What is a OBJ file?
OBJ is a plain-text 3D geometry format from the late 1980s that stores vertices, faces and texture coordinates, with materials in a companion MTL file. Its age is its strength: almost every 3D application can import it, and being text makes it easy to inspect.
At a glance
- Full name
- Wavefront OBJ
- Extensions
- .obj
- Type
- 3D model
- Introduced
- 1980s
- Created by
- Wavefront Technologies
- Compression
- None
- MIME type
- model/obj
Strengths
- Read by almost every 3D application
- Plain text, so it is inspectable and diffable
- Supports UV coordinates and per-face materials
Limitations
- No animation or skeletal data
- Materials live in a separate MTL file that is easily lost
- Large and slow to parse compared with binary formats
When to use OBJ
Moving static geometry between 3D applications that may not share a modern format.
You need animation, or a single self-contained file. Use GLB.
Convert OBJ files
Every tool below runs in your browser unless it is labelled otherwise, so the file stays on your device.
OBJ to GLB Converter
Turns Wavefront OBJ meshes into GLB (glTF binary), the format most web viewers, Unity, Godot, and AR tools expect by default.
GLB to OBJ Converter
Extracts mesh geometry from GLB or glTF files and exports it as Wavefront OBJ for editing in older desktop 3D modeling tools.
STL to OBJ Converter
Converts STL mesh files to Wavefront OBJ format, useful when an older modeling tool or export pipeline expects OBJ instead of STL.
OBJ compared
Related 3d model formats
Last updated 2026-08-03