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HybridDesign

A workbench for FreeCAD 1.1 that models the way Fusion 360 does.

A command ribbon with Fusion's names and shortcuts, extrude and revolve by sketch region, Press Pull, Shell, Joints. It sits on top of the stock PartDesign, Part, Sketcher and Assembly, so the file stays a plain .FCStd that opens without the workbench.

  • Python
  • FreeCAD 1.1
  • OpenCASCADE
  • Qt / Coin3D

v0.1.0 · in daily development · proprietary licence

Screen recording, 14 September 2026, ×2
Who it's for

Fusion 360 habits, without Fusion 360's strings

For people who learned to model in Fusion 360 and want to keep working that way, but can't or won't depend on it.

No cloud, no sign-inFusion needs an Autodesk account and has to go online regularly. FreeCAD with HybridDesign runs fully offline, and your files stay on your disk.
No licence surprisesNo subscription terms that change under you and no feature limits on a personal licence. FreeCAD is open source.
Lower costNo per-seat subscription for every engineer; FreeCAD itself is free.
Closed networksGovernment agencies, defence and other air-gapped sites can't run cloud-bound CAD. A local, offline tool can go there.
359
commits, 10–22 Sep 2026
~100
test files, headless and GUI
106
command icons, light and dark
up to 12×
faster Press Pull preview

What it adds to FreeCAD

  • Ribbon panels Create, Modify, Assembly, Construct, Inspect and Sketch, named as in Fusion
  • Fusion's keys: E, Q, H, F, M, J; conflicting FreeCAD shortcuts are parked and given back on exit
  • Extrude and Revolve by sketch region, with Objects To Cut and new bodies from pieces
  • Hole by point, circle or edge; threads and counterbores
  • Press Pull and Offset Face, including faces next to fillets
  • Shell, Draft, Scale, Combine, Split Body, body patterns, Move/Copy
  • Joints and as-built joints with Fusion's joint types and limits
  • Automatic references between bodies: sketch on another body's face, cut several bodies at once
  • Retries when the kernel refuses, for example Fillet with a smaller radius
  • Imported STEP parts work in every body command
  • Layout grid, section view with hatching, Material 3 light and dark themes
  • Render cache and two-stage display for heavy assemblies
Development log

What changed, newest first

Written from the commit history. Timings are measured in the FreeCAD GUI on a Ryzen 5 5600U laptop, FreeCAD 1.1.1 / OCCT 7.8.1.

RSS: this log RSS: all my dev logs

Display quality that never leaks into a file

Heavy parts are drawn coarse while you edit and exact when idle; that temporary setting is now never written into the document.

  • A file damaged by the old behaviour is repaired when it opens
  • The progress window for long opens keeps its timing under load
  • A GUI test suite built on the structure of a real working file

A smoother viewport on heavy assemblies

  • Orbit picks its pivot without a stall: last preselection first, an exact pick only when it is cheap
  • Hover highlighting picks only where the cursor rests, never while a button is held
  • One frame per recompute instead of repainting in the middle of it
  • Render cache pinned only for parts up to 100 k triangles; heavier ones stay automatic
  • A fillet survives when its edge is made longer and FreeCAD loses the edge mapping

Viewport and panels: 177 commits in a day

  • Two-stage display for heavy parts, with a mesh cache on disk
  • Section view with hatching by the drafting standards and a live drag
  • Horizon levelling, zoom clamp, a pastel palette shared by all bodies
  • Picks keep their identity in Offset Face, Press Pull, Draft and the panels
  • Fillet shows its preview first, and every row keeps its own edge
  • FreeCAD's console output became an acceptance check: a run with new warnings fails

Press Pull on a real model: up to 12× faster preview

On the lithograph's VR6 axis model (132 objects) most of the Pull latency went into building the coloured preview. The preview now reuses the regions the offset already built.

PreviewBefore, sAfter, sSpeed-up
Rail face, +0.1 mm8.050.6712×
Top plate face (244 faces), +0.1 mm7.381.933.8×
Hole wall, −0.1 mm7.860.6612×
Distance input to status0.4330.01238×

A 5000-object scene: clean recompute 7 ms, input to finished Press Pull preview 0.38 s. After: median of three runs.

Its own icons, a render cache, Press Pull next to fillets

  • 106 command icons redrawn; every colour greys out when a command is disabled
  • Coin render cache on every part, and HybridDesign's first Preferences page
  • A progress window while a file opens or imports
  • Press Pull on faces next to fillets: offset them together or keep the fillet radius

Imports, themes and Fusion's layout grid

  • Imported STEP parts, primitives and links work in every body command
  • Extrude from any sketch region, a Revolve panel, pieces become bodies
  • Live previews for patterns, Mirror and construction planes
  • Fusion's layout grid in every 3D view; Material 3 light and dark themes
Screen recording from that day, played at ×2.

A real ribbon

  • Tabs, panels, big icons with labels, overflow per panel
  • The sketch hides after the operation that used it, as in Fusion
  • References between bodies stay live in both directions
  • A cylinder seam in the way is moved instead of failing the feature
  • GUI tests run offscreen, so a test run never takes over the desktop

Day one: the spec and the operations layer

  • Design specification, package skeleton, headless test runner and GUI harness
  • Extrude and Revolve with directions, cuts across several bodies
  • Holes with threads and counterbores, Combine
  • Joints with Fusion's types, limits and offsets; as-built joints
HybridDesign

Want to try it or follow along?

The workbench is not published yet. Write to me if you model in FreeCAD and want Fusion's workflow there, or if you need a FreeCAD tool built for your team.

fozzfut@gmail.com LinkedIn Telegram · +7 926 046 5551 WhatsApp · +7 926 046 5551