PLY to DAE converter: the surface, as it is
Drop a .ply and get a zip with the .dae and its files, converted in Blender on our server. The trip keeps the geometry and nothing more; vertex colours cannot come along. Free, no account, nothing to install.
How do I convert PLY to DAE?
Drop the file on this page, wait while the server converts it, and download a zip with the .dae and its files.
- 1Choose a .ply. Files up to 50 MB.
- 2The converter opens it in Blender on our server and writes DAE. Most files take under a minute; the page shows the result in 3D when it is done.
- 3Download a zip with the .dae and its files. The upload and the result are deleted 3 days later.
- In:
- .ply, ASCII or binary
- Out:
- a zip with the .dae and its files
- Keeps:
- the geometry
- Cost:
- free, no account
- Vertex colours cannot be carried into DAE.
What survives the trip
A PLY holds a mesh or a point cloud with per-vertex colour, ASCII or binary. A file with points and no faces is refused rather than converted into an empty model: every target here stores surfaces, and turning points into one is reconstruction, not conversion.
The result is a zip with the .dae and the images its materials name, where the source has them: Collada 1.4.1, Z-up, one unit to the metre, triangulated. Only base-colour textures are written; normal and roughness maps have no place in the Collada writer. The source has no skeleton, so none is written.
PLY and DAE do not hold the same things, and the page says so before you upload: the trip keeps the geometry and nothing more, and vertex colours cannot come along. DAE is what SketchUp, Second Life and OpenSim uploads, and older engines and toolchains, still ask for.
What this conversion cannot do
Measured on real files, not assumed. Everything below is a property of the formats or of the pipeline, and knowing it beforehand is cheaper than discovering it in your 3D tool.
A point cloud is refused
Many scanners write a PLY with points and no faces. There is no surface to carry into a mesh format, so the converter stops with a message. Reconstruct a surface first (Poisson or ball pivoting in MeshLab or CloudCompare), then convert.
Shape keys make a very large file
Collada is XML, and every shape key is a complete second copy of its mesh in text. A model with many shape keys produces a .dae ten times the size of the source. If the destination ignores morph targets, as most old Collada importers do, FBX or GLB serves better.
Uploads stop at 50 MB
A larger file is refused before anything is uploaded. Decimate a dense mesh or shrink the textures in your 3D tool first; neither changes the format.
Frequently asked questions
Does the unit survive?
PLY has no unit field, so the numbers are copied as they are. A program that works in metres reads a scan stored in millimetres a thousand times too large; scale it by 0.001 where you open it.
When is Collada still the right target?
When the program on the other end takes little else: SketchUp, Second Life and OpenSim mesh upload, older game engines, some robotics and simulation packages. For anything current, FBX or GLB is the better road.
Is anything uploaded, and for how long?
Yes: the file you drop goes to our server in New York, is converted there, and both the upload and the result are deleted 3 days after the conversion. Nothing is shared with anyone.
Can I look at the PLY first?
Yes, without uploading anything: the PLY viewer draws it in your browser. Open the PLY viewer →
Can this become a VTuber avatar?
Not as it is: an avatar needs a skeleton, skin weights and a face that moves, and a .ply has none of them. Rig and texture the model in Blender first, then convert the rigged file to VRM.
The other format pairs
All 50 are free, all run the same pipeline, and all say what they drop.
PLY to GLB
PLY in, GLB out, free: one file.
PLY to FBX
PLY in, FBX out, free: one file.
PLY to OBJ
PLY in, OBJ out, free: zipped with its files.
DAE to GLB
DAE in, GLB out, free: one file.
DAE to FBX
DAE in, FBX out, free: one file.
DAE to OBJ
DAE in, OBJ out, free: zipped with its files.
GLB to DAE
GLB in, DAE out, free: zipped with its files.
FBX to DAE
FBX in, DAE out, free: zipped with its files.
OBJ to DAE
OBJ in, DAE out, free: zipped with its files.
STL to DAE
STL in, DAE out, free: zipped with its files.
PLY to STL
PLY in, STL out, free: one file.
PLY to USDZ
PLY in, USDZ out, free: one file.
DAE to STL
DAE in, STL out, free: one file.
DAE to PLY
DAE in, PLY out, free: one file.
DAE to USDZ
DAE in, USDZ out, free: one file.
USDZ to DAE
USDZ in, DAE out, free: zipped with its files.
GLB to PLY
GLB in, PLY out, free: one file.
FBX to PLY
FBX in, PLY out, free: one file.
OBJ to PLY
OBJ in, PLY out, free: one file.
STL to PLY
STL in, PLY out, free: one file.
USDZ to PLY
USDZ in, PLY out, free: one file.
Only want to look at the file? GLB viewer, FBX viewer and OBJ viewer all run on your own device — nothing is uploaded.
Is your model going into VTubing?
A .ply is a surface without a skeleton, so no converter can make a VRM avatar out of it directly. Rigged and textured in Blender, the same model converts to VRM on the FBX to VRM converter, with the bones mapped onto the VRM humanoid.
Open the VRM converter