- Home
- Getting started
- Interface
- Interface
- Home screen
- Customizing your workspace
- The main toolbar
- Preferences window
- Explorer window
- The graph view
- The Library
- Properties
- 2D view
- 3D View
- Dependency Manager
- Resources
- Resources
- Importing, linking and new resources
- Bitmap resource
- Vector graphics (SVG) resource
- 3D scene resource
- AxF (Appearance eXchange Format)
- Font resource
- Warnings from dependencies
- Substance graphs
- Substance graphs
- Substance graph key concepts
- Creating a Substance graph
- Exposing a parameter
- Graph parameters
- Inheritance in Substance graphs
- Output size
- Values in Substance graphs
- Publishing Substance 3D asset files (SBSAR)
- Exporting Bitmaps
- Exporting PSD files
- Sample Substance graphs
- Warnings in Substance graphs
- Nodes reference for Substance graphs
- Nodes reference for Substance graphs
- Atomic nodes
- Node library
- Node library
- Texture Generators
- Texture Generators
- Noises
- Noises
- 3D Perlin Noise
- 3D Perlin Noise Fractal
- 3D Ridged Noise Fractal
- 3D Simplex Noise
- 3D Voronoi
- 3D Voronoi Fractal
- 3D Worley Noise
- Anisotropic Noise
- Blue Noise Fast
- BnW Spots 1
- BnW Spots 2
- BnW Spots 3
- Cells 1
- Cells 2
- Cells 3
- Cells 4
- Clouds 1
- Clouds 2
- Clouds 3
- Creased
- Crystal 1
- Crystal 2
- Directional Noise 1
- Directional Noise 2
- Directional Noise 3
- Directional Noise 4
- Directional Scratches
- Dirt 1
- Dirt 2
- Dirt 3
- Dirt 4
- Dirt 5
- Dirt Gradient
- Fluid
- Fractal Sum 1
- Fractal Sum 2
- Fractal Sum 3
- Fractal Sum 4
- Fractal Sum Base
- Fur 1
- Fur 2
- Fur 3
- Gaussian Noise
- Gaussian Spots 1
- Gaussian Spots 2
- Grunge Concrete
- Grunge Damas
- Grunge Galvanic Large
- Grunge Galvanic Small
- Grunge Leaks
- Grunge Leaky Paint
- Grunge Map 001
- Grunge Map 002
- Grunge Map 003
- Grunge Map 004
- Grunge Map 005
- Grunge Map 006
- Grunge Map 007
- Grunge Map 008
- Grunge Map 009
- Grunge Map 010
- Grunge Map 011
- Grunge Map 012
- Grunge Map 013
- Grunge Map 014
- Grunge Map 015
- Grunge Rough Dirty
- Grunge Rust Fine
- Grunge Scratches Dirty
- Grunge Scratches Fine
- Grunge Scratches Rough
- Grunge Shavings
- Grunge Splashes Dusty
- Grunge Spots
- Grunge Spots Dirty
- Liquid
- Messy Fibers 1
- Messy Fibers 2
- Messy Fibers 3
- Microscope View
- Moisture Noise
- Perlin Noise
- Plasma
- Caustics
- Voronoi
- Voronoi Fractal
- Waveform 1
- White Noise
- White Noise Fast
- Patterns
- Patterns
- 3D Linear Gradient
- 3D Volume Mask
- Alveolus
- Arc Pavement
- Brick 1
- Brick 2
- Brick Generator
- Checker 1
- Cube 3D
- Cube 3D GBuffers
- Fibers 1
- Fibers 2
- Gaussian 1
- Gaussian 2
- Gradient Axial
- Gradient Axial Reflected
- Gradient Circular
- Gradient Linear 1
- Gradient Linear 2
- Gradient Linear 3
- Gradient Radial
- Height Extrude
- Mesh 1
- Mesh 2
- Panorama Shape
- Polygon 1
- Polygon 2
- Scratches Generator
- Shape
- Shape Extrude
- Shape Mapper
- Shape Splatter
- Shape Splatter Blend
- Shape Splatter Data Extract
- Shape Splatter to Mask
- Splatter
- Splatter Circular
- Star
- Starburst
- Stripes
- Tile Generator
- Tile Random
- Tile Random 2
- Tile Sampler
- Triangle Grid
- Weave 1
- Weave 2
- Weave Generator
- Filters
- Filters
- Adjustments
- Adjustments
- Auto Levels
- Channel Mixer
- Chrominance Extract
- Clamp
- Color Match
- Color To Mask
- Contrast/Luminosity
- Convert To Linear
- Convert to sRGB
- Grayscale Conversion Advanced
- Hald CLUT
- HDR Range Viewer
- Height Map Frequencies Mapper
- Highpass
- Histogram Range
- Histogram Scan
- Histogram Scan Non-Uniform
- Histogram Select
- Histogram Shift
- Invert
- Lighting Cancel High Frequencies
- Lighting Cancel Low Frequencies
- Luminance Highpass
- Min Max
- Pow
- Quantize
- Replace Color
- Replace Color Range
- Threshold
- Blending
- Blurs
- Channels
- Effects
- Effects
- 3D Texture Position
- 3D Texture SDF
- 3D Texture Surface Render
- 3D Texture Volume Render
- Ambient Occlusion (HBAO) (Filter Node)
- Ambient Occlusion (RTAO)
- Bevel (Filter Node)
- Cross Section
- Curvature (Filter Node)
- Curvature Smooth
- Curvature Sobel
- Diffusion Color
- Diffusion Grayscale
- Diffusion UV
- Edge Detect
- Emboss With Gloss
- Extend Shape
- Flood Fill
- Flood Fill Mapper
- Flood Fill to BBox Size
- Flood Fill to Gradient
- Flood Fill to Grayscale/Color
- Flood Fill to Index
- Flood Fill to Position
- Flood Fill to Random Color
- Flood Fill to Random Grayscale
- FXAA
- Glow
- Mosaic
- Multi Directional Warp
- Non Uniform Directional Warp
- Reaction Diffusion Fast
- RT Irradiance
- RT Shadow
- Shadows (Filter Node)
- Shape Drop Shadow
- Shape Glow
- Shape Stroke
- Summed Area Table
- Swirl
- Uber Emboss
- Vector Morph
- Vector Warp
- Normal Map
- Tiling
- Transforms
- Material Filters
- Material Filters
- 1-Click
- Effects (Material)
- Transforms (Material)
- Blending (Material)
- PBR Utilities
- Scan Processing
- Mesh Based Generators
- Mesh Based Generators
- Mask Generators
- Weathering
- Utilities (Mesh Based Generators)
- 3D View (Library)
- 3D View (Library)
- HDRI Tools
- Node library
- Graph items
- Substance function graphs
- Substance function graphs
- What is a Substance function graph?
- Create and edit a Substance function graph
- The Substance function graph
- Variables
- FX-Maps
- FX-Maps
- How it works
- The Iterate Node
- The Quadrant Node
- Using Substance function graphs in FX-Maps
- Warnings in Substance function graphs
- Sample Substance function graphs
- Nodes reference for Substance function graphs
- MDL graphs
- Bakers
- Best Practices
- Pipeline and Project Configuration
- Color Management
- Package Metadata
- Scripting
- Scripting
- Plugin basics
- Plugin search paths
- Plugins packages
- Plugin Manager
- Python Editor
- Accessing graphs and selections
- Nodes and properties
- Undo and redo
- Application callbacks
- Creating user interface elements
- Adding actions to the Explorer toolbar
- Using color management
- Using spot colors
- Logging
- Using threads
- Debugging plugins using Visual Studio Code
- Porting previous plugins
- Packaging plugins
- Scripting API reference
- Technical issues
- Release Notes
Activation and licenses
This page has information on how to activate and manage your licenses so you can start using Designer.
Activation process per application type
The activation process depends on where you purchased or have access to Designer:
Application Type | Activation process |
---|---|
Creative Cloud Desktop | See the dedicated page in the HelpX documentation. In case there are any issues the Creative Cloud documentation may provide additional answers. |
Steam edition | Launch the product directly from your Steam library. |
Substance 3D Standalone | See the activation process described below. |
Activation steps (Substance edition)
USING THE ACTIVATION WIZARD
Three choices are available:
- Evaluate this product: Legacy trials are no longer available. Instead, you can start a 30 day trial for each Substance 3D application here or with Creative Cloud Desktop. Each trial is independent of the other Substance 3D applications, so you can try them one at a time or all at once.
- Activate using a license file: activate the product with a license file (*.key) downloaded from your account page on the Substance 3D website before 30 Sep 2022.
- Activate using your account: Legacy substance accounts can no longer be used for activation. More information about Substance accounts is available here.

Manual activation
You can manually activate Designer by putting the license.key file in the following folder:
Platform | Version | Path | |
---|---|---|---|
Windows | 11.2 or newer | App Data (local) | C:\Users\[username]\AppData\Local\Adobe\Adobe Substance 3D Designer |
App Data (roaming) | C:\Users\[username]\AppData\Roaming\Adobe\Adobe Substance 3D Designer | ||
Legacy | App Data (local) | C:\Users\[username]\AppData\Local\Allegorithmic\Substance Designer | |
App Data (roaming) | C:\Users\[username]\AppData\Roaming\Allegorithmic\Substance Designer | ||
Mac | 11.2 or newer | /Users/[username]/Library/Application Support/Adobe/Adobe Substance 3D Designer | |
Legacy | /Users/[username]/Library/Application Support/Allegorithmic/Substance Designer | ||
Linux | 11.2 or newer | /home/[username]/.local/share/Adobe/Adobe Substance 3D Designer | |
Legacy | /home/[username]/.local/share/Allegorithmic/Substance Designer |
Make sure that the file is called license.key otherwise the application will not be able to find it.
ENVIRONMENT VARIABLE
You can override the location that Designer checks for the license.key file with an Environment Variable.
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