Modo .lxo
Modo’s scene format, from LightWave’s descendants.
What an .lxo file holds
LXO is the native format of Modo, the modeller built by the team who originally wrote LightWave, which is why the same IFF-chunked reader handles both. Modo is widely used in product visualisation and game art for its modelling toolset, so a lot of hard-surface work arrives this way.
Commonly seen in: Modo, product visualisation, game art pipelines.
| Data | Stored in LXO |
|---|---|
| Geometry | Yes |
| Materials and colour | Yes |
| Texture maps | Yes |
| Animation and rigs | No |
| Scene hierarchy | Yes |
| Read here | Yes |
| Written here | No |
Tested against a real file
The last sweep loaded CrazyEngine.lxo from Assimp test models through the viewer on this site: 2,460 triangles across 1 meshes and 1 materials, in 2.4 seconds. Every format's result is on the test results page, run 2026-09-08.
Convert LXO to another format
Every pairing has a page saying what survives the trip.
Other things to do with an .lxo file
Questions about LXO
How do I open an .lxo file?
Drop it into the viewer on this site and it opens in the browser, with the scene tree, the materials and the mesh statistics. Nothing is uploaded. If you want it in another program instead, convert it to GLB, which almost everything reads.
Is LXO a good format to archive in?
LXO stores geometry, materials and colour, texture maps, scene hierarchy. Anything outside that list will not be in the file at all, so archive the original alongside it if the surfacing or the rig matters.
Does converting LXO lose quality?
Geometry is copied vertex for vertex, so the shape does not degrade. What gets lost is whatever the target format has no field for: convert to STL and the materials go, convert to OBJ and the animation goes. The comparison table on each converter page says exactly which.
Formats that hold the same things
Or go back to the full format reference.