Is vertex colour preserved?

PLY vertex colour is translated as material colour in the USDZ, not as a texture. It shows, but with less detail than a real texture map. If your scanner also exported a separate texture, go through GLB instead.

Do heavy scans work on a phone?

A photogrammetry PLY can hold millions of triangles and Quick Look gets sluggish. Reduce the mesh before converting with the polygon reducer: under a million triangles AR stays fluid.

Does it work for intraoral scans?

Yes — a dental PLY converted to USDZ can be shown to the patient on their own phone. For clinical review use the dental viewer, which measures in real millimetres.

No file handy?

Convert toUSDZ

Coordinates and scale are preserved exactly as they are.

Convert PLY to USDZ

Drop your PLY files and download them as USDZ: free, in batch, and they never leave your device.

PLY → USDZ: what you should know

PLY to USDZ is the route for showing a scan in augmented reality. PLY is the typical format of 3D scanners and photogrammetry, and it usually carries colour stored vertex by vertex.

The resulting USDZ opens natively on iPhone and iPad through Quick Look: the scan appears in the real space with nothing to install — exactly what you need when showing the result to someone who doesn't work in 3D.

Like everything else on ilove3d, the conversion happens in your browser. The scan never travels to a server.

Related conversions

STL → USDZ PLY → STL PLY → OBJ PLY → GLB PLY → 3MF OBJ → USDZ glTF → USDZ GLB → USDZ

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