In September 2020 Autodesk announced some changes to their Fusion 360 license for Personal Use that may have some makers confused or disappointed.
Autodesk posted details about these changes on their blog: Changes to Fusion 360 for Personal Use
I teach several classes at Chimera Arts Makerspace in Fusion 360. The introductory class in the series: "Introduction to Fusion 360 for Makers" helps makers evaluate whether Fusion 360 is a good choice for their projects and a safe investment of their time.
My initial reaction to Autodesk’s changes is that the move is unsettling and confusing, but, on closer examination of the details of the changes, it may be for the best in clarifying the uses of the software, something many beginners stumble over when trying to come to terms with the huge feature set of the program.
Most importantly, I don’t see anything in the features that have been removed from the Fusion 360 Personal Use license that change the overall value proposition of using Fusion 360 for hobbyist projects. Autodesk claims they had to make these changes to stem the abuse of the free non-commercial Personal Use license for commercial use. This move by Autodesk doesn’t appear to be intended to squeeze revenue from the maker community by forcing them to upgrade to a paid version for critical features. The Personal Use license will remain free and very capable for laser cutting, CNC routing, 3D printing and most 3-axis CNC machining applications.
I was very concerned that removal of “DXF export” referred to removing the ability to export 2D sketches in the DXF format. It does not. That critical feature remains in the Personal Use license. 3D Printing and the ability to export 3D STL models are also still present in the Personal Use license.
IGES parametric model export has been removed from the Personal Use license. Originally, STEP model export was slated for removal too, but Autodesk recanted and STEP export will remain intact. Additionally DXF/DWG 3D model export has been removed, but as noted above 2D DXF is still included.
The core set of CAM/Manufacturing capabilities in Fusion 360 are still available under the Personal Use license, and the set of features still far exceeds anything else I'm aware of in any other free or low-cost software. But the new Personal Use license removes two major CAM/Manufacturing features -- rapid movements and tool changes. Instead of rapid feed-rate movements the generated G-code will encode moves to use maximum feed-rate. The pay-as-you-go Manufacturing Extension is no longer available under the Personal License. The Manufacturing Extension adds advanced CAM operations, many are focused on setup efficiency (such as hole detection) and machine run-time efficiency. Others enable support for 4 and 5 axis and advanced manufacturing methods.
