12 Best Digital Twin Software Platforms in 2026, Compared
The best digital twin software depends on what your twin has to do. For physics-based factory, warehouse and robot twins, start with NVIDIA Omniverse and Isaac Sim. For planning production lines and testing PLC code, Siemens Plant Simulation and Process Simulate. For interactive 3D on many devices, Unity Industry or Unreal Engine. For a cloud model fed by IoT data, Azure Digital Twins or AWS IoT TwinMaker, and for infrastructure, Bentley iTwin. The best open-source picks are Eclipse Ditto for device data and Godot for 3D. For PLC training, Factory I/O or the free Open Industry Project.
If you would rather have a twin built than buy a platform, Kena Labs builds 3D simulations from your drawings, CAD and sensor data and checks them against those sources. Book a demo with Kena Labs.
Ziva.sh publishes this list. Kena Labs, listed under companies that build twins for you, is a sister company of Ziva. Ziva itself is an AI agent for game engines and Isaac Sim, not a digital twin platform, and is not ranked. Every vendor fact below is taken from the vendor's own page or repository as of 7 November 2026, and quotation marks mark their exact words; prices are as the vendor shows them. The list is grouped by category, not ranked, and we have not tested these products.
The 12 platforms at a glance
| # | Software | Type | Best for | Licensing, as stated by the vendor |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | NVIDIA Omniverse | 3D simulation libraries (OpenUSD) | Physics-based factory and warehouse twins | Free for development and production since May 2026; community support without a paid subscription |
| 2 | NVIDIA Isaac Sim | Robot simulator on Omniverse | Robots, sensors, ROS 2, synthetic data | Apache 2.0 for repository code; dependencies under other terms |
| 3 | Siemens Plant Simulation and Process Simulate | Discrete-event and robotics simulation | Line planning, material flow, virtual commissioning | Commercial; no price on the page |
| 4 | Unity Industry | Real-time 3D engine | Interactive apps on mobile, web and XR, CAD import | "$4,950.00/yr per seat" |
| 5 | Unreal Engine | Real-time 3D engine | Photorealistic large scenes | Free for most non-game companies under $1M revenue; "$1,850 per user per year" above |
| 6 | Godot | Open-source game engine | Free, customizable 3D and operator UI | MIT |
| 7 | Azure Digital Twins | Cloud twin graph (PaaS) | Buildings, campuses and plants modeled as graphs | Azure usage pricing |
| 8 | AWS IoT TwinMaker | Cloud twin service | Operational twins on AWS IoT data | AWS usage pricing |
| 9 | Bentley iTwin Platform | Infrastructure twin APIs | Infrastructure digital twins | "Request pricing" |
| 10 | Eclipse Ditto | Open-source device twin framework | Twins of internet-connected devices | EPL-2.0 |
| 11 | Factory I/O | PLC training simulator | Practicing PLC programs on a virtual factory | 30-day free trial, then paid |
| 12 | Open Industry Project | Open-source PLC and conveyor simulator | Free conveyor and PLC simulation in the browser | MIT, "Free. No account, no licence key." |
Simulation and 3D platforms
1. NVIDIA Omniverse
Omniverse is NVIDIA's set of OpenUSD libraries for industrial digital twins. NVIDIA says: "With NVIDIA Omniverse, NVIDIA Metropolis, and NVIDIA AI, you can leverage powerful libraries, SDKs, APIs, and NVIDIA NIM™ microservices to develop and deploy industrial facility digital twin applications at scale." Its page names Foxconn and Pegatron factory twins.
- Licensing: "As of May 2026, Omniverse is freely available for both development and production use with no NVIDIA AI Enterprise subscription required." Without that subscription, "support is limited to community support via the NVIDIA Developer Forum and Discord" (licensing).
- Pick it when the twin is about physics, sensors and AI on a factory or warehouse floor, and your team can work with OpenUSD and NVIDIA GPUs.
2. NVIDIA Isaac Sim
Isaac Sim is "a simulation platform built on NVIDIA Omniverse, designed to develop, test, train, and deploy AI-powered robots in realistic virtual environments." Its docs list imports from "URDF, MJCF, Onshape CAD, or USD" and validating robot stacks "with ROS 2".
- Licensing: "The Isaac Sim software in this repository is covered under the Apache 2.0 License", but "Building or using the software requires additional components licenced under other terms", such as the Omniverse Kit SDK.
- Pick it when robots are the point of the twin: arms, AMRs, sensor rigs and sim-to-real training.
Ziva, an AI agent, also works inside Isaac Sim for teams through Ziva Enterprise, where it can import robots, wire ROS 2 bridges and build Replicator pipelines.
3. Siemens Plant Simulation and Process Simulate
Plant Simulation lets you "Model, simulate, visualize and analyze production systems and logistics processes to optimize material flow and resource utilization for all levels of your plant planning". It supports interfaces "including ActiveX, C, CAD, COM, JSON, MQTT, ODBC, OPCClassic, OPCUA, Oracle SQL, Socket and XML" and integrates with "TIA Portal, PLCSIM Advanced and SIMIT". For robot cells, Process Simulate can "Simulate real programmable logic controller (PLC) code with the hardware using Siemens TIA Portal and PLCSIM Advanced software or OPC UA software and the actual robot programs".
- Licensing: commercial; neither page shows a price.
- Pick it when the numbers matter: throughput, buffers, line balancing, and virtual commissioning on Siemens automation.
4. Unity Industry
Unity Industry is Unity's plan for non-game work: "Transform your 3D data into interactive applications that deliver measurable results, enhance efficiency, and achieve business goals." Unity says "70+ CAD and 3D file formats can be imported" (Unity).
- Licensing: "$4,950.00/yr per seat". Unity's pricing FAQ says Unity Industry "is required if you create applications outside of games or entertainment and your company's total finances exceed $1,000,000 USD", and Unity Personal is "For gaming and entertainment applications only" (plans).
- Pick it when the twin ships as an app to phones, tablets, browsers or headsets, and CAD import is a big part of the job.
In 2024 Capgemini announced that Unity's Digital Twin Professional Services team would join it (see companies).
5. Unreal Engine
Epic's digital twin page says: "By combining the power of Unreal Engine with live, real-time data, you can create photorealistic virtual replicas that continuously mirror real-world assets." It names companies including Lotus, Geely, Samwoo and Korea Aerospace Industries.
- Licensing: "Unreal Engine is free to use for students, educators, hobbyists, and most non-games companies making less than $1 million USD in annual gross revenue." Above that, "Unreal Subscription costs $1,850 per user per year" (FAQ). If you license "a game or application that relies on engine code at runtime" to third parties, you pay a 5% royalty on revenue above $1 million instead of seats (license).
- Pick it when visual quality and very large scenes, such as cities, campuses and plants, matter most.
6. Godot
Godot is "free and open source software released under the permissive MIT license", "for any purpose". It is the only fully open-source engine here, and its UI system "is also capable of handling complex UI applications and tools" (features). The trade-offs: no built-in OPC UA or Modbus, no native CAD import, and physics that the Godot Jolt project says "should not be relied upon if determinism is a hard requirement". For industrial use, eSOL sells eXRP, a "Godot-based Real-time 3D Engine" for "3D simulations, digital twins, HMIs, and more".
- Licensing: MIT, no fees.
- Pick it when you want to own all the code and deploy without per-seat or runtime costs, and the physics or process model lives elsewhere.
More in Is Godot good for digital twins?
Cloud and data platforms
7. Azure Digital Twins
"Azure Digital Twins is a platform as a service (PaaS) offering that enables the creation of twin graphs based on digital models of entire environments, which could be buildings, factories, farms, energy networks, railways, stadiums, and more" (Microsoft). Models are written in DTDL, which Microsoft calls "a JSON-like language". Microsoft notes it "is different from digital twin builder (preview) in Fabric and the device twins used by IoT Hub."
- Pick it when the twin is a live graph of rooms, assets and sensors on Azure, and 3D is a viewer on top.
8. AWS IoT TwinMaker
"AWS IoT TwinMaker is an AWS IoT service that you can use to build operational digital twins of physical and digital systems" (AWS). We found no end-of-support notice for it on AWS's maintenance, sunset or shutdown lists, though AWS IoT Events and AWS IoT Analytics are on its shutdown list.
- Pick it when your plant data already lives in AWS IoT services.
9. Bentley iTwin Platform
"iTwin Platform helps developers build scalable infrastructure digital twin applications with open APIs and services" (Bentley).
- Licensing: "Request pricing".
- Pick it when you are building infrastructure twins on top of engineering data.
10. Eclipse Ditto
"Eclipse Ditto is an open source framework helping you to build digital twins of devices connected to the internet" (Eclipse), licensed under EPL-2.0. It keeps each device's state and exposes it to other systems; it has no 3D.
- Pick it when you want an open-source backend for device twins and will build or buy the front end separately.
PLC training and virtual commissioning
11. Factory I/O
Factory I/O says: "Factory I/O connects to real PLCs, soft PLCs and PLC simulators over Ethernet, OPC UA or Modbus TCP. Siemens and Allen-Bradley PLCs are plug and play." "Try the full Ultimate Edition free for 30 days. No credit card required."
- Pick it when you are learning or teaching PLC programming on ready-made scenes.
12. Open Industry Project
Open Industry Project lets you "Simulate conveyors, robots and machines with a built-in PLC", programmed "in IEC 61131-3 Structured Text or Ladder Diagram". It is "Free. No account, no licence key." and "Open source under the MIT License". Its desktop app connects to external PLCs over Modbus TCP, OPC UA, EtherNet/IP, S7 and ADS (repository). It is built by autStand and labeled "Early release: expect breaking changes".
The older Godot version, which most articles still describe, was archived on GitHub on 21 October 2026 and "is no longer maintained" (repository).
- Pick it when you want a free Factory I/O alternative for learning and prototyping.
The best open-source digital twin software
- Eclipse Ditto (EPL-2.0): device twins and their data.
- Godot (MIT): the 3D scene, operator UI and XR.
- Open Industry Project (MIT): conveyor and PLC simulation in the browser.
- NVIDIA Isaac Sim (Apache 2.0 repository code, with dependencies under other terms): robot simulation.
A common open-source stack is a device-twin backend such as Ditto, a 3D front end such as Godot, and the PLC or simulator as the source of truth.
Which game engine is best for a digital twin?
Unreal Engine for photorealism and very large scenes. Unity Industry for CAD-heavy apps on mobile, web and XR. Omniverse when the twin is built on OpenUSD and physics. Godot when you want no license fees and full control of the code, and can keep the physics or process model outside it. The engine is usually the smaller decision; getting the drawings, CAD and live data into it accurately is most of the work.
Companies that build digital twins for you
If you have the drawings and the data but not a team to turn them into a twin, these companies build them. Facts are from each company's own pages.
- Kena Labs. Kena Labs turns "specs and photos into interactive 3D": "Drawings, photos, CAD, reports and sensor data become one scene", "Checked against the drawing, the sensor record or the case file", handed off as "OpenUSD for simulation, IFC for the plant model". Its published demos, on public-domain and sample material, include a 1950 pump house rebuilt from one drawing and a parcel line tested in 16 scenarios at once in NVIDIA Isaac Sim. Kena Labs is a sister company of Ziva. Book a demo.
- Capgemini. Its Experience Engineering practice builds "digital twins for real-time simulation" and XR. In 2024 Capgemini announced that "Unity's Digital Twin Professional Services team will join and embed within Capgemini" (announcement).
- Accenture. "Accenture's Physical AI Orchestrator lets manufacturers build live digital twins of planned and existing physical assets, from conveyors and industrial and mobile robots to shop floor and warehouse layouts", built on NVIDIA Omniverse.
- Program-Ace. Builds "Custom software that mirrors a physical product, plant, or system as a live, data-connected model" with Unity and Unreal.
- MindInventory. "We build digital twins that model your real-world operations, predict what happens next, and let you test changes before they reach the physical environment."
How to choose
- Decide what the twin is for. Planning a line, training operators, monitoring a plant and testing PLC code need different tools.
- Find the source of truth. If numbers drive decisions, the model belongs in a simulation tool or the PLC, and the 3D layer shows it.
- Check your data paths. List the PLCs, protocols (OPC UA, Modbus, MQTT), CAD formats and historians you need to connect, and check each against the vendor's own documentation.
- Price the whole deployment. Seats, runtime and cloud usage add up differently; an MIT engine has no license cost but more integration work.
- Validate against the real asset. A twin is only useful once someone has compared it with drawings, measurements or sensor logs.
If you want a twin built and checked against your drawings, talk to Kena Labs. Kena Labs is a sister company of Ziva.