Web or native Linux version plans?

[maksymN8J95]

We recently switched entirely to Linux and Fusion 360 is the only product in our workflow that is not properly supported or available. Are there any plans to have a proper web browser version alike OnShape or native Linux version? I think there was a webassembly project in the past but it seems not to be available anymore and the other web version uses a Windows remote desktop with a really bad performance. We've been paying the subscription for over two years now, but no Linux support as well as no usable web client will leave us with no other choice but to consider moving to a different CAD software. 

[sjcannonatlovejoy]

Thought I'd add my agreement to this thread in case numbers make a difference. I also only dual boot windows 11 for using fusion 360, and it's just a hassle compared to a native linux app, not to mention the performance hit with the windows 11 overhead. I'd love to see linux support from fusion 360, especially since the rest of my workflow and personal-use apps have either a linux-native solution, or at least an efficient implementation on wine.

[jbradwayZ96JM]

Ditto. I only dual boot for Fusion. Windows is completely unprofessional now. There have been several occasions where I have been flailing in meetings trying to present to customers but I can't because my laptop is stuck doing some BS Windows update for 30min at a time. Mind you that is on my personal copy of Windows 11 PRO which I should have full control over. My laptop sounds like a helicopter while sitting idle despite meticulously checking all settings and ensuring nothing but the bare minimum productivity tools are installed. The same laptop booting into Fedora is silent and incredibly fast and has not made me miss a single meeting. My battery life is at least 4x on Linux as well. All this is ignoring the huge elephant in the room of forced AI and the privacy nightmare that Copilot brings. It is unacceptable that I have to continuously go into gpedit.msc and disable Microsoft Recall after every update. It is silly that I should have to maintain a second set of high spec workstation hardware just to run this specific software at the same time as having a usable OS. 

Autodesk needs to poll their customers and make a business decision based on their responses:

1) I'm fine with Windows and can use Autodesk on Windows.

2) I would really like to move to Linux, but there are a few tools that stop me including Autodesk.

3) I have to make specific extra steps or incur extra cost in maintaining hardware specifically to run Autodesk in Windows. I would love to pay Autodesk to make this easier for me instead.

4) I am so fed up I am willing to give up on Autodesk products if they do not support Linux. <-(This is me.)

[lusanagi]

Adding my 2 cents as well

I've switched to linux since almost a year now, and even though at the start I was still booting to winbloat because of some games and Luminar Neo (another sore point), I've since been booting to linux only and dread the times I have to boot into winbloat because I either need to edit photos or work on a big project in fusion (I have a vm, but only usable on small projects)

I get that linux is still niche and that's the reason many companies don't look this way (though I'm surprised Corel has a native version of Aftershot 3, and it is licensed software so the excuse we always hear about payed software in linux not being feasible become moot; and could be a replacement for Luminar, but I'd need to relearn the controls and forgo some of the stuff Luminar has), but just making sure Fusion is compatible with wine/proton should be less of a hassle than working on a native version (and actually ALMOST works using GitHub - cryinkfly/Autodesk-Fusion-360-for-Linux: This is a project, where I give you a way to use A...: it installs, but when trying to authenticate if falls flat on it's face, and even if you manage to get around it it has issues like covering the whole screen when you want to open a project or import a mesh with the background darkening, which makes the pointer not being able to select anything

[jbradwayZ96JM]

It is possible to install Fusion in a Bottle and get past the log-in using this method. (Pay close attention to running the authenticator using the terminal. You also need to be a bit quick with your copy/paste.) https://xhyrom.dev/blog/posts/proper-way-to-install-fusion360-on-linux 
However, you can do all that and see a part of the Fusion ribbon. The next step is to go to your settings and choose OpenGL as your graphics, but when I tried this the whole Bottle crashed out after a few seconds before the settings menu even loaded. 

The way I see it is that Linux is for makers, and not just software makers. CAD is a tool for people who need to design something that doesn't exist, to add more information to the world. This seems to go hand-in-hand with the overall principles of Linux and the greater open source community. 

[kostas_kritikos]

Same here. Currently on dual boot system. Installing at the moment a virtual machine in Linux in order to try how well Fusion 360 runs this way.

Many existing users will move to alternative software eventually. Onshape looks fine to me.

There is no good excuse for Autodesk supporting the Windows monopoly, since they do offer a MacOS version.

There has to be a Linux version.

[lord_durand]

I add my voice, Fusion is the only thing keeping me on Windows and I don't even bother updating to Win 11. In the next few month, when my Fusion subscription will have to be renew, I will not do it unless I found some way to use it decently on Fedora or Mint.

Some programer friend of mine told me that porting software from Linux to other systems is not complicated. Maybe Autodesk should start to make a version working on Linux distribution then porting it on Mac or Window. Best of all world, simpler and probably many potential user who would trade their current windows based CAD software to a good Linux base CAD software.

[holmudden]

I would REALLY like a Fusion 360 release for Linux.

We have a payed subscription to Fusion 360 since 5-6 years back and run a small part-time business with 3D-printing and CNC-machining.
We don't use Windows at all, only Apple hardware and the MacOS version of Fusion 360 works beautiful on my old Macbook pro, but I would love to use Fusion 360 on a Linux machine because it would be more flexible regarding the hardware.

My private computer is Linux and it's an amazing OS 😍 and since MacOS is a UNIX system it would not be impossible to make a Fusion 360 version to Linux since you already have one for UNIX?

[jiri_kralATTPP]

I've been using paid Fusion at work for years now, but Windows 11 at it's current state is just unacceptable. If there is not at least a plan for Linux version at the time my subscription runs out, I will not be extending. Fusion is best CAD that i know and it will be hard for me to give up, but my hate for current state of Windows ecosystem overpowers that now. And I'm not paying Apple their overpriced RAM and storage prices on principle, even though the hardware is pretty sweet.

[designofgok]

I'm in the same boat and have posted same in this thread. I'm desperately
disappointed to be forced to abandon fusion. I think onshape my best bet
but vastly inferior and more expensive. Freecad? Well, that's a real
stretch and I simply don't enjoy using (or trying to use!) it. Out of
interest: what programme are you looking at migrating to?

[maksymN8J95]

For me the solution was to setup Windows 11 LTSC running in a KVM with GPU passthrough with Looking Glass on Ubuntu 24.04. The performance is near native. I ran some benchmarks with CAM to confirm it's above 90% of native performance on Windows. However, this kind of setup is in my opinion quite difficult for people who are new to Linux. On top of that it requires a fairly good motherboard and ideally (but not necessarily) a CPU that has 2 or more CCDs like Ryzen 9 9950x for the optimal core and cache split. This setup simply isn't practical for everyone. The biggest absurd is that it was still easier to set all this stuff up including modifying GRUB settings than to get Fusion 360 to run with Wine or Proton.

[jiri_kralATTPP]

I will try BricsCAD and FreeCAD. Not sure if Onshape make that much sense for me as I need to be offline on occasion and for online only I might as well join our company's Solid Edge server installation. Plus I will need Kicad for PCBs.

I tried VM for CAD, although no GPU passthrough for me as laptops generally don't support it even when they have two GPUs.
I will still need to use VM with Windows for my other industrial software like TIA portal, but that's already such a trash that I run it in VM anyways, because it messes up whole Windows installation.

[o_kozumplik]

I also want to get rid of WIN and Fusion is the only obstacle for this approach at this moment. All other stuff like programming IDE's, gerber tools,  are available for Linux or fully working in Wine. I really like Fusion because it consists of electronic design + mechanical design together in one tool, continuously developed and supported. But WIN11 are agressively decreasing productivity of my R&D team with each and every big update and we can not afford it indefinitely.

Please give us this opportunity to stay with Fusion ... on Linux.

Thank you very much in advance.

[jbradwayZ96JM]

PS: For the record, I am a commercial customer and have been for many years. I am perfectly happy spending money on software, just not software that aggressively fights my workflow. I dropped my Office? Copilot?  Something...365?...subscription when it couldn't figure out what is name was or what it was supposed to do. I dropped Windows when it couldn't reliably do basic stuff like browsing file folders or not having billboard advertisements in my face every 5 minutes. I love Fusion and am an active Insider contributor, but at some point it's just not worth fighting Microsoft anymore. 

[DrCyanide]

I've switched to Linux, and while I'm still duel booting Windows 10 I refuse to downgrade it to Windows 11. At some point Autodesk will make enough changes that Fusion will stop working with Windows 10, and without a Linux version I don't see me continuing with them. As it is I don't want to even boot into Windows 10 unless it's absolutely vital.

Yes there are a lot of Linux distros out there, but frankly if Autodesk could only support Fusion for a single distro then I'd install that distro.

I strongly prefer native apps to web apps, so OnShape is not something I'm eager to jump to. That said, the current Linux CAD offerings are pretty miserable to use. It's likely I'll try using Blender for my next project over FreeCAD, but if those don't work then OnShape would be the only other viable option. I'm not willing to put up with Microsoft's OS any longer, and I'm not going to buy a new desktop when my current one is a powerhouse. My kids have shown an early interest in 3D modeling, and they'll learn what Dad is using - which for the time being won't be Fusion.

[jbradwayZ96JM]

Definitely give FreeCAD another look if you haven't recently. It acts a little different than other CAD tools, but once you learn a few quirks, the workflows are very similar. The tool is super powerful as well. Check out some of the Youtube videos from MangoJelly Solutions or Deltahedra. I think even (especially?) kids could make some part files without much trouble.

[DrCyanide]

Right after posting I did another search for options, and came across SolveSpace. Haven't had hardly any time to do any meaningful testing, but first impressions is that it navigates more like Fusion than FreeCAD does. Without looking at any tutorials I was able to draw a basic shape, extrude it, go back and add some constraints, etc. I'll have to test and see if I can model an actual part later, but right off I'm more excited about using it than I was when I opened up FreeCAD.

[stringwringler]

I've been a subscriber for around 8 years and have moved to Linux Mint on my laptop. I keep my desktop with Windows 10 dual boot for the sake of Fusion. The sooner I can ditch Windows the better. I've tried Wine/Bottles/Winboat but can't get it to run properly. I feel forced into having to change to some other CAD solution albeit do not really want to. I bought myself some time signing up for extended W10 support but when September come I need to be ready to move the rest of my PCs over to Linux.

[waywest000]

It's months later.  I am a paying subscriber, and I still need Fusion to work under Linux.  Please, just facilitate the login process and do a little work to ensure it will run under Proton or Wine and everything else will be taken care of by the open source community.  This is becoming a really big issue.

[radiophysique]

Oh, I'm pretty sure they can create a version for Linux. Fusion is based on Qt, Node.js, possibly Chromium/CEF. It uses Python for the API and scripting, Vulkan/OpenGL for rendering. These are just the usual technologies available for Linux. Nothing special.

[lord_durand]

I wonder what could make them do a Linux version then. I mean, I'm not a market development specialist or whatever, but it's seem like there could be a potential to growth for a minor cost...