At what point does low poly become high poly? - Off-Topic

RE: At what point does low poly become high poly?

GeorgeWaria — Mon, 10 Feb 2025 12:14:11 +0000

Thanks everybody! So basically there's no fixed number - it depends on the project, the platform, and what you're actually modeling. Makes a lot more sense now!

RE: At what point does low poly become high poly?

HowardZes — Fri, 07 Feb 2025 15:30:35 +0000

bruh just use nanite and forget about poly count 😎

RE: At what point does low poly become high poly?

MliscaBiz — Thu, 06 Feb 2025 16:49:56 +0000

It all depends on what you're modelling. A simple cube could be low poly at 6 faces, while a detailed character could be considered low poly at 20k faces. It's all about the minimum number of polygons needed to effectively represent the shape. If you're doing a stylised low-poly look, it's different - you're deliberately using visible polygons as part of the aesthetic.

RE: At what point does low poly become high poly?

hzr414n — Wed, 05 Feb 2025 13:26:02 +0000

One practical consideration: try to UV unwrap anything over 10k polys. Pain in the neck! That's often what defines "low poly" for me - can I actually work efficiently with it? High poly is great for detail, but you need that optimized low poly for actual production use.

RE: At what point does low poly become high poly?

HrentDelek — Wed, 05 Feb 2025 12:16:43 +0000

Think in terms of purpose rather than specific numbers. A low poly model is what you actually use in production - games, realtime rendering, etc. High poly is what you use to bake details from - this can be millions of polys. The whole point is to capture high resolution details in texture maps that your low poly model can use.

Here's a practical way to think about it:

For basic props (like a monitor):
- Low poly: 50-200 tris
- Mid poly: 200-1000 tris
- High poly: 1000+ tris

For characters:
- Low poly (mobile): 3k-10k
- Mid poly (modern games): 15k-50k
- High poly (baking): 100k-millions

But these are rough guidelines, not rules.

RE: At what point does low poly become high poly?

Serhii — Wed, 05 Feb 2025 11:09:52 +0000

From a game development perspective, it's all relative to your project. In our current project, "low poly" characters are 15-40k polygons, which would have been considered high poly a few years ago. For mobile games, you may need to stay under 10k. Meanwhile, some AAA games with UE5's Nanite can handle much more. There's no universal number - it depends on your platform and requirements.

At what point does low poly become high poly?

GeorgeWaria — Wed, 05 Feb 2025 11:04:27 +0000

Total beginner here - I keep seeing the terms low poly and high poly everywhere, but what actually defines them? Is there a certain number of polygons that makes something low or high? I get different answers everywhere I look.