What’s new in 3ds Max 2027?

A few weeks ago, 3ds Max 2027 was officially released, introducing new features and capabilities for both artists and developers. With this release, 3ds Max saw many upgrades including Arnold to 5.9.0, USD to 0.14.0, Substance to 3.0.6, performance improvements across tools, modifiers, and render workflows, and much more. Refer to the product release page for a detailed feature breakdown for 3ds Max 2027.

New Features, Improvements, and Updated Workflows

3ds Max 2027 ships with several notable updates across its plugin ecosystem: 

• Arnold for 3ds Max updated to 5.9.0 (Arnold 7.5.0.0)
• USD for 3ds Max updated to 0.14.0
• Substance updated to 3.0.6
• Autodesk Assistant (Technical Preview): An AI-powered tool that helps you quickly find information about features and workflows directly within the product — a welcome addition for developers and artists alike looking to streamline their pipeline research. Read more here.

SDK Changes

Now let’s get into what matters most for plugin developers.

• .NET 10.0 Support: 3ds Max 2027 moves plugin development to .NET 10. Note that .NET 8, introduced in 3ds Max 2026, has reached an end of life and is no longer supported. If you are still on an older version, refer to our porting guide from .NET Framework to .NET for plugins for step-by-step migration guidance.
• DirectX 9 Removal: Support for DirectX 9 has been fully removed. This affects several headers that have been dropped from the public SDK — notably id3d9graphicswindow.h, idx9pixelshader.h, and idx9vertexshader.h — along with related interfaces in ihardwarematerial.h, ihardwarerender.h, and RTMax.h. Developers relying on these should migrate to the DirectX 11 equivalents now available in the SDK.
• Updated Core Dependencies: 3ds Max 2027 development specifies Visual Studio 2022 (v17.14.x), C++20, Qt 6.8.3. Review your plugin dependencies against these versions before building. You could also use the newer Visual Studio 2026, when you set the toolset to be v143.
• API Changes: There are targeted API updates across several headers — including new methods in custcont.h, ioapi.h, and IValidateNodeCallback.h, as well as deprecations in object.h, gfx.h, and others.
• Updated Samples and Documentation: Samples and documentation have been updated to reflect all API changes in this release.