Welcome to the 3ds Max 2026.2 Update! You can access the 3ds Max 2026.2 Update from your Autodesk Account.
Read on to learn about the new features and updated workflows you'll find in this release. For technical details including What's Fixed, please see the 3ds Max 2026.2 Update Release Notes.
For more on the evolution of 3ds Max over the years, check out the 3ds Max timeline on Autodesk Area.
What else is new?
This release of 3ds Max also includes the following changes and improvements.
| Material Switcher and Multi/Sub-Object Previews |
You can turn off swatch rendering for Material Switcher and Multi/Sub-Object to improve performance with large numbers of materials. In the 3dsmax.ini file, there are two new options under Materials: Show MultiMaterial Previews and Show MaterialSwitcher Previews. These get added the first time you use the corresponding material. By default, they are set to 1 which means that the swatches get rendered. Set them to 0 to skip swatch rendering. |
| Skin Modifier Performance Improvements and Default Setting Update |
The Skin modifier is now more responsive when reacting to changes in the mesh beneath it in the modifier stack. When working with dense meshes or making adjustments that affect topology, you may notice faster updates and improved interactivity in these situations. In some cases, scene load times involving Skin may also benefit from these optimizations. In addition, the default value for the Skin modifier's Bones Affect Limit has been reduced from 20 to 5. This adjustment reflects the most common user preference and may help improve performance and reduce memory usage in scenes using the Skin modifier. |