A voxel is a unit of graphic information that defines a point in three-dimensional space. A voxel model is often used in games like Minecraft, Minetest, and Veloren.
Voxel also stands for 3D pixel which is the smallest element of a 3D printed object, and it represents a certain grid value.
As Minecraft (The game) took the internet in a storm, as it is played by all generators from young kids to adults, voxel became popular than ever to create minecraft models.
And as the heat became intense especially with the NFT market rising, and the demand for gaming industries, the demand for voxel editor increased.
Many kids and teens find voxel models fun, which we believe is it a great entry for 3D design, 3D printing, and game development.
Here in this article, we present you a collection of voxel creation tools and voxel editors which are totally free and open-source.
Goxel is my favorite app in this list, not just because it works on Windows, Linux, and macOS, but it also because it is easy to use even for my 5 years old son. That's why we recommend it in our collection of design apps for kids.
Goxel allows you to create amazing 3D voxel models and use them in your work as easy if you are creating 2D pixel art.
Goxel supports layers, and allows you to export your models in many formats: Magica Voxel, Qublicle, glTF2, obj, ply, and build engine.
The developers created a port for iPad which support touch, panning, zoom, and stylus.
Vengi is a collection of 3D voxel tools that include Voxel editor which support many voxel formats.
Vengi editor supports layers, object trees, scripts, animations and model modifiers. However, it is intended for serious designers, and it is still under heavy development.
Voxenko is a free open-source Voxel editor made with the Godot Game engine. It comes with rich color library, drag-and drop support, save and load model in JSON format, advanced mouse control and more.
Voxenko is available for Windows, Linux, and macOS.
5- Vuxel
Vuxel is a simple lightweight 3D voxel editor written in Node.js that works directly from your browser. It is released as an open-source project under the MIT License.
6- BlockyTracker
BlockyTracker is a web-based 3D Voxel browser and editor with ray tracer support. It is written in JavaScript, Three.js, and Python. Made by Gerard Parareda and Roger Cecilia (rceci64) in 2019 under the MIT license.
7- PhotoVoxel
The PhotoVoxel app is a powerful 3D voxel editor aiming for game developers and designers. It is compatible with Unreal Engine 4 and the Unity game engine.
PhotoVoxel offers a customizable user-interface, multi-viewport and supports many export formats.
8- Grid
Grid is an experimental simple voxel editor written by Martin Slachta, and released as an open-source project under GPL-3.0 License.
StoneVox 3D focuses on a simple to look at but tool rich environment for creating 3D voxel based models.
StoneVox 3D is distributed under NPOSL-3.0. Which basically means you can use it for commercial works. You may also, modify and create derivative works, as long as you don't sell it and release source code.
DelphiDoom Voxel Editor is an open-source plugin for the DelphiDoom game engine.
DelphiDoom is a port of the Linux Doom code to the Delphi programming language by Jim Valavanis (Jval). It features an advanced software renderer and also supports Chex Quest, Heretic, Hexen, and Strife. DelphiDoom is licensed under the terms of the GNU General Public License.
Voxel Plugin allow you to create fully volumetric, entirely destructible, infinite worlds in Unreal Engine. It is compatible with 4.24, 4.25, 4.26, 4.27 and Unreal 5.
12- Bones3; Voxel Plugin for Unity Game Engine
Bones³ (pronounced "Bones Cubed") is an advanced voxel block editor designed for the Unity engine. The framework is designed to allow users to create voxel structures and worlds both in-editor and in-game, as well as exposing a flexible API for writing custom world manipulation scripts.
End note
If you know of any other open-source 3D Voxel editor that we did not mention here, let us know, and we will gladly add it.
What is iTowns?
iTowns is a Javascript/WebGL framework for visualizing 3D geospatial data. It can connect to various servers, load different data formats, and targets the last two major versions of Firefox, Safari, and Chromium-based browsers.
Features
* Visualizes 3D geospatial data
* Connects to various servers
* Loads different data formats,
WebGL is a JavaScript API for rendering interactive 2D and 3D graphics within a web browser. It is based on OpenGL ES, a widely used standard for graphics rendering on embedded systems.
WebGL is commonly used for a variety of applications, including:
* 3D Graphics: WebGL allows developers to create and
The Untold Engine: An easy to use, open source, 3D game engine for iOS/macOS game development
License
The Untold Engine is licensed under the LGPL v2.1. This means that if you develop a game using the Untold Engine, you do not need to open source your game. However,
jMonkey is a free, open source game engine, made especially for Java game developers who want to create 3D games using modern technology. The software is programmed entirely in Java, intended for wide accessibility and quick deployment.
Features
jMonkeyEngine is only one level of abstraction away from OpenGL.
The engine
Godot is a cross-platform, free and open-source game engine released under the MIT license. It was initially developed by Argentine software developers Juan Linietsky and Ariel Manzur for several companies in Latin America prior to its public
Godot Engine is a feature-packed, cross-platform game engine to create 2D and 3D
GDevelop is a free, open-source, and cross-platform game creation tool that anyone can use to create games without programming skills. Unleash your creativity with GDevelop and create any kind of game: platformers, puzzles, shoot 'em up, strategy, 8-bit games, and many more.
GDevelop is a full-featured, no-code, open-source game
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"Castle Game Engine" is a cross-platform (desktop, mobile, console) 3D and 2D game engine, supporting many asset formats (glTF, X3D, Spine...) and using modern Object Pascal
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Features
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Powerful visual editor to design 3D and 2D games.
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A lot of components to design viewport contents (3D and 2D world,
Blender is a free and open-source 3D modeling software for creating 3D models, visual effects, 3D animations and interactive 3D apps. It is available for Windows, Linux, macOS, and BSD systems.
Buildify
Buildify is a .blend file that allows you to create, build, and customize 3D buildings within Blender, just
What is a voxel?
A voxel is a unit of graphic information that defines a point in three-dimensional space. A voxel model is often used in games like Minecraft, Minetest, and Veloren.
Voxel also stands for 3D pixel which is the smallest element of a 3D printed object, and it
OctoPrint is a free open-source 3D printer manager that allows a full control over your 3D printer, processes, and tasks.
With OctoPrint you can access the embedded webcam feed and watch remotely how your printer is creating your newest thing. Get constant feedback regarding the current progress of your print