Sketchfab Celebrates its 10th Anniversary

Screenshot of Sketchfab at its launch 10 years ago

10 years ago, on March 26th 2012, we launched sketchfab.com. The idea was pretty simple: 3D artists spend hours making beautiful 3D models, but share them as 2D screenshots, for lack of a better solution, which sounded crazy to us. So we went on to build the first platform to easily share 3D models in all their 3D glory. As with many successful startup launches, our site immediately went down after launching. :)

The site started pretty simple, just as a 3D viewer. We kept improving it, both in terms of rendering quality and performance, adding features and integrations, while growing a passionate community around it. Here are some of the highlights of the past 10 years at Sketchfab:

• 2012: Going live, getting a Blender exporter
• 2013: Opening our New York office
• 2014: Introducing annotations, getting natively integrated in Photoshop, adding VR support,
• 2015: Getting whitelisted in the Facebook newsfeed, adding PBR support, getting a native integration with HoloLens, adding animation support
• 2016: Passing 1 million models, getting Twitter, WordPress, LinkedIn, and Steam integrations
• 2017: Adding sound and ARKit support, passing 1 million users, releasing the model inspector
• 2018: Launching the Sketchfab Store, releasing our download API, getting integrated into Spark AR by Facebook, partnering with Apple for the launch of USD support, passing 3 million models
• 2019: Getting integrated with Magic Leap, adding support for Oculus Quest
• 2020: Launching app-free AR support and Sketchfab for teams
• 2021: Reaching 7 million members, joining the Epic Games family
• 2022: Getting native integration in NVIDIA Omniverse

The 3D ecosystem is quite different today from what it was 10 years ago. It is now easier than ever to create 3D content, using everything from VR sculpting tools to cutting-edge 3D capture technologies like the iPhone’s LiDAR. And with the promise of the metaverse, the demand for 3D content is booming. This rapid growth in 3D creation and consumption makes it more important than ever to have one central place to host, manage, publish, and share 3D content. We are committed to continuing to improve that place, with the fantastic support of the Epic Games ecosystem.

Finally, today I want to thank our community of creators—we wouldn’t be here without you. Our 3D viewer can only look as good as the content it displays, and you have made some incredible art over the years. On top of posting great content that amazes us every day, you help us improve what we do and how we do it, you spread the word about Sketchfab, and you educate others about what can be achieved with real-time 3D. I’m grateful for ten years of your passion, creativity, and support!