Quick Nest

Nesting enables you to arrange objects for more efficient material use. LightBurn 2.1 offers two options for nesting: Quick Nest, described here, and Nest Selected. Quick Nest has some limitations, which you can read about here.

Use Quick Nest if you:

Have LightBurn Pro, version 2.1 or newer.
Want a fast, easy-to-use, built-in nesting workflow.
Are okay with slightly less dense nesting in some designs.

How to Use Quick Nest

Use Nest Selected if you:

Have LightBurn Core, or any version before LightBurn 2.0.
Need to pack parts as tightly as possible, especially with parts that are concave or have complex outlines.

How to Use Nest Selected

Using Quick Nest¶

You can find Quick Nest in the Docking Toolbar or by going to Arrange → Dock → Nest Selected.

To use Quick Nest:

Create a rectangle to use as a container for the shapes you want to nest.
Select the container and all of the objects you want to nest.
Adjust settings in the Docking Toolbar, if desired.
Select Quick Nest.
If you want, you can run Quick Nest multiple times to potentially get different layouts.

Quick Nest Settings¶

Move as Group¶

Enable this to move all objects as a single group.

Lock Inner Objects¶

Enable this to ensure that inner objects move with the objects surrounding them, whether or not they're grouped.

Lock Objects For Rotation¶

Enable this to lock the rotation of objects being nested. Disable this to allow Quick Nest to rotate the objects as part of the nesting process.

Allowing rotation can improve material usage, but may not work well for all designs, particularly when cutting parts from material with a visible grain.

Padding¶

Use Padding to set the minimum distance between parts. The number is in either millimeters or inches, depending on your Design Units.

Quick Nest Limitations¶

Quick Nest uses bounding box nesting. It defines each object by the bounding box, or smallest possible rectangle that can fully contain it, and then packs those bounding boxes as tightly as possible into the container you choose.

The great thing about Quick Nest is that it's fast, convenient, and powerful enough for most use cases. However, because it nests according to the bounding box and not the actual shape, complex shapes can't nest into each other as densely as a full nesting solution.

If you have complex shapes and need the absolute densest possible packing, you may want to check out Nest Selected, which automates the process of exporting your shapes to nest with SVGnest.com and re-importing those shapes back into LightBurn.

Quick Nest Errors¶

Select a Target Rect to Nest Into¶

If you get this error message, LightBurn doesn't see a selected rectangle to use as a container.

Fix the error by selecting a rectangle to arrange your parts inside of in addition to the parts to be nested.

Target Rect is Too Small¶

If you get this error message, the rectangle you've selected as a container is too small to nest the parts you've selected with the current settings.

Fix the error by using a container at least as large as the measurements in the error message.

For more help using LightBurn, please visit our forum to talk with LightBurn staff and users, or email support.