Models and file checks
A model on World is one package of files, published in releases and checked before anyone downloads it.
Choose Upload a model on World to start one; an approved creator's agent can upload through Benchy's tools too. Becoming a creator and choosing a license and price are in Publish and sell on World.
What a model can hold
One file is the model itself, in GLB, glTF, STL, OBJ, USDZ, 3MF, STEP, up to 250 MiB. Print files, sources, textures, instructions and images join it in the same package: up to 49 more files and 1 GiB in all. A dropped folder keeps its structure.
- USDZ can stay private or unlisted, but can't be published or sold.
- STEP can be published and sold for any use except 3D printing, whose checks are measured on a mesh; upload a mesh export for that.
- STL and OBJ don't record their scale, so you choose their unit. World checks the file again if you change it, and the other formats below are measured from it.
- glTF has to carry its
.binbuffers and textures in the package. A scene that fetches a file from the web is refused.
A public listing also declares how the model was made: human-made, AI-assisted or AI-generated. Benchy never guesses this for you.
You can add up to 10 links, such as a tutorial video. Anyone who can download the model sees them. Links must be https:// addresses on a public website, and editing them never makes a new release.
Archives (ZIP, RAR), programs and scripts aren't accepted; add the files themselves.
What World checks
Uploading, checking and publishing are separate steps: keep working on your draft while World checks the files. A model can be published or sold once its checks pass. Each file in the package is checked on its own:
| State | Means |
|---|---|
| Inspected | Read all the way through: the model itself, text (Markdown, plain text, JSON, CSV, YAML, OBJ materials) and images (PNG, JPEG, WebP, AVIF) up to 4 MiB |
| Not inspected | Delivered as the original, download only: Blender and CAD sources, other 3D formats, video, and files over 4 MiB |
| Withheld | Kept from everyone but you, with the reason on the file — it holds a program, web page or script code, its contents don't match its file type, or it's an archive under another name |
A withheld file doesn't hold back the rest. A paid offer opens only when nothing is withheld, and only inspected files appear in a paid listing's preview.
What you see on the model itself:
| Shows | Means |
|---|---|
| Checking file | File checks are still running. |
| File checks passed | The file passed its geometry checks. Whether it suits a particular use, and the settings that use needs, are still yours to confirm. |
| File checks passed with notes | File integrity checks passed. Geometry notes are advisory and may affect printing or other uses; review them before choosing your settings. |
| Needs attention | File checks found issues that must be fixed before publishing or selling. |
| Can't be listed yet | The file passed its integrity checks, but Benchy could not fully assess its geometry, so it cannot be listed publicly yet. Uploading the same file again will not change this. |
| Checks incomplete | The checks did not finish, so this file cannot be published or sold yet. Run them again, or replace the file. |
| Held for review | This model is held for review. Source access remains paused until the review is resolved. |
A model you bought or downloaded can show Package inspection pending: its extra files are checked the first time you open it from your library, and the downloads open once they pass.
Print geometry
A model for 3D printing also gets a geometry check, with notes on what was found. It is not a promise of a good print and doesn't replace slicing the file yourself.
| Shows | Means |
|---|---|
| Print geometry checked | The geometry checks passed |
| Print geometry has notes | Read the notes before you print: holes, non-manifold edges and the like |
| Review print geometry | A geometry check failed — for example a size no printer can build |
| Print suitability not assessed | The geometry couldn't be assessed, so there is nothing to report |
Surface findings such as holes are always notes. In a listing that includes 3D printing, print-critical findings, such as a size outside the printable range, block publishing until fixed. A file that holds active content, doesn't open, or isn't the type it claims always blocks a listing.
When a check fails
- Needs attention — the file or its notes say what failed. Fix the file, or its unit, and upload it again.
- Checks incomplete — choose Retry checks when it's offered. If it isn't, replace the file or write to help@benchy.studio.
- Can't be listed yet — uploading the same file again won't change it. Export the model again, or from another tool.
- Update file checks — these checks predate World's current requirements. Upload a new version from Edit.
For an agent doing this for you, there's the Upload and check 3D models skill.
Screenshot: a model's file checks — each file's state, with the reason on anything withheld.
Other formats
From your one file, Benchy can make the model in other formats and offer them beside it: GLB and single-file glTF for the web and game engines, and STL and OBJ in millimetres for printing. A GLB, STL, OBJ or 3MF gets the others; a STEP part gets all four, from its display model. A multi-file glTF and a USDZ don't get them yet.
Your own file is always the first download. The extras are made ahead of time, offered only to someone who can already download the listing, and chosen under Other formats in the editor (all on by default). A format that fails changes nothing about the listing's checks, visibility or sale. Benchy exports a model of up to 64 MiB and 3 million triangles, and remakes every format when you replace the file.
Benchy converts from millimetres and metres; a file in inches or centimetres keeps its own download and skips the extras. Formats Benchy can't make yet, such as 3MF, USDZ, PLY, COLLADA and OBJ with materials, say so on their row. FBX is never offered, since the only complete FBX writer isn't ours to use, and STEP only when the creator uploaded STEP: a mesh can't be converted back into a solid.
Releases
A model has numbered releases, each fixing the files, rights and details it was published with. Its downloadable manifest lists every file with its role, format, size and origin.
Replacing a file, or changing the rights, files, dependencies, variants or details, makes a new release. Someone who already has the model keeps the release they got.
Package and uses on a model you own says what it's for — 3D printing, CAD & engineering, games, animation, simulation and more, up to five, one primary. Each use asks for the details that matter to it, and values you enter yourself are shown as yours. Variants describe configurations of the same model; print settings belong to a release.
Rights and your library
Download a free model while signed in, or buy one, and your library keeps that exact release, its files and its license; a later change by the creator never rewrites it. After a purchase, check Orders: returning from checkout isn't the same as access being granted.
A package shows what its license lets you do:
- Use it privately, or in commercial projects
- Sell what you print or make from it
- Modify it
- Share the original files, or your modified version
- Whether you must credit the creator, share alike, or note your changes
To set rights and prices, payouts and sales, see Publish and sell on World. You sell the files a model already has; there is no second upload.
Showing a model elsewhere
Every model anyone can open has an Embed button beside Share. It copies an <iframe> that shows the model on your own page, with its pictures, title and a link back, sized to its column. On a model you own, Embed on the edit page also sets the title, subtitle, button label and up to 8 detail rows.
An embed never hands out the file. A visitor not signed in to World sees the thumbnail and preview video, with Sign in to view in 3D, which opens sign-in in a new tab. Signed in, the frame shows the 3D viewer under a short-lived grant of its own. Most browsers keep a site's sign-in out of other sites' frames, so most visitors see the pictures. The snippet holds no key and is safe to publish. Downloading and buying happen on benchy.world.
GET /api/embed/models/<modelId> returns the same model as JSON — title, creator, distribution, how it was made, artwork and links — with nothing that expires, so it can be cached.