Snap Objects to Points

Align objects to snap points when translating or rotating parts, pushing and pulling faces, or sketching curves.

There are three types of snaps, some of which take precedence over others. In order of highest to lowest precedence:

Point snaps: Predefined points on your model including end, middle, center, center arc, intersection, and quad points.
On snaps: Points on a sketch curve that move with the mouse cursor (only available in sketch mode).
Grid snaps: Points on the grid (available when sketching or translating). Grid spacing can be changed in the Preferences.

All snaps are active by default, although you can suspend grid snapping temporarily by pressing the Alt key.

Working with Snaps

When you move or push/pull an object, it automatically snaps to snap points such as end points, center points, quad points, and midpoints.

You can precisely align two parts by clicking a snap point on a part, dragging the part to translate it, and then releasing the mouse button near a snap point on a second part.
When push/pulling faces and subfaces, they will automatically snap to snap points. This technique can be used to align to faces or subfaces so they are at the same level, or to make one face flush with another. Note that as you pull, you need to drag the cursor towards a particular hotspot on the part you want to align to, or the face won't snap. If the right hotspot isn't becoming active as you drag, try rotating the view slightly.
When using the Move tool, you can align the origin of the tool to a snap point by holding down the Shift key and dragging. This is useful when you want to change the pivot point for rotations.
When placing or dragging end points and other interactive hotspots in sketch mode, the snap selector appears and continually snaps to the closest grid point as you change the position of the cursor. As the cursor approaches an existing sketch curve, the grid snap changes to an "on" snap, allowing you to snap to any point on the curve. Snap hints appear as the cursor passes over snap points such as end points, center points, quad points, and midpoints.

Enable, disable, and reverse snaps.

At the lower right of the application window, click to open the Snap Filter menu.

Choose from the following options:

Option	Description	Note
	Enable all snaps.
	Disable all snaps.
	Reverse snaps.	This enables the disabled snaps and vice versa.
Snap to Visible	Only snap to visible geometry.	This helps prevent snapping to objects that are behind other objects.
Grid	Snap to the closest point on the grid when sketching or translating.	Grid spacing can be changed in the Preferences window under Drawing.
End	Snap to end points.
Middle	Snap to midpoints.
Center	Snap to center points.
Center Arc	Snap to center arc points.
Intersection	Snap to intersection points.
Quadrant	Snap to quad points.
On	Snap to any point on a sketch curve with the mouse cursor.	Only available in sketching mode.

Press Esc or click an empty space in the modeling window to exit the Snap Filter menu.

To	Do this
Temporarily disable snaps	Hold down the Alt key as you select.