Convert PLY to STL in your browser

Turn an ASCII PLY scan mesh into print-ready ASCII STL without installing anything. The parsing and the facet-normal maths both run in your tab.

L'outil et les libellés sont en français. Les notes de référence ci-dessous restent en anglais.

PLY → STL converter

Runs entirely in this browser tab. Your file is never uploaded and nothing is stored.

Déposez votre fichier PLY ici, ou cliquez pour le choisir

or — no sign-up required

TaskBider drafters, detailers and BIM coordinators work remotely and every listing shows the pay. Typical published range for this work: $18–$45/hr.

1Make sure the PLY is ASCII, not binary (re-save from MeshLab or CloudCompare if needed).
2Drop the file above and download the .stl.
3Open it in your slicer and check the bounding box against the real object before printing.
4If the slicer reports non-manifold edges, repair the mesh — a scan surface is rarely watertight as exported.

Scan colour is lost: STL stores triangles and nothing else.
Scan meshes are dense. Decimating to the detail you actually need keeps slicing times sane.
Output is ASCII STL; re-save as binary in the slicer if you need a smaller file.

PLY — Polygon File Format

The Stanford scan format. Plain text in its ASCII flavour, which is why photogrammetry and laser-scan meshes can be rewritten here.

STL — Stereolithography mesh

The triangle-soup format every 3D printer and mesh tool reads. Openly documented in both ASCII and binary form, with no units, colours or structure.

Geometrically yes, but scan meshes usually need a hole-filling and manifold pass before a printer will accept them.

No. Without faces there are no triangles to write — mesh the cloud first.

TaskBider lists remote CAD and BIM roles with the pay shown on every listing.