears, making it impossible to select adjacent parts. 

Size popups block objects

Similarly, the tiny measurement popups obscure the grow handles on small objects. This requires a lot of fiddling with the pan controls to be able to select a grow handle.

Information pane blocks objects

Clicking on an object causes an information popover box to appear, often covering up what you're working on. It should be smart enough to appear on the side of the window opposite your object.

Vanishing controls

One quibble about the align UI , and the "increase in vertical height" square, is that if you're looking at an object straight-on then the horizontal dimensional controls often aren't visible and you have to change views by tilting down to see them. I run into this one a lot.

Offscreen size popups

Sometimes the little measurement popups appear off-screen, especially when zoomed in, making them unhelpful.

Zooms to centre only

If you want to zoom to a specific point, as I nearly always have to do, you have to zoom in, shuffle around with the awkward pan, zoom in again. Very time-consuming. I should be able to click within the window to specify the zoom-in point.

Object move on resize

Making changes to an object - resizing etc - can result in the object flying far across the plane, and you have to mess around with tilting to find it.

Small UI elements

Control points are small and sometimes hard to see, especially for older users or those with poor vision. A temporary zoom view - hold down a modifier key to have a circle containing a magnified view of the cursor area - would be very handy.

Drop in a jpeg for tracing etc

A lot of the time I need to trace an object or use it as the basis for a model. (Comparing a object' proportions to that of a photo or drawing) I should be able to import a JPEG as a flat object, with adjustable transparency, I can move around, resize, use to trace, etc. Or at least an optional flat layer that can be shown or hidden.

Cut tool

Rather than making holes and grouping, it'd be useful to be able to slice objects. Or perhaps convert a hole-cut object into a single component, like the STL converter above.

A rod or tube as a basic object

A common object I use a lot is a long tube or rod. This is different from a cylinder or tube in that I wouldn't want to resize it to reshape. I'd want to stretch and lengthen it, add some bends, and so on. Diameter and wall thickness could be specified as an object properly. There's a shape generator that can do this, but it's very low resolution.

Wrap around objects

It's really common to need to wrap something around something else. Like a pipe around a box. Or, if the wrapped object is a hole, then you can cut panel lines and other details into a surface.

VII.  A possible future direction for Tinkercad

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Note: I am not Autodesk, and I'm afraid I'm not able to assist with problems or requests for help with Tinkercad.