Issue Description
Uncertainty in Understanding Poly Count Tool Results
You have successfully run the Poly Count Tool on your Archicad project but are unsure how to interpret the results.
Solution
While the tool provides data on the number of polygons in the model, you're unclear about what is considered a high or low polygon count, and how it might impact project performance, especially in terms of rendering, navigation, or file size.
In Archicad, what constitutes a "large" polygon count can vary depending on the hardware you're using and the complexity of your project. However, a general guideline would consider a model with:
- 200,000 to 500,000 polygons as moderate to large.
- 500,000 to 1 million polygons as large.
- 1 million polygons or more as very large or heavy.
Once you exceed around 500,000 polygons, you may start to notice performance issues, especially if your hardware or GPU isn’t optimized for high-poly rendering. However, Archicad handles polygon-heavy models better when the geometry is clean and efficiently modeled, meaning that well-optimized models with high polygon counts may still perform adequately.
To improve performance in large projects, it helps to use techniques like model simplification (reducing unnecessary details), smart object use, and reducing the level of detail in areas where it's not crucial. Archicad's settings like 3D model view options can also help manage polygon-heavy models by showing simpler versions of objects or by filtering what's displayed in 3D views.
The Poly Count Tool is part of the Goodies, installed separately:
Download ARCHICAD Goodies on https://www.graphisoft.com/downloads/goodies/