Sketch 3D vs Plastic
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Sketch 3D
Create and animate 3D models with intuitive touch controls. Import various file formats, apply video textures, and capture animations. Share your creations with a community of designers.
- Design 3D models with touch
- Apply video as model texture
- Create 3D model animations
- Import various 3D file formats
- Capture movie from 3D scenes
- Use True Depth Camera for face models
- Share designs with community
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Sketch 3D is a tool for designing 3D models from your fingertips. You could download models from others, and could also share your great designs with other users by saving models in Public space. New Feature: Integrated MaterialX library into the app. Mesh object can be applied with materialx documents. When Saving and Loading with material, the document relative path is stored as a diffuse map entry, similar to the way of handling movie textures. Other features like material adjustment and graph editing are not supported yet. User could download free material documents from public websites and import those zip files with this app, using ShareTo or AirDrop. Feature: Use True Depth Camera to capture face model. Feature: Support using video as model texture. You could use video clips from Photo Album, or from Internet URL (YouTube URL not supported), and then apply it onto a model as texture map. Feature: Capture movie from the 3D scene. Note! If your device could not capture movie, then, could try out a smaller output resolution (by tapping the control pane). However, arbitrary output size may stop capturing prematurely. Feature: Design 3D model animation with skeleton structure. You could design a skeleton structure by placing bones in hierarchical relation. Attach model to the skeleton, and then moving the bones to define different poses. Each pose represented as a keyframe in the timeline view. And animation sequence is produced by playing interpolation between the keyframes. Features: - Import 3D content directly from browser or email, either in .zip, .rar, .7z. - Support formats: Collada DAE, OBJ, 3DS, STL(for 3D printing), and others. - Import/export to iCloud drive, via iTune File Sharing, or to Public area via Apple CloudKit Service. - Supports AirDrop. - Support Quad faces. - Smooth surfaces using Subdivision. - Mirroring editing. - 2-fingers vertex movement, 3 or 4-fingers planar shape creation. - Versatile multi-touches drag-through-space gestures to support editing and changing viewing angle at the same time. - Flexible face strip drawing. - Stitching boundary faces. Stitch triangle soap into connected faces. Stitch over edge or vertex to form a larger face. - Stitching Triangles to Quads. - Loop Cut faces. - Bevel edges. - Extrude faces or edges. - Revolve (Spin). - Vertex Smoothing. - Vertex Slide along edges. - Crease Editing after mesh subdivision. - Split mesh from, or Join mesh to the editing one. - Support hierarchical mesh node structure. - Direct vertex color editing when texture map is not used. - Edit texture map UV coordinates, include atlas generation. - 3D Text generation. - Scene interaction with your created shape. - Design Animation with skeleton structure. - Capture movie from the 3D scene. - Support using video as model texture map.
Plastic
Create 3D models using volumetric primitives and boolean operations, not polygons. Apply color and make non-destructive edits throughout the entire workflow. Export your creations for animation, rendering, or 3D printing.
- Volumetric modeling with primitives
- Add and subtract operations
- Integrated coloring tools
- Non-destructive editing
- Export to PLY format
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In contrast to most other modeling tools, Plastic does not use polygons to define the shape of an object. Instead, you build up a volumetric representation by simply combining primitives with add and subtract operations. The same tools used for modeling can also be used to apply color to the model in one continuous workflow. And, since all of these actions in Plastic are non-destructive, you can easily change aspects of your scene at any point without affecting unrelated work. When you are done, objects can be exported as PLY files to be animated, rendered, or 3D printed with the help of other tools. To get started, create a new project by tapping the “+”-symbol in the project gallery. To edit an object in the scene, you can either tap it twice in the outline or tap the “Edit” button after selecting it and switching to the attributes panel. By tapping the plus button in the outline panel, you can now add strokes to your object and build up its shape. Although I am trying my best to provide a polished experience, Plastic is still in an early stage in its development and occasional bugs, missing features, and frequent design changes cannot be completely avoided. If you are interested in updates on the development progress, feel free to follow me on Twitter @raffael_kaehn. For feedback, please send me a direct message or an email to feedback@plastic.app.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is rating: Plastic at 3.8 against Sketch 3D's 2.9. Plastic also leads on review sentiment (86% vs 48%) and in-app purchases (none vs 2). Sketch 3D's advantage is price ($2.99 vs $9.99) and ratings volume (443 vs 16). On update cadence, ads and device support there is nothing between them.
Scored on Price · Rating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings · Update frequency · Ads · In-app purchases · Monetization · Best chart rank · Devices · Requires iOS
Sketch 3D costs $2.99 and Plastic $9.99 up front. Sketch 3D sells 2 one-off in-app purchases. Plastic asks for nothing beyond the download.
Plastic holds the better App Store score, 3.8 against 2.9. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Sketch 3D has 443 ratings behind it against 16, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews point the same way: 48% of Sketch 3D's written reviews are positive against 86% of Plastic's.
Sketch 3D ships an update every 6 weeks, Plastic monthly. The most recent releases landed on September 22, 2026 and September 9, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Sketch 3D | Plastic |
|---|---|---|
| Price | $2.99 — better | $9.99 |
| Rating | 2.9 (443 ratings) | 3.8 (16 ratings) — better |
| Positive reviews | 47.9% of reviews | 85.7% of reviews — better |
| Number of ratings | 443 — better | 16 |
| Update frequency | Every 6 weeks | Monthly — better |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | Yes | No — better |
| Monetization | Free with in-app purchases — better | Paid |
| Best chart rank | #109 — better | — |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad, iPod — better | iPhone, iPad |
| Requires iOS | 14.0 — better | 16.0 |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 188 MB | 123 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Victor Ng | Raffael Kaehn |
Customer experience
Sketch 3D
Plastic
Bugs and requests
Sketch 3D
Reported bugs
3 issues- Crashes when trying to load or save projects
- Texture and color issues when importing models
- Unresponsive controls and buttons
Requested features
4 requests- In-app tutorials and video guides
- Improved user interface and controls
- Support for importing custom 3D models
- Ability to save and load projects reliably
Plastic
Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.
In-app purchases
Sketch 3D
- Unlimited Keyframe Editing$1.99
- Unlimited Video Capturing$1.99
Plastic
No in-app purchases









