Blender

This page says how to install Blender so Claude can make 3D models for your game, and what Claude does with it. You need Blender only when you ask Claude for a model that nothing else has. The asset library and the other tools on Models need no Blender.

What Claude does with Blender

Claude builds a model as a short Python program for Blender, and never draws it by hand. When you ask for a model, such as “make a knight model”, Claude takes the following steps:

1. Writes models/knight.py in your game, the script that builds the knight with Blender’s own Python.
2. Runs Blender with no window. Blender runs the script, saves the model as public/assets/knight.glb, and draws a picture of it.
3. Checks the knight against its concept, when you gave one, with one spawnite model check: a sheet of the knight from the front, three-quarter, side and back, the concept drawn over it, and the heights where the two differ, in centimetres. Models says what the check prints.
4. Changes the script from those numbers and runs it again until the knight matches, then looks at the knight standing in your game.

Both files, the script and the model, belong to your game. Your game never needs Blender to run, build or publish, because it reads the model file. Anyone can play it without Blender, and you need Blender again only to change the model.

To run the second step yourself, run the following in your game’s folder:

pnpm exec spawnite model make knight

Install Blender

Claude’s model scripts need Blender 5 or later. To check the version you have, run blender --version.

Install Blender where Claude looks for it, with one of the following:

• macOS: run brew install --cask blender, or download Blender from blender.org and drag it into Applications. Blender 5.0 and later run on Apple silicon only, so an Intel Mac cannot make models.
• Windows: run winget install BlenderFoundation.Blender, or download the installer from blender.org. Both need an administrator and install under C:\Program Files\Blender Foundation\. Claude does not find Blender from the Microsoft Store: the Store adds only a blender-launcher command, which keeps Blender’s output and errors from Claude. Use winget or the installer instead.
• Linux: run sudo snap install blender --classic. Claude makes models with no display, such as over a remote shell. That was tested with Blender’s download from blender.org on a machine with a GPU. Blender from snap, Flatpak or your distribution’s package, and a machine with no GPU, are untested.

Claude looks for Blender in three places, in the following order:

1. The file that the BLENDER_PATH environment variable names.
2. A blender command on your PATH.
3. The folder where your system’s installer puts it.

Claude runs the first Blender it finds. When an older Blender comes first, such as a Linux distribution’s own package on your PATH, set BLENDER_PATH to Blender 5.

A Blender from anywhere else, such as Steam or a Linux tarball, needs BLENDER_PATH set to its program file, or its folder on your PATH. For example, for Blender from Steam on Windows:

setx BLENDER_PATH "C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\Blender\blender.exe"

After setx, open a new terminal, or restart the app you run Claude in, so it sees the variable. Installing Blender needs no restart, because Claude looks for Blender each time it makes a model. When Claude finds no Blender, it tells you the install command for your system.

Watch a model being built

Blender Lab’s MCP server, Blender’s own, lets Claude run code in your open Blender, so you can watch a model take shape in its window. It needs Blender 5.1 or later.

Blender warns that the server runs the code an agent writes with no guard, so that code can delete your data or send it elsewhere. Blender recommends a virtual machine, or a computer with nothing sensitive on it.

The model file in your game still comes from the script, run with no window, so anyone with Blender can make the same model again. What you watch is the same script, run in your Blender in a scene of its own.

Set it up

Take the following steps once:

1. Install uv, which runs the server:

   • macOS: brew install uv
   • Windows: winget install astral-sh.uv
   • Linux: curl -LsSf https://astral.sh/uv/install.sh | sh

2. Install the blender-live plugin from the public spawnite/plugin marketplace, the one Connect your agent adds, then start a new Claude Code session:

   claude plugin marketplace add spawnite/plugin
   claude plugin install blender-live@spawnite

3. In Blender, open Edit › Preferences › Get Extensions. If Blender asks, allow online access: the add-on starts its server only with online access on.

4. Open Repositories at the top right, click + › Add Remote Repository, and enter https://lab.blender.org/.

5. Search for MCP, and click Install.

6. Under Add-ons, open MCP, and check that Auto Start is ticked, so the add-on starts its server each time Blender opens.

In Claude Desktop, open the server’s .mcpb file from Blender Lab’s page instead of step 2. The file runs the server with uv too.

To add the add-on from a terminal instead of steps 3 to 5, quit Blender, then run the following, where blender is the command from Install Blender:

blender --command extension repo-add --name "Blender Lab" --url https://lab.blender.org/ lab_blender_org
blender --online-mode --command extension install --sync --enable mcp

These commands leave Blender’s online access off. Turn on Allow Online Access in Edit › Preferences › System › Network, then check step 6.

Watch it

Open Blender, then ask Claude to let you watch, such as “make a knight model, and let me watch in Blender”. Claude takes the following steps:

1. Checks your open file. When it has unsaved changes, Claude asks before it saves the file.
2. Makes the knight’s model file with no window, as it always does.
3. Runs the same script in your Blender, in a new scene named knight (model-builder), and shows that scene in your window. Your own scenes stay as they are, and the scene menu at the top of the window switches back.

Only one add-on can listen on the server’s port, 9876. When another Blender MCP add-on holds it, this add-on fails to start with Address already in use. To free the port, untick the other add-on in Edit › Preferences › Add-ons, which turns it off without removing it, then restart Blender.

To turn live mode off, run claude plugin disable blender-live@spawnite. Claude then builds with no window only, and runs no code in your open Blender.