【2025】Autodesk Fusion – It’s the future of design and manufacturing

in 2025 AutoDesk released the new pricing and upgraded their old Fusion 360 to the newer version of the application, now known as simply Fusion. The branding has changed but under the hood remains one of the best Computer Aided Drafting & Design (CAD) suites aimed at all comers, including Corporations, Professionals, Start-ups, Inventors, and Hobbyists. This amazing package also integrates Computer Aided Manufacturing (CAM), Computer Aided Engineering (CAE), and Electronics as a one-stop shop from concepts to small and large-scale fabrication production lines with just a few mouse clicks. This article will look at what Fusion is, what it isn’t, and how to use this ground-breaking application.

Early Development of Fusion

Quoted image; PDO

AutoDesk has been around for a very long time and is probably best known for AutoCAD, which has been an Industry Standard CAD package for decades. Fusion was originally based on a technology demonstration application called Inventor Fusion, which was released in 2009. In about the middle of 2013 a new version of this software was released as a developed cloud-based version of Inventor Fusion and marketed as Fusion 360.

Over time, AutoDesk has developed both Inventor and Fusion in, initially parallel, slowly diverging ways. Inventor is aimed at mechanical design, documentation, and testing, while Fusion has reached out in several directions. For example, in 2017, a popular suite of hobbyist and maker tools called AutoDesk 123D was split up into TinkerCAD and other applications, while Fusion benefitted from tools such as the Slicer feature from that suite, and hobbyists were encouraged to switch to Fusion.

More recently in 2021, Autodesk Meshmixer was discontinued, after functionality was integrated into Fusion. This software is aimed at Form modeling and Sculpting and has complemented the Parametric Modelling native to Fusion. Also, in 2021 AutoDesk integrated Netfabb, a powerful Additive Manufacturing, Design, and Simulation package aimed at not just hobbyist single-print 3D printing, but Industrial 3D printer Farms and the associated packing and stacking of 3D parts that this type of manufacturing requires. in 2025 Fusion 360 was re-named to the current Fusion, dropping the 360 after licensing and program updates.

Not just a CAD program

 “Autodesk Fusion: More than CAD, it’s the future of design and manufacturing. Autodesk Fusion connects your entire manufacturing process by integrating CAD, CAM, CAE, and PCB into a single solution allowing you to design and make anything.”

Quoted; ARKANCE

I have been using Fusion for about three years now and I am a very active member of the AutoDesk Forums, particularly in the Fusion forum though I join the AutoCAD forum also from time to time.

Originally Fusion and Inventor were developed in parallel (technically they still are). Where Inventor is aimed primarily at engineers and mechanical design; Fusion is much broader, both in scope and the audience it is trying to capture. Fusion is NOT a One Stop Application for everything but it covers many of the bases and areas of engineering and design associated with the entire process: from a conceptual idea to a mass-produced finished product line. With Fusion, an idea can quickly be modeled up, tested under simulated conditions, taken to Production Prototype, generated the CNC code for the machines, created the engineering drawings and documentation, animated and rendered for the marketing team, and much more.

Not only can Fusion do all of this, with the right settings and parameters, it will automagically design and create models and drawings and other tasks with powerful built-in AI functions. Imagine creating most of the production drawings for a design by clicking a check box in a panel and hitting Ok!

Fusion also has the ability to form models in association with the Parametric Modelling and plug-in extension modules and work with a variety of manufacturing and fabrication systems like Injection Moulding, Laser Cutting, Additive and Subtractive CNC, and a few others. Fusion is not THE software application that does it all, but it comes very close in some areas.

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Features of Fusion

Fusion has a number of Workspaces where the user can do different things that can be integrated together. While there are plenty of applications that allow you to do CAD and there are plenty of applications that allow simulated testing, and there are plenty of applications that allow you to do Rendering and Animation, Fusion uses these workspaces, and others, to group together these capabilities into spaces where the required tools are all in one place and all in one single software application. Let’s have a look at some of these Workspaces and see what they do.

Design

Quoted image; Autodesk

In its most basic form, Fusion is a Parametric Modelling CAD package. This means that it has the ability to create 2D and 3D designs using very accurate positioning of points, lines, and curves, and mathematical functions that can be or are driven by parameter sets that can easily be changed. That in itself is a very useful ability that many applications also have, even AutoCAD has these basic abilities. Where Fusion differs from many of these other packages is that it also combines organic modeling or Form modeling that many other different applications also have, but few have both like Fusion does and also the ability to combine them together.

The Design Workspace is also further split up into smaller Workspaces with common useful tools. The main aim of the design workspace is to create Models that can be used for other purposes, so there is a Solid workspace that covers this main activity. There is also the ability to work with Surfaces. So far, we are pretty standard but Fusion allows working with Meshes that can be imported or created and combined; Forms, Plastics, and Sheet Metal tools, any of which can be combined together into the same Design in a myriad of ways. All of these sub-areas are tied together with the Sketch tool to allow careful crafting directly of the model. The ability to work with Forms AND Sheet Metal (and everything else) is what makes Fusion very different from its competitors, but it doesn’t stop just there.

So, in summary, all of these Basic Design Tools are available:

• Solid
• Surface
• Mesh
• Sheet Metal
• Plastic

How about we throw Artificial Intelligence (AI) into the mix and allow the user access to Generative Design?

Sometimes AI just knows things that you don’t. After all, you actually don’t know what you don’t know. AI can be used to take a Model, set up some design parameters like the design space and set conditions and goals, and press the button and let it work out different ways to meet those goals with a design study. The study will return a design that is Manufacture Ready after a period of time. How much time will depend on many parameters but some simple or very mature and elegant results can be created in minutes. An AI-generated Design Study can be run many more times than multiple Design Teams couldn’t do in much more time. This saves time, money, and resources. Generative Design will never replace the Design Teams, but it will make their job so much easier and allow them to concentrate on other priorities.

One of the great things about Generative Design is that critical areas can be targeted. Imagine taking a basic design and optimizing it for weight and volume while keeping the strength but still maintaining specific curvature for an aerodynamic application. It isn’t Science Fiction; it exists right here and right now. Generative design is used extensively in the Aerospace and Transportation Industries but the same AI can be used to create attractive artwork and jewelry designs, aesthetic building shapes, and solve many other problems that would otherwise need a separate Design Study in the normal engineering design process.

【2025】Fusion 360 vs SolidWorks: Leading 3D CAD Software Comparison

Render

Quoted; Autodesk

I got some very interesting search results for Render when I popped my Google Goggles on. In this case, we will NOT be talking about protective Cement; dead animals, or simplifying complex issues. What we will be talking about is the ability of a program to take a 2D or 3D image and synthetically change it so that it appears much more like the real thing. While some things only need to be cleaned up, modern rendering can create images that are so realistic that you feel like you can reach out and touch them.

Fusion allows the user to select different materials and textures and add them to their model so that not only does a wood panel look like a panel of wood, but you can literally tell if it is Pine or Oak. The default material in Fusion is Steel, but change that to Copper or Bronze and it really looks like those different materials. Glass looks like Glass and you can even select Frosted Glass. Fusion has all of these capabilities.

Fusion gives you the control to not only select the different materials and textures but also you can set the scene, and set the view, including lighting and perspectives, and multiple light effects like sunshine reflecting off a window onto the model. The current model can be taken from the engineers directly to the marketing and graphic design departments in real time.

Animation

Creating a new product does not stop when the design goes out the door to the customer. Before it goes out the door the marketing people need to get hold of it and create a way to sell it and in a modern world, creating some kind of Animation is a must. Fusion allows the user to create animations that can be used for marketing or support services by creating short (or long) videos of a photorealistic design, exploding it on the screen into constituent parts (sort of like blowing it up but without the big Bang!), allowing editing and annotating different parts of the animation, and putting it all back together. In a few minutes, the full functionality of a design can be shown off or comprehensive repair or maintenance guides can be created. Animation can be tracked from start to finish, speeds changed and parts highlighted.

Fusion can quickly transfer ideas to the customer; collaborators and other stakeholders to and from the designers simply with the transfer of an animated file. Fusion can animate the design before it has even been fabricated to allow testing in a virtual world of such things as tolerances and design defects where things just don’t work of fit in the virtual world. These problems can be found and fixed BEFORE the prototype comes off the line.

Simulation

Quoted; Autodesk

So far in this article, I have shown Fusion to be a very functional tool for basic design, but now we are starting to get into where this amazing software really comes to the front. Simulation is about testing software versions of the model for various characteristics to find problems and solve them before it is too late. Fusion can do many types of Simulation, including basic Static and Dynamic scenarios using a very accurate Finite Element Analysis engine.

Finite Element Analysis (FEA) is a validation tool used in Digital Prototyping. FEA is a computerized environment that will show how a design might work in the real world in actual use and these types of tests and simulations are vital to engineers so that they can prove a design is safe and will actually do what it is meant to do. Fusion uses FEA to test such things as static stresses under a load; dynamic stresses under a load; temperature effects; bending; buckling; breaking; melting and freezing. Fusion can take the guesswork out of a design and minimize prototyping and destructive testing. While most of the available simulations are common to all designs, Fusion even has built-in simulations for such things as Injection Moulding, a common form of manufacturing.

While you cannot analyze EVERYTHING, all of the most common FEA tests are available, and simple Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) is available for such things as heating and cooling Electronics.

Manufacture

Quoted; Autodesk

The rubber is still hitting the road. The next Workspace in Fusion is the Manufacturing Workspace. Fusion uses this space to connect the design model up to the actual machines that will fabricate it. AutoDesk has gone to great trouble to connect with some of the largest CNC manufacturers in the world, like HAAS, to allow Fusion to actually simulate the machines, work out optimum fabrication methods, create and change the actual CNC code in the machine’s native CNC language. When the actual machines are hooked up to the network, Fusion will even allow you to download and begin production on those machines – all from a software model.

Not only does Fusion have the ability to work with standard CNC cutting machines, otherwise known as Subtractive Manufacturing but also Fusion is very mature with Additive Manufacturing. Additive Manufacturing is not just 3D Printing in plastic, it also includes Metal Laser Sintering and other advanced additive machines. The Fusion software can control Injection Moulding and other processes too.

Drawing

Quoted; Autodesk

So now that you have taken your idea completely from an idea to a finished manufactured product, the work does not stop there. A series of Engineering Drawings will be required for ongoing design updates, maintenance, or simply to have a paper or electronic version for the archives or if anything goes wrong. Fusion has this covered with the integrated Drawing Workspace.

Drawings can be created directly from the Model in the Design workspace. Fusion creates the drawings either in a semi-manual way where the user makes the drawings with the built-in Tools; or fully automatically with another AI so that the engineer just needs to tweak (if necessary) the drawings to finish them off. All of the drawings will be created to the relevant Standard, including European and American drawing Standards, and can easily be converted between US Customary Units to the SI Metric units.

I recently automatically created drawings for one of my designs that had more than 100 parts and assemblies. What would have taken me weeks to create by hand Fusion automatically generated all of the production drawings, the bill of materials, and Assembly and sub-assembly drawings – all in less than 10 minutes. I only use the basic Fusion and all of this capability and what I have written about so far comes with it.

Extensions

Quoted; Autodesk

Fusion software is definitely unique in what it offers to users, but there are some users who need even more capability than it already has. For these advanced Users, Fusion has Extensions.

Do you need 5-axis CNC support? What about full-blown metals-based Additive Manufacturing capabilities? Plastic Injection Moulding? Then you are probably going to need the Fusion Manufacturing Extension, an even more mature and in-depth suite of tools. These tools allow capabilities previously only found by manufacturers’ custom machine software suites. In Fusion, these tools are not only built in but are fully integrated with the rest of Fusion.

Other Extensions include expanded FEA and in-depth testing and simulation suites, a Design Extension that more fully integrates AI into the design process, and a comprehensive Top-Down Management Extension that gives greater control over the entire fabrication process. AutoDesk is constantly working with many Industries to try to integrate Fusion into their workflows.

How Much Does Fusion Cost?

Here is the cost chart of each use/subscription for Fusion.

Learning Fusion

Fusion is still under constant development and the AutoDesk Forums are very active, not least because the AutoDesk Developers monitor the forums and actually take notice of what the Users want. Sure, not every itch will be scratched, but considering what Fusion actually is most people for the most part are very happy. By the way, you can find me in the Fusion forums regularly helping out people with problems.

There are some great Fusion learning resources provided by AutoDesk. The Documentation is not just boring reading but has some excellent embedded tutorials that explain various functions simply with an example. Self-paced learning is also a great way to learn Fusion in a bit more depth with a series of tutorials on specific areas of Fusion, like programming CNC machine Tool Paths.

On YouTube, AutoDesk has an entire Fusion Channel that aims at beginners, intermediate, and experts on many, many, commonly used, and not so commonly used functions of the software. AutoDesk also has AutoDesk University with comprehensive learning and Certification available. In my experience, time is NEVER wasted on doing any of this learning. These tutorials are also updated regularly as Fusion is updated. My best advice, pick something you like and model it for practice and pleasure, you will not regret it.

Conclusion

This review of Fusion has only just scratched the surface of what Fusion really is all about. Fusion is not a one-stop shop for all users, but it isn’t meant to be. What Fusion is all about is giving Users the tools and functionality that they need, all integrated into a single software application. Fusion by no means replaces other software for specific complex applications. What Fusion does do is give enough depth and functionality so that at least most users have what they need for most jobs.