This page provides information on installing V-Ray for Maya.
Overview
This guide is to serve as a reference for installation of V-Ray 5.0 for Maya. Please refer to the Terminology section for specific terms used in this document.
If you experience any problems, please check the Troubleshooting section.
A complete installation of V-Ray 5.0 for Maya consists of:
If you are a trial user, please refer to the Trial installation of V-Ray for Maya, as the process differs from the one showed on this page.
Make sure you use the latest version of V-Ray and the License Server.
Installing V-Ray for Maya
This section describes the installation of V-Ray for Maya using the provided installer.
See how to install V-Ray for Maya from a .zip file at Installation from zip.
Windows
The V-Ray installer will automatically remove any previous installations. This will allow you to seamlessly upgrade from previous versions. If you experience problems you can manually uninstall the previous versions to perform a clean install. For more information please refer to the Uninstall V-Ray page.
| Operating system | Maya Version | Installer Name |
| Windows 64-bit | Maya 2018 | vray_adv_51020_maya2018_x64 |
| Windows 64-bit | Maya 2019 | vray_adv_51020_maya2019_x64 |
Windows 64-bit | Maya 2020 | vray_adv_51020_maya2020_x64 |
| Windows 64-bit | Maya 2022 | vray_adv_51020_maya2022_x64 |
| Windows 64-bit | Maya 2023 | vray_adv_51020_maya2023_x64 |
Before running the installation, make sure your Windows account has administrative privileges.
Run the installer.
1. Upon the start of the installation, Windows may ask you for permission to run the installer with administrator privileges. Please confirm.
2. You will be presented with the V-Ray licensing agreement. Please take a moment to review the agreement. Check the I accept the Agreement checkbox and click Install to proceed with standard installation.
If you need to customize your V-Ray installation, press the Advanced button.
V-Ray type
The available installation types are:
Full – This is a full installation and includes all components as described in the “Installation overview” section. It will allow you to use V-Ray in Maya for Distributed or Network Rendering, to run IPR render server, use V-Ray SDK, and have V-Ray license server on this machine.
Standalone only – This installation includes V-Ray Standalone and IPR render server. Please choose this option if you plan to use this machine only for Distributed Rendering with V-Ray Standalone and an IPR render server.
Add firewall exceptions – Automatically adds firewall exceptions so IPR for Maya and V-Ray Standalone can run uninterrupted.
Directories
Here you can specify the installation paths. Please check if the default folders are correct.
Download V-Ray material library – When this option is enabled, at the end of the V-Ray installation you also download the latest version of V-Ray Material library. For more information about V-Ray material library, see the V-Ray Material Library Browser page.
Help make V-Ray even better – Participate in the improvement decisions for future version of V-Ray. No intelligence property is violated when agreeing to participate in the feedback program. We do not gather scenes, assets, materials, etc. What we receive is user preferences on just a few key render settings and the resulting render times. The point of this feature is to improve V-Ray's performance and the user experience. This preference can be changed at any time later on from the V-Ray Render Settings > Settings > About V-Ray > Feedback program settings. For more information, see the Chaos Telemetry page.
Licensing
In this step, you can specify whether the V-Ray license server will run locally or on another machine.
If you select the option Remote you will have to fill in the IP address of your V-Ray license server in the field Primary License Server. Please leave the port 30304 unchanged. An Alternate License Server is used when the primary one does not respond.
3. If you choose the Local Licensing Option, you are presented with the License Server installation.
Chaos License Server Options
4. At this step you can choose the license server directory.
Migrate data during installation – When enabled, transfers all of your settings made with older versions of the License Server, such as enabled dongle subsystem, proxy settings, etc. Disabling this option will install License Server with all settings at their defaults and any custom settings from the previous installation will be lost.
Add firewall exception – Enabling this option allows the default licensing port (TCP 30304) in the firewall. If you disable it at this step, you will need to manually add firewall exceptions later.
5. After you click the Install button, the installer will proceed to uninstall any previous versions and install V-Ray on your machine.
If the installer detects any applications that need to be closed, they will be listed before being able to continue. Please close them and click Continue.
6. Now V-Ray 5 is ready to render!
macOS
The V-Ray installer will automatically remove any previous installations. This will allow you to seamlessly upgrade from previous versions. If you experience problems you can manually uninstall the previous versions to perform a clean install. For more information please refer to the Uninstall V-Ray page.
| Operating system | Maya Version | Installer Name |
| macOS 64-bit | Maya 2018 | vray_adv_51020_maya2018_mavericks_x64 |
| macOS 64-bit | Maya 2019 | vray_adv_51020_maya2019_mavericks_x64 |
| macOS 64-bit | Maya 2020 | vray_adv_51020_maya2020_mavericks_x64 |
| macOS 64-bit | Maya 2022 | vray_adv_51020_maya2022_mavericks_x64 |
| macOS 64-bit | Maya 2023 | vray_adv_51020_maya2023_mavericks_x64 |
Before running the installation, make sure your macOS account has administrative privileges.
Run the installer.
1. Upon the start of the installation, macOS may ask you for permission to run the installer with administrator privileges. Please confirm.
2. You will be presented with the V-Ray licensing agreement. Please take a moment to review the agreement. Check the I accept the Agreement checkbox and click Install to proceed with standard installation.
If you need to customize your V-Ray installation, press the Advanced button.
V-Ray type
The available installation types are:
Full – This is a full installation and includes all components as described in the “Installation overview” section. It will allow you to use V-Ray in Maya do Distributed or Network Rendering, run IPR render server, use V-Ray SDK, and have V-Ray license server on this machine.
Standalone only – An installation which includes V-Ray Standalone and IPR render server. Please choose this option if you plan to use this machine only for Distributed Rendering with V-Ray Standalone and an IPR render server.
Add firewall exceptions – Automatically adds firewall exceptions so IPR for Maya and V-Ray Standalone can run uninterrupted.
Note that starting with version 5.20.00, V-Ray is notarized. For earlier versions, information on how to run the macOS installer safely on macOS Catalina and later can be found on the Installation of Chaos Cloud Rendering Client App page or in Apple's How to open an app that hasn’t been notarized or is from an unidentified developer article.
Directories
Here you can specify the installation paths. Please check if the default folders are correct.
Download V-Ray material library – When this option is enabled, at the end of the V-Ray installation you also download the latest version of V-Ray Material library. For more information about V-Ray material library, see the V-Ray Material Library Browser page.
Help make V-Ray even better – Participate in the improvement decisions for future version of V-Ray. No intelligence property is violated when agreeing to participate in the feedback program. We do not gather scenes, assets, materials, etc. What we receive is user preferences on just a few key render settings and the resulting render times. The point of this feature is to improve V-Ray's performance and the user experience. This preference can be changed at any time later on from the V-Ray Render Settings > Settings > About V-Ray > Feedback program settings. For more information, see the Chaos Telemetry page.
Licensing
In this step, you can specify whether the V-Ray license server will run locally or on another machine.
If you select the option Remote you will have to fill in the IP address of your V-Ray license server in the field Primary License Server. Please leave the port 30304 unchanged. An Alternate License Server is used when the primary one does not respond.
3. If you choose the Local Licensing Option, you are presented with the License Server installation.
Chaos License Server Options
4. At this step you can choose the license server directory.
Migrate data during installation – When enabled, transfers all of your settings made with older versions of the License Server, such as enabled dongle subsystem, proxy settings, etc. Disabling this option will install License Server with all settings at their defaults and any custom settings from the previous installation will be lost.
Add firewall exception – Enabling this option allows the default licensing port (TCP 30304) in the firewall. If you disable it at this step, you will need to manually add firewall exceptions later.
5. After you click the Continue button, the installer will proceed to uninstall any previous versions and install V-Ray on your machine.
6. Now V-Ray 5 is ready to render!
Linux
1. Unpack the contents of the installation archive to a temporary folder (called vray_install_dir below);
2. Open a console and navigate to that folder;
3. Make sure you have root permissions or use the su or the sudo command and run the installation file in the directory for the respective Maya version:
Operating system | Maya version | Installer name |
| Linux 64-bit | Maya 2018 | vray_adv_51020_maya2018_centos6 |
| Linux 64-bit | Maya 2019 | vray_adv_51020_maya2019_centos7 |
| Linux 64-bit | Maya 2020 | vray_adv_51020_maya2020_centos7 |
| Linux 64-bit | Maya 2022 | vray_adv_51020_maya2022_centos7 |
| Linux 64-bit | Maya 2023 | vray_adv_51020_maya2023_centos7 |
4. Follow the instructions of the installer; if you had a previous version of V-Ray for Maya, the installer will try to automatically remove it first.
For example:
$ cd vray_install_dir
$ sudo ./vray_adv_50000_maya2018_linux_x64
follow installer instructions
$ exit
5. Upon the start of the installation, Linux may ask you for permission to run the installer with administrator privileges. Please confirm.
6. You will be presented with the V-Ray licensing agreement. Please take a moment to review the agreement. Check the I accept the Agreement checkbox and click Install to proceed with standard installation.
If you need to customize your V-Ray installation, press the Advanced button.
V-Ray type
The available installation types are:
Full – This is a full installation and includes all components as described in the “Installation overview” section. It will allow you to use V-Ray in Maya do Distributed or Network Rendering, run IPR render server, use V-Ray SDK, and have V-Ray license server on this machine.
Standalone only – An installation which includes V-Ray Standalone and IPR render server. Please choose this option if you plan to use this machine only for Distributed Rendering with V-Ray Standalone and an IPR render server.
Directories
Here you can specify the installation paths. Please check if the default folders are correct.
Download V-Ray material library – When this option is enabled, at the end of the V-Ray installation you also download the latest version of V-Ray Material library. For more information about V-Ray material library, see the V-Ray Material Library Browser page.
Help make V-Ray even better – Participate in the improvement decisions for future version of V-Ray. No intelligence property is violated when agreeing to participate in the feedback program. We do not gather scenes, assets, materials, etc. What we receive is user preferences on just a few key render settings and the resulting render times. The point of this feature is to improve V-Ray's performance and the user experience. This preference can be changed at any time later on from the V-Ray Render Settings > Settings > About V-Ray > Feedback program settings. For more information, see the Chaos Telemetry page.
The V-Ray Material library directory is reset to the default location for each installation process.
Licensing
In this step, you can specify whether the V-Ray license server will run locally or on another machine.
If you select the option Remote you will have to fill in the IP address of your V-Ray license server in the field Primary License Server. Please leave the port 30304 unchanged. An Alternate License Server is used when the primary one does not respond.
7. If you choose the Local Licensing Option, you are presented with the License Server installation.
Chaos License Server Options
At this step you can choose the license server directory.
Migrate data during installation – When enabled, transfers all of your settings made with older versions of the License Server, such as enabled dongle subsystem, proxy settings, etc. Disabling this option will install License Server with all settings at their defaults and any custom settings from the previous installation will be lost.
8. After you click the Continue button, the installer will proceed to uninstall any previous versions and install V-Ray on your machine.
9. Now V-Ray 5 is ready to render!
Some GUI Distributions of Linux may be incompatible with the GUI of the installer. In that case run the installation with -gui=0 attribute.
For example:
$ cd vray_install_dir
$ sudo ./vray_adv_51020_maya2022_linux_x64 -gui=0
follow installer instructions
$ exit
Check your License
Once the installation of the License Server is done, you are directed to the License Server local host (127.0.0.1:30304) in order to sign in and activate it.
The License Server will skip its installation process for two reasons:
- If it detects a previous installation of the Online License Server on your machine.
- If you choose the option Remote V-Ray license server on the network.
For full information on the License Server options and settings, see the Licensing section of the documentation.
Configure V-Ray
Loading the V-Ray for Maya Plugin
Once you have installed V-Ray for Maya, you can load the plugin from the Maya plugin Manager:
Start Maya.
Open the Plugin Manager from the Windows > Settings/Preferences > Plug-in Manager menu.
Scroll down to the vrayformaya.mll plugin entry.
Check the Loaded and Auto-load options to load V-Ray for Maya.
Click Close.
Register V-Ray Render Server as a Service
You can register the V-Ray Standalone application as a Windows service so that it runs automatically on Windows boot from the Windows Start > All Programs > V-Ray 5 for Maya 20xx folder > Register V-Ray render Server as a service. V-Ray Standalone can now be used as a render server for Distributed Rendering, Network Rendering and rendering with IPR.
Running V-Ray Standalone
V-Ray Standalone is installed as part of the V-Ray for Maya installation. It can be started from Windows Start > All Programs > V-Ray 5 for Maya 20xx folder > V-Ray standalone command prompt. Once started, you will need to start a command-line rendering by first calling the vray command and then adding parameters to it:
vray -sceneFile = "[v-ray scene file]"
where [v-ray scene file] is a .vrscene file. Start it without parameters to see a list of available command line options.
Running a V-Ray Standalone Render Server
You can use V-Ray Standalone render servers for distributed rendering, where a single frame is simultaneously calculated across many machines. Before you can use distributed rendering, you have to start the V-Ray Standalone application in render server mode on the machines that you wish to use. To do that, open the application from Windows Start > All Programs > V-Ray 5 for Maya 20xx folder > Launch V-Ray render Server
Loading the V-Ray for Maya Plugin
Once you have installed V-Ray for Maya, you can load the plugin from the Maya plugin Manager:
Start Maya
Open the Plugin Manager from the Window > Settings/Preferences > Plug-in Manager menu.
Scroll down to the vrayformaya.bundle plugin entry;
Check the Loaded and Auto-load options to load V-Ray for Maya.
If you do not see the vrayformaya.bundle entry, you will need to browse explicitly for it. The file is located by default in the /Applications/Autodesk/mayannnn/vray/plug-ins/ directory. The plugin will attempt to load a shared library, libvray.dylib, which is installed in the /Applications/Autodesk/mayannnn/vray/lib folder and should be readily accessible for Maya to load without modifying the DYLD_LIBRARY_PATH variable.
Note: do not attempt to make V-Ray for Maya load the libvray.dylib library with the same name for the standalone version of V-Ray, which is located in the /Applications/ChaosGroup/V-Ray/Mayannnn/VRay.app/Contents/libs folder. Attempting to load the V-Ray standalone library into Maya will cause Maya to crash immediately.
Running V-Ray Standalone
V-Ray Standalone is installed as part of the V-Ray for Maya installation. It can be executed using the vray bash script which is normally installed in the /Applications/ChaosGroup/V-Ray/Mayannnn/VRay.app/Contents/MacOS/vray.bin directory:
/Applications/ChaosGroup/V-Ray/Mayannnn/VRay.app/Contents/MacOS/vray.bin -scenefile="[v-ray scene file]"
where [v-ray scene file] is a .vrscene file. Start it without parameters to see a list of available command line options.
Running a V-Ray Standalone Render Server
You can use V-Ray Standalone render servers for distributed rendering, where a single frame is simultaneously calculated across many machines. Before you can use distributed rendering, you have to start the V-Ray Standalone application in render server mode on the machines that you wish to use. To do that, run the following command from a Terminal window:
/Applications/ChaosGroup/V-Ray/Mayannnn/bin/vrayserver
where nnnn is the particular version of Maya (2020 etc).
Loading the V-Ray for Maya Plugin
Once you have installed V-Ray for Maya, you can load the plugin from the Maya plugin Manager:
Start Maya;
Open the Plugin Manager from the Windows > Settings and Preferences > Plugin manager menu.
Scroll down to the vrayformaya plugin entry;
Check the Loaded and Auto-load options to load V-Ray for Maya.
If you do not see the vrayformaya entry, you will need to browse explicitly for the V-Ray for Maya plugin, which is called vrayformaya.so and is located by default in the /usr/autodesk/maya20xx/vray/plug-ins/ directory. The plugin will attempt to load a shared library, libvray.so, which is installed in the /usr/autodesk/maya20xx/lib folder and should be readily accessible for Maya to load without modifying the LD_LIBRARY_PATH variable.
NOTE: do not attempt to make V-Ray for Maya load the libvray.so library with the same name for the standalone version of V-Ray, which is located in the /usr/ChaosGroup/V-Ray/Standalone_for_Linux_x64/lib/linux_x64 folder. Attempting to load the V-Ray standalone library into Maya will cause Maya to crash immediately.
Running V-Ray Standalone
V-Ray Standalone is installed as part of the V-Ray for Maya installation. It can be executed using the vray bash script which is normally installed in the /usr/autodesk/maya20xx/vray/bin/ directory, for example:
$ /usr/autodesk/maya2020/vray/bin/vray -scenefile="[v-ray scene file]"
Use the -help option to see a list of the available command line options.
Running a V-Ray Standalone Render Server
You can use V-Ray Standalone render servers for distributed rendering, where a single frame is simultaneously calculated across many machines. Before you can use distributed rendering, you have to start the V-Ray Standalone application in render server mode on the machines that you wish to use. This is done with the vrayserver command, for example:
$ /usr/autodesk/maya2020/vray/bin/vrayserver