Step by step

The wizard runs left to right along the steps at the top of the window: welcome › source › target › greyscalegorilla › insydium › redshift › scripts › items › preview › run › report › cleanup. Click any step you have already finished to jump back to it. Nothing is written to disk until you click Migrate on the Preview screen.

Welcome

A reminder to close Cinema 4D, and that a snapshot is taken before anything changes. If you have migrated before, an undo an earlier migration card lists your snapshots with a restore button for each, and a factory reset for each version. See Safety & undo.

Source and Target

Pick the version you are moving from, then the one you are moving to. Each card shows the version (read from the installed Cinema 4D itself, so 2026.3.4 rather than just 2026), the install’s ID, its settings folder and its application folder.

• The usual migration — last year’s version to this year’s — is pre-selected. Where you have two installs of last year’s version, the one you used most recently is chosen.
• The Target list only shows versions newer than the source.
• Command-line, Team Render and c4dpy settings folders never appear here; they travel with the main install (see below).

Once both are chosen, a Migration kind card says whether this is a major-version bump (say 2026 → 2027, where C++ plugins are left behind) or the same major version (say 2026.2 → 2026.3, where every plugin is copied). Plugins explains why.

Share my plugins with command-line and Team Render renders

On the Source screen, if you have ever run the Commandline renderer or Team Render, this box appears. Cinema 4D gives each of those its own settings folder (ending _x, _c and _s), with its own plugins list, so a render sent from Deadline, RenderPal or Team Render can start without your plugins. Ticked, the migrator links those folders to the plugins being migrated, so you install once and every way of rendering sees them. It adds links, not copies. Leave it on unless you know you never render that way.

Greyscalegorilla

Whether you use Greyscalegorilla, Cargo or KitBash3D connectors. The answer decides whether their connector plugins are left behind for reinstalling. See Greyscalegorilla, Cargo & co..

INSYDIUM

What was found of INSYDIUM Fused (X-Particles, Cycles 4D, TerraformFX, MeshTools, Taiao) on the source, and one checkbox: Carry over INSYDIUM user data (saved presets and settings). The plugin itself is never copied. See Plugins.

Redshift

Whether you use the Redshift that ships with Cinema 4D (Bundled, the default) or load one from a shared folder (Zero-install). See Plugins.

Scripts

Optional, and off unless you tick them: fresh copies of script packs installed into the new version’s scripts folder, whatever the old one had.

• Aturtur AR_Scripts — the newest release, downloaded from github.com/aturtur/cinema4d-scripts when the migration runs. Needs an internet connection.

Items

The list of everything that can be migrated, one card per item, with the recommended ones ticked. Recommended, All and None set the ticks in one go. Every item is described in What gets migrated.

Preview

The plan, worked out from your answers but not yet carried out. It can take a few seconds on a big install: the migrator looks at every file it might copy.

• Five headline figures: total actions, total size, files, plugins skipped and warnings.
• A section for each kind of action — copy_file, copy_tree, merge_tree, patch_prefs, merge_layout, download, rewrite_config, symlink_dir and skip — each listing the item, size, file count, a note, and the source and destination paths.
• A Snapshot the new version first checkbox, on by default. Leave it on.
• Red and yellow cards for anything to deal with first: Cinema 4D still open, warnings, or folders the app can’t read or write.

Go Back and change anything you like; the plan is worked out again when your choices change. When you are happy, click Migrate. In the trial, the button stays disabled.

Run

A progress bar and a live log, one line per action, marked [OK] or [FAIL]. When it finishes, the Report opens by itself.

Report

A summary, everything that was done, any failures and warnings, and the buttons to undo it. See The report.

Cleanup

Optional, and only offered when the migration had no failures (a script pack that failed to download doesn’t count — it takes nothing from the old version): removing the version you migrated from. Only do this once you are happy with the new version.

1. Run the Maxon uninstaller (Windows only — macOS has none).
2. Delete the leftovers: the old version’s settings folder and its command-line / Team Render folders, and the old application folder itself. Open what will be deleted to see the exact list first.

Deleting is permanent: a snapshot covers the new version, not the old one. You can simply close the app instead and keep the old version installed.