Home » How to rotate drawing view in SolidWorks?

Unlike rotating a model, there aren’t as many options for rotating a drawing view. This tutorial will cover three options for rotating drawing views.

Switching to an alternate standard view is an option. Select the view to bring up the view properties. From here the view orientation can be changed. Any dependent views will be updated and dimensions may be lost.

Alternatively, select rotate view from “Zoom/Pan/Rotate” from the right click menu and input the desired angle of rotation. Rotation is counter-clockwise and the angle does not increment with additional clicks on “apply”.

Rotation can be set for an individual view or can be set to include dependent views. The option for centre marks applies to their orientation relative to the drawing view. On placement the lines of centre marks are horizontal and vertical. Rotating the view 45° without the option selected will result in a view rotated to 45° with the lines of the centre marks remaining horizontal and vertical.

Rotation will also affect any blocks attached to the view.

A final option for rotation involves using “3D Drawing View” from the View heads up toolbar.

With this option, any of the standard views can be selected. It also allows for manual manipulation of the view, using zoom/pan/rotate as you would for a model. This method will change the orientation of the dependent views.

Tip: Use 3D Drawing View to create isometric section views.