About Accessing Drawings Remotely

You can save and open drawings in your Autodesk Web & Mobile Account from any location in the world with internet access, and on any device--desktop, web, or mobile.

When you save a drawing file to your AutoCAD Web & Mobile Account, you get convenient access to the file as an alternative to emailing the drawing file to yourself. Your drawing becomes accessible for viewing and editing from any of your internet-connected devices, such as a tablet when you're in the field, or from a web browser on a different desktop computer in a remote location.

The commands for saving and opening drawings from your online account are available from the Quick Access toolbar.

The first time you use one of these commands, you get a prompt to install the Save to Web & Mobile plug-in application.

Note: These commands are available only on 64-bit systems.

Access From a Web or Mobile Device

Here's how to access to your uploaded drawings with a web or mobile device:

• From a tablet or a different computer, use your web browser to log in to your Autodesk Web & Mobile Account.
• From a mobile device, install the AutoCAD app from your app store. When you start the app, you first log in to your Autodesk Account.

Saving Drawings

Saving a drawing works in the same way as regular AutoCAD operation. By default, the program also automatically saves your drawing 10 minutes after the last time it was saved.

Note: When a drawing file is opened from AutoCAD Web & Mobile, it retains the DWG version in which it was last saved. By default, this is the AutoCAD 2018 file format. You can specify a different default file format in the Options dialog box, Open and Save tab.

External References

When you upload a drawing with external references to your Autodesk Web & Mobile Account:

• A drawing file is packaged in a compressed format (*.dwgzip) together with its referenced files.
• Support for external references is limited to xrefs (.dwg files) and image files only. No other reference or support files are included in the drawing package.
• When an uploaded drawing package is unpackaged, it does not recreate a folder hierarchy. The drawing and its references are located in a single folder.

Note: Editing referenced files can result in conflicts between the online and the local versions. To avoid complex situations that could result in your losing work, referenced files are set to read-only.

Notes and Limitations

Here are several considerations when using the Web & Mobile feature:

• Drawing file sizes are limited depending on your account. Drawings in free accounts can be up to 10 MB in size.
• Modifying the same file simultaneously on multiple devices can lead to version control problems and should be avoided.
• Online plotting from Web & Mobile is limited to PDF format.

For larger, more complex drawings, use the AutoCAD eTransmit feature to package a complete set of files and avoid missing files when sharing drawings with others outside your company. However, when sharing copied files, remember that version control is based only on date and time.