What are Revit families and what is their purpose?
Revit is Building Information Modelling (BIM), therefore each Revit building model is built from different parts, just like a real building would be. Real buildings are constructed from foundation upwards and would typically have walls various thicknesses and lengths, doors & windows various heights, color, type and so on. The same principle is used in Revit, which makes it an incredible and powerful tool to use.
But what are Revit families? – Revit families are amazing libraries of fully functional (BIM) templates & 3D models of various objects ( doors, windows, stairs and so on ), that can be downloaded from external sources, for example from our website. Revit families are crucial part of Revit, as each 3D building model is made from hundreds or thousands of different Revit families.
Below you can find some definitions of Revit families:
Model – Family Categories – Families – Types – Instance
The model – is the entire building in Revit as a whole.
Family categories – types of elements that a building can is made from: columns, floors, walls, doors, windows etc.
Families – different types of columns: for example, rectangular column, round column, rolled I-beam column.
Types in the family – the same looking rectangular column can be various sizes: 400×400, 500×500, etc.
Instance – there can be several 400×400 columns in one building. Each individual column is called a Instance.