When starting AutoCAD, the drawing area is composed of a single viewport where we create, view, and modify the drawing or the 3D scene. As the project advances, it may be useful to divide the drawing area in more viewports so that we can simultaneously view different parts of the model (for instance, a bridge drawing, where we want to see both extremes) or view it from different angles. We can start a command in one viewport and end it in another. As against the layout viewports, viewports in model space never overlap and completely fill the drawing area. Any model modification will be reflected in all viewports but visualization tools are independent. We can have viewports with different zooms, pans, orbits, or orthographic views, with different visual styles, perspective, or parallel modes.

Viewport controls

The viewport controls, available in AutoCAD since Version 2012, are the three top-left menus for each viewport.

These viewport controls represent easy processes for controlling multiple visualization parameters already seen in this chapter:

• The [-] control: This viewport control controls the viewports' configuration and activation on visualization tools such as the ViewCube tool and the less used SteeringWheels or Navigation Bar.
• The [Top] control: This viewport control specifies the view direction between the saved, orthographic, and isometric views. It is also used for applying the VIEW command and toggling between parallel and perspective modes.
• The [2D Wireframe] control: This viewport control specifies the visual style, and is also used for accessing the VISUALSTYLES command.

Working with multiple viewports

The VPORTS command (no alias) allows you to configure viewports. It displays a dialogue box with two tabs:

• New Viewports: The New name field allows you to name the configuration; Standard viewports includes all possible configurations, and the preview is displayed on the right-hand side; Apply to specifies if the chosen configuration is applied to the drawing area or to the current viewport; Setup specifies if the configuration is 2D or 3D, the last applying immediately different views. Selecting each viewport in the Preview area, it's possible to change the view and visual style.
• Named Viewports: This tab just lists and previews the named viewport configuration.

Single configuration restores a single viewport in the drawing area.

Viewport configurations can also be accessed on viewport controls, on the Viewports toolbar, the Viewports menu bar in the View tab, and on the ribbon's View | Model Viewports panel.

Note

As with most commands that display dialogue boxes, VPORTS also has a command-line version, -VPORTS. This one has the Toggle option, which allows for a quick change between a single viewport and multiple viewports.