Embed Any 3D Model on Your Website — No Three.js Required

Setting up a 3D viewer takes longer than most teams expect. Pick a renderer, configure a CDN, deal with CORS, write a loading state, add orbit controls, tune the lighting, make it responsive. Half a day in, you might have something that halfway works. Then you have to figure out mobile.

SphereLinks now handles all of that. Upload a file and you get a hosted viewer plus an iframe snippet you can paste into any HTML page, Webflow site, Notion block, or CMS.

What's new: The SphereLinks 3D Viewer supports GLB, FBX, OBJ, and STL. Every upload generates a permanent viewer URL and a ready-to-copy embed. Orbit controls, auto-rotate, fullscreen, and light/dark backgrounds are included.

What you get after uploading

Upload a model and three things happen: the file goes to a global CDN, a permanent viewer URL appears at https://spherelinks.io/embed/{modelId}, and the dashboard generates an iframe snippet you can copy immediately.

Opening the viewer URL directly gives you a full-page interactive viewer with orbit, zoom, and pan. The snippet is what you drop on other sites.

The embed snippet

<iframe
  src="https://spherelinks.io/embed/3fe1ede8-17fc-4f38-8702-ab241c146a07?autorotate=1"
  width="640"
  height="480"
  frameborder="0"
  allow="fullscreen"
  allowfullscreen
  title="Your Model Name"
></iframe>

Copy it from the model card, paste it anywhere that accepts HTML. That's it.

Supported formats

GLB is the one to use if you have a choice. Textures, animations, and materials in one binary file. Loads fast, looks good.

FBX exports from Maya, 3ds Max, Cinema 4D, and Blender load automatically. The viewer converts Phong materials to PBR on import so surfaces actually pick up environment reflections rather than looking like plastic.

OBJ is widely supported but doesn't embed textures. Uploaded OBJ models render with a neutral material. Usable, but if your model has textures baked in, use GLB.

STL is common for 3D-printed parts and mechanical models. Renders as a single mesh with a matte grey finish.

You don't need to convert anything before uploading. Drop in whatever your tool outputs.

URL parameters

Three query parameters control the viewer without touching JavaScript.

autorotate=1 makes the model spin slowly on load. 0 to disable.

bg=light switches to a light grey background — useful if your page is white and the dark viewer looks out of place.

controls=0 hides the UI (rotation toggle, fullscreen button) for decorative embeds where the controls feel like clutter.

Combine them:

https://spherelinks.io/embed/{modelId}?autorotate=1&bg=light&controls=0

What the viewer does

There's no lighting configuration step. The viewer ships with a full rig: ambient light, key/fill/rim directionals, a city HDRI for reflections, and soft contact shadows under the model. It looks decent for every format without touching anything.

Orbit controls work on mouse and touch. Drag to rotate, scroll to zoom, right-click or two-finger drag to pan. Damping is on by default so the motion doesn't feel like flicking a marble.

Auto-rotate pauses when the visitor interacts and resumes when they stop.

GLB files with PBR materials show proper specular highlights and reflections. FBX and OBJ materials get their roughness capped and environment intensity boosted so they don't look completely flat.

The fullscreen button works in the embed as long as the iframe has allow="fullscreen" — the generated snippet already includes it.

Where it actually gets used

E-commerce is the obvious one. Paste the iframe next to product photos. No Shopify app, no theme code — just an iframe in a rich text block. Shoppers who can rotate a product before buying tend to return it less often. The 3D viewer takes about two minutes to add.

Design portfolios are a good fit too. Screenshots of 3D work always lose something. An embedded viewer that someone can actually spin around is a better argument for your skills than a render.

Architecture and real estate are underused. Drop a room layout or building exterior directly into a proposal. The client can look at it from any angle, which is usually the question they have anyway.

Technical docs are worth trying if you're describing mechanical parts or assemblies. Even a simple 3D view of what you're referring to cuts down on "which part is the X again" confusion.

How it works under the hood

File uploads go to S3, fronted by CloudFront. The viewer URL is a Next.js page that pulls model metadata from a Lambda API, then streams the file from CloudFront to the browser.

All the 3D rendering happens client-side — Three.js and WebGL. The server sends HTML and metadata; the browser does the GPU work. There's no server-side rendering bottleneck, so many embeds loading at once isn't a problem.

The embed URL allows cross-origin framing in its Content-Security-Policy and has no X-Frame-Options header, so the iframe works from any domain without configuration on the embedding site.

What doesn't work yet

Large FBX and OBJ files are slow on mobile. Over 100 MB is where things start to hurt. A 50 MB FBX usually converts to under 10 MB as a GLB, which is worth doing if that's your situation.

OBJ files don't carry textures. Models render with a neutral material. If textures matter, GLB is the right format.

GLB animations don't play in the embed yet. The model loads in its bind pose. That's coming.

Getting started

Go to your [SphereLinks dashboard](https://spherelinks.io/models), click Upload Model, and drop your file in. The embed snippet appears on the model card as soon as the upload finishes.

If you're already using the AI generation pipeline, each generated model gets a viewer URL and embed snippet automatically. Nothing extra to do.

The viewer is free on all plans. No per-embed charges, no bandwidth caps for normal usage.

Ready to generate your first 3D model?

Upload an image and get a production-ready GLB file with PBR textures in under two minutes.