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Convert USD to USDC

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Verified by Adam B.· reviewed by FE Editorial ·updated Jun 23, 2026
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Is it possible to convert USD to USDC?
Yes - USD converts to USDC.

You can do it right here with our free converter - no sign-up, and your file is deleted right after.

The fastest path is Pixar's usdcat command-line tool from the OpenUSD toolset: run usdcat -o out.usdc in.usd to re-serialize the same scene as a binary Crate file. This is a lossless container change - the scene data is identical, only the on-disk encoding switches from text/ASCII to compact binary.

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Tested on macOS, Windows & Linux
Last verified Sep 2026

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Why convert USD to USDC?

A plain .usd file can hold either ASCII text or binary data, while .usdc is specifically the binary "Crate" encoding. People convert to .usdc because binary Crate files are far smaller and load much faster in DCC apps and renderers, which matters for large production scenes.

How to convert USD to USDC

usdcat (OpenUSD toolset) OPEN-SOURCE

Install OpenUSD, then run usdcat -o NewScene.usdc Scene.usd. For an ambiguous .usd file you can force binary with usdcat -o out.usd --usdFormat usdc in.usd.

SideFX Houdini (Solaris/LOPs) PAID

Load the layer in LOPs and use a USD ROP / USD Render Settings output pointing to a .usdc file, which writes the binary Crate on disk.

NVIDIA Omniverse FREE

Open the .usd stage and use File > Save As, choosing the .usdc extension to save the scene in binary Crate format.

About these formats

.USD Universal Scene Description

A .usd file holds a 3D scene in Pixar's Universal Scene Description format, storing geometry, shading, and references to other assets that get composed into one scenegraph. The plain .usd…

Open .USD details →
.USDC USDC File

A .USDC file is a data file used by specific software.

Open .USDC details →

Quality & what to watch

  • The conversion is lossless: .usdc stores exactly the same scene graph as the source, just in binary.
  • Binary Crate files are not human-readable, so you lose the ability to hand-edit the scene in a text editor.
  • Crate files are version-sensitive; a .usdc written by a very new USD build may not open in older software.

Frequently asked questions

Is `.usdc` the same as a Crate file?
Yes. .usdc is the binary "Crate" serialization of USD data, as opposed to the ASCII .usda text format.
Do I lose data going from `.usd` to `.usdc`?
No. usdcat re-serializes the identical scene, so no prims, attributes or references are lost - only the encoding changes.
Why convert to `.usdc` at all?
Binary Crate files are smaller and load significantly faster than ASCII, which speeds up opening large scenes.
Can I convert it back to text?
Yes, run usdcat -o Scene.usda Scene.usdc to get the human-readable ASCII form back.