Autodesk Maya vs. Third Design vs. ZBrush

ZBrush

Overview
Product	Rating	Most Used By	Product Summary	Starting Price
Autodesk Maya	Score 8.4 out of 10	N/A	Autodesk offers Maya, a 3D animation, modeling, simulation and rendering tool available to artists, animators, and educators, used to create realistic characters, models, and scenes, as well as effects such as explosions, cloth movement, etc.	$234 per month
Third Design	Score 0.0 out of 10	N/A	Third Design is a platform where companies and individuals can create immersive presentations for home design, architecture, for training manuals. Its immersive (3D) presentations help people understand concepts 85% faster than classical 2D presentations (PPT). The solution aims to offer everyone the ability to design these experiences without any prerequisite technical knowledge, and the ability to start from a plethora of starter templates on the Third Design website. The vendor states users…	$0 per editor
ZBrush	Score 9.4 out of 10	N/A	Pixologic in Los Angeles offers ZBrush, a digital sculpting and painting program for the 3D industry. Built within its interface, ZBrush offers tools for digital artists with an arsenal of features that have been developed with usability in mind, to create a user experience designed to feel natural while simultaneously inspiring the artist. With the ability to sculpt up to a billion polygons, ZBrush allows users to create almost limitless models.	$39.95 per month

Pricing

Autodesk Maya

Third Design

ZBrush

Editions & Modules

Monthly: $235
per month per user
Yearly: $1875
per year per user
3-Year: $5625
3 years per user

Free: $0
per editor
Starter: $12.99
per editor per month
Professional: $49.99
per editor per month

Individual: $39.95
per month
Individual: $179.95
per 6 months
Individual: $895.00
perpetual license
Companies & Students: price varies
floating perpetual license
Companies & Students: price varies
academic perpetual license

Offerings

Pricing Offerings
Autodesk Maya	Third Design	ZBrush
Free Trial
Yes	No	No
Free/Freemium Version
No	Yes	No
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
No	No	No

Entry-level Setup Fee

No setup fee

Optional

No setup fee

Additional Details

Maya is also available through Autodesk's Flex plan and pricing. Tokens expire 1 year from date of purchase. Not all products and features are available with Flex. Students and teachers at qualified academic institutions worldwide are eligible for free access to Autodesk software for one-year through the Autodesk Education Community.

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More Pricing Information

Community Pulse
	Autodesk Maya	Third Design	ZBrush
Considered Multiple Products	Autodesk Maya Salomi Rai Junior Animator Chose Autodesk Maya Animating in Autodesk Maya is much more convenient and easier in comparison to Blender. It's easier to use features like constrains, motion trails, and attribute editors in Autodesk Maya. Most of the time I use Blender for modeling and Autodesk Maya for animation. Either way, I … Incentivized Helpful?	Third Design No answer on this topic	ZBrush Verified User Director Chose ZBrush ZBrush’s Brush system allows our digital artists to quickly and easily apply various textures and details to their models with relative ease. This makes it easier for digital influencers to give their creations a unique look and feel while still achieving a professional quality … Incentivized Helpful? Salomi Rai Junior Animator Chose ZBrush Zbrush is specifically used for sculpting the 3D object. Poly paint, Re-topologizing, and hard surface modeling are other great features of this software. While other mentioned software mainly focus[es] on animation, rigging, and so on. Incentivized Helpful?

Best Alternatives
	Autodesk Maya	Third Design	ZBrush
Small Businesses	Onshape Score 7.6 out of 10	Onshape Score 7.6 out of 10	Onshape Score 7.6 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies	Onshape Score 7.6 out of 10	Onshape Score 7.6 out of 10	Onshape Score 7.6 out of 10
Enterprises	Rhino Score 8.4 out of 10	Rhino Score 8.4 out of 10	Rhino Score 8.4 out of 10
All Alternatives	View all alternatives	View all alternatives	View all alternatives

User Ratings
	Autodesk Maya	Third Design	ZBrush
Likelihood to Recommend	9.0 (8 ratings)	- (0 ratings)	8.4 (3 ratings)
Usability	8.0 (1 ratings)	- (0 ratings)	- (0 ratings)

User Testimonials
	Autodesk Maya	Third Design	ZBrush
Likelihood to Recommend	Autodesk Autodesk Maya is a great software, it has so many tools that you can create a full movie without even jumping to any other software. Although it's pretty hard to learn but there is nothing more fun, once you get a hang of it. In general, its tools are best for modeling and animation. Incentivized Verified User Anonymous Read full review	Third Design No answers on this topic	Pixologic Blender is still behind Zbrush when it comes to production quality. But ZBrush is a bit on the expensive side. But again, I've used it for 20 years. So the $100s of spent back then have paid off many times over by now. Just something to consider when purchasing, though. Incentivized Jacquelyn Tolksdorf Founder Read full review
Pros	Autodesk Easy to build workflow due to strong customizability. Industry share. Easy to collaborate with other companies. Strong cooperation with other software. Incentivized Verified User Anonymous Read full review	Third Design No answers on this topic	Pixologic Intuitive UI design. Advanced sculpting capabilities. Integration with other 3D software. Incentivized Verified User Anonymous Read full review
Cons	Autodesk Right now Maya has no good viewport like Blender 2.8 has. It is good that Maya 2019 devs focused on performance and stability but it's strange to see that mainstream soft aren't on trend in developing really cool and helpful tools. Maya LT is very good for artist who don't need complex FX tools. So the devs must add python API to Maya LT. Add more helpful tools to modeling section especially for retopology. Incentivized Miroslav Bobryshev 3D Asset Artist / 3D Generalist Read full review	Third Design No answers on this topic	Pixologic Difficult and messy UI Not well-suited for renders Not suitable for animation and rigging Expensive Incentivized Salomi Rai Junior Animator Read full review
Usability	Autodesk As Autodesk Maya was one of the first softwares I learned, so I feel very fun to work with it. The overall usabilty feels very natural to me and I felt it's easy to learn but tough to master kind of software. Some people find it very difficult to learn, so I deduced some rating points. Incentivized Verified User Anonymous Read full review	Third Design No answers on this topic	Pixologic No answers on this topic
Alternatives Considered	Autodesk We were evaluating the products within the Adobe portfolio like Adobe Animate, Adobe PhotoShop, Adobe After Effects majorly among few others before finalising on the Autodesk Maya. One of the major reasons for that was earlier experience with the Autodesk Maya tool for the engineer and also it has more to offer than Adobe with multiple products. Incentivized Verified User Anonymous Read full review	Third Design No answers on this topic	Pixologic Even though it's 4x as old, ZBrush is still better in my opinion. Plus, I'm just so used to it by now after 20 years. Blender will indeed become better over time and the leading industry standard soon, but for now, ZBrush is still better for me for sure. Love it! Incentivized Jacquelyn Tolksdorf Founder Read full review
Return on Investment	Autodesk Effectively able to get the designs created and visualised Video creation for concepts has become easy ROI has been good, but if the costing is brought down then its even more amazing Incentivized Verified User Anonymous Read full review	Third Design No answers on this topic	Pixologic a single tool to quickly and effectively create 3D objects. Highly detailed 3D models allow us to create a range of highly detailed NFT 3D art collections for our clients. Setting up licenses across an entire team can become costly. Incentivized Verified User Anonymous Read full review
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