What's the difference between DWF and DWFx?

DWF (Design Web Format) is Autodesk's lightweight publishing format introduced in 1995 as the AutoCAD-to-internet bridge - smaller than DWG, viewer-only, and safe to share without exposing editable geometry. The format wraps drawings, sheets, and 3D models in a single package that opens in the free Autodesk Design Review or Autodesk Viewer. Architects publish DWF for client review, construction managers ship DWF to subs for redlining, and as-built archivers keep DWF as a frozen reference because the format is genuinely read-only.

Converting DWF to HEIC takes the escape-from-Autodesk logic one step further than the format itself: even the free viewers are a Windows-desktop affair, and the people who most need to glance at a sheet - a client on an iPhone, a sub's foreman on an iPad - have none of them installed. Per-sheet HEIC renders drop into Photos and Messages natively on those devices, and since plan sheets are flat lineart, each one typically weighs only a few hundred kilobytes, half of what JPG renders would cost across a dozen-sheet set.

DWF can contain both 2D vector sheets and 3D models. 2D sheets rasterise cleanly at any chosen DPI; 3D models require a camera viewpoint to render - our converter uses the default isometric view stored in the DWF, but for custom angles open in Design Review first, set the view, and re-publish. DWFx, the newer Microsoft-XPS-based variant introduced in 2008, is detected and processed by the same uploader. For recipients who need to mark up rather than just view, or for portals that reject HEIC, produce JPG copies via HEIC to JPG.

Reasons to convert DWF to HEIC usually come down to compatibility, file-size, or specific feature requirements. Common situations:

• An app or platform only accepts HEIC uploads.
• You need a feature unique to HEIC (e.g. transparency, vector scaling, animation, multi-page pages, etc.) that DWF doesn't provide.
• You're optimising file size — modern formats often produce smaller files than the older format you started with.
• You need a single archival format across a project so files behave consistently in the same viewer.

1. Open the DWF → HEIC tool on heic.now.
2. Drag your DWF file onto the drop zone, or click Select files. You can drop a whole folder of files at once.
3. The output is fixed to HEIC. If the format supports extra options (page size, transparency background, quality, EXIF stripping), tweak them in the right-hand panel.
4. Click Convert. The job runs on our server and finishes in a few seconds for typical photos.
5. Download the result. Files stay in storage for 24 hours and are then permanently deleted.

The entire flow is free for the first 10 jobs per day with no signup required. A free account doubles that quota; a premium plan removes the limit entirely.

• For 3D DWFs, set the camera angle in Design Review first then re-publish - default isometric isn't always the right hero shot.
• Multi-sheet DWFs export to one HEIC per sheet by default - use the bundle-as-zip option to keep things organised in client deliverables.
• Render at the paper-space sheet size at 150 DPI for phone/tablet review, 300 DPI if recipients will pinch-zoom into dimension text.
• DWFx (Microsoft XPS variant) needs no separate handler - our converter detects and processes both.
• If the DWF has redline markup, the markup layer renders into the HEIC; toggle it off in Design Review and re-publish first for clean sheets.