Maxon is expanding Redshift for Architects with official support for Archicad. This happened last week during Graphisoft IGNITE 2026 in Budapest, Hungary.
The official Archicad support comes after the product launched with Redshift for Architects for Vectorworks and then Revit. Adding Archicad closes the loop, and now Redshift’s real-time, high-end visualization system works on the top three global BIM solutions.
Redshift for Architects
The 2027 release builds on previous releases with additional features and improvements. Architects can visualize and refine designs directly within their preferred BIM environment, then move projects into Maxon’s Cinema 4D when they need deeper creative control, advanced animation, simulation, or cinematic-quality (film- and broadcast-level) presentations.
Key Takeaways
- Version 2027 adds official Archicad support for Max Redshift for Architects, adding support for the new Archicad 30
- Ray-traced Refractions improve the accuracy of glass and transparency and deliver an advantage over competitor solutions that only approximate refraction
- New Material Creation native in the app, plus dedicated Light Manager
“Architectural visualization increasingly has to do more than show what a building will look like; it must help communicate an idea, tell a story and, in many cases, become a finished marketing asset in its own right,” said Nicolas Burtnyk, Executive Vice President of Rendering at Maxon. “Redshift for Architects provides a path from fast visual feedback all the way through to the kind of high-end rendering, animation and simulation workflows used in film and advertising, within an environment that keeps them in their creative flow.”
Version 2027 now supports Archicad in addition to Revit and Vectorworks.
Redshift for Architects 2027 includes updates such as better interactive previews with faster shader compilation, refraction, transparent shadows, and ray-traced depth of field. The latest version also adds a new Custom Material Creation manager and a dedicated Light Manager, giving architects and archviz professionals more direct control over how their designs and scenes look and are presented.
In-App Real-Time Interactive
Maxon’s solution works like its chief competitors, letting the rendering technology embed directly into the creative authoring packages they know and love. Whether that’s Vectorworks, Revit, or now Archicad, users build scenes in the environment they already know.
MORE: AIA26: Maxon’s new Redshift for Revit and More
The new ray-traced depth of field (DoF) technology improves how the live preview presents glass, transparency, and camera effects. The ray-traced refraction is also critical in architectural visualization, where glass and transparent materials play a central role in design. Unlike competitor real-time renderers, Maxon’s Redshift for Architects doesn’t approximate refraction; it can now trace these interactions directly, helping architects trust their design decisions as the preview delivers more realistic light behavior.
Custom Materials Creation
Architects can now create custom materials from scratch in Redshift using physically based rendering (PBR) controls, rather than relying only on materials converted from the host BIM application or pulled from the Redshift Library.
This gives users more creative control when a specific material isn’t already available in the model or library. Users have full control over base color, specular, transparency, fuzz, coat, emission, and geometry channels. When materials come from your host BIM application, they convert to Redshift materials and lock. To modify them, users must unlock them and create a copy. Adjustments to the copy overwrite the existing objects assigned this material.
Dedicated Light Manager
Architects now have dedicated controls in Light Manager to create and manage supplemental Redshift lights directly in the visualization workflow. These lights remain separate from the host BIM model, letting users shape the final image without altering the architectural lighting scheme.
Redshift 2027 features a new dedicated Light Manager for finer control of scene lighting.
Users can place and aim lights visually in the Redshift viewport, then fine-tune properties such as intensity and color temperature with fully ray-traced feedback. The net result is greater separation between design lighting and presentation lighting, in other words, between intended built environment and artistic freedom.
Push to Cinema 4D
Maxon’s new push into real-time interactive rendering with Redshift for Architects marks a much-needed use of the company’s industry-leading visualization technologies, traditionally used in markets such as film and broadcast television. Cinema 4D, its flagship application, has long had a strong following among agencies and archviz pros. Bringing this technology downstream to typical architects follows a natural evolution in the market’s democratization of rendering technology.
When architects want to take their visualizations further, they can push their scenes directly to Cinema 4D, either in-house or to third-party professionals.
