List of finite element software packages

This is a list of software packages that implement the finite element method for solving partial differential equations.

Software	Features	Developer	Version	Released	License	Price	Platform
Agros2D	Multiplatform open source application for the solution of physical problems based on the Hermes library	University of West Bohemia	3.2	2014-03-03	GNU GPL	Free	Linux, Windows
Analysis3D [1]	Very powerful but easy to use FEM software for structural engineering of 2D and 3D frames and trusses	Cuylaerts Engineering	2.05	2018	Proprietary commercial software	Free educational version available [2]	Linux, Windows
CalculiX	It is an Open Source FEA project. The solver uses a partially compatible ABAQUS file format. The pre/post-processor generates input data for many FEA and CFD applications	Guido Dhondt, Klaus Wittig	2.13	2017-10-08	GNU GPL	Free	Linux, Windows
Code_Aster	Open source software for structural mechanics	EDF	14.0	2017-08-29	GNU GPL	Free	Linux, Windows
DIANA FEA	General purpose finite element package utilised by civil, structural and geotechnical engineers.	DIANA FEA BV, The Netherlands	10.1	2016-11-14	Commercial	Paid	Windows, Linux
deal.II	Comprehensive set of tools for finite element codes, scaling from laptops to clusters with 10,000+ cores. Written in C++.	Wolfgang Bangerth, Timo Heister, Guido Kanschat, Matthias Maier et al.	8.4.1	2015-08-01	QPL up to release 7.2, LGPL after that	Free	Linux, Unix, Mac OS X, Windows
DUNE	Distributed and Unified Numerics Environment, written in C++	DUNE Developer team	2.4.1	2016-02-29	GPL Version 2 with Run-Time Exception	Free	Linux, Unix, Mac OS X
Elmer	Open source multiphysical simulation software developed by Finnish Ministry of Education's CSC, written primarily in Fortran (written in Fortran90, C and C++)	CSC	8.2	2016-03-15	GPL	Free	Linux, Mac OS X, Windows
FEBio	Finite Elements for Biomechanics	University of Utah (MRL), Columbia University (MBL)	2.7	April, 2018	Custom	Free	Linux, Mac OS X, Windows
FEniCS Project	Software package developed by American and European researchers with the goal to enable automated solution of differential equations	FEniCS Team	1.6.0	2015-07-29	LGPL (Core) & GPL/LGPL (Non-Core)	Free	Linux, Unix, Mac OS X, Windows
FeatFlow	High-performance computational fluid dynamics CFD FEM solver	FEAST Team	1.3		Open Source	Free	Linux, Unix, Mac OS X
FEATool Multiphysics	Matlab and GNU Octave FEM PDE simulation toolbox	Precise Simulation	1.6	2017-03-17	Proprietary EULA	Free for personal use, up to 2,000 nodes/6,000 unknowns	Windows, Mac OS X, Linux, Unix
Femap	Finite element pre- and post-processor	Siemens PLM Software	11.4.0	2016-09-16	Proprietary commercial software		Windows
FreeFem++	Software written in C++ for rapid testing and finite element simulations. The problem is defined in terms of its variational formulation	Université Pierre et Marie Curie and Laboratoire Jacques-Louis Lions	3.45	2016-03-11	GPL	Free	Linux, Mac OS X, Windows, Solaris
GiD	GiD is a universal, adaptive and user-friendly pre+post processor for numerical simulations in science and engineering. It can work with Kratos Multiphysics, Calculix, OpenFOAM, and many other (commercial and open source) solvers.	CIMNE – UPC / BarcelonaTech	13		Proprietary EULA	550€ for academical / 1600€ for commercial use	Windows, Linux, Mac OS X
GetFEM++	A generic finite element library written in C++ with interfaces for Python, Matlab and Scilab. It focuses on modeling of contact mechanics and discontinuities (e.g. cracks).	Yves Renard, Julien Pommier	5.0	2015-07	LGPL	Free	Unix, Mac OS X, Windows
Hermes Project	Modular C/C++ library for rapid development of space- and space-time adaptive hp-FEM solvers	hp-FEM group	3.0	2014-03-01	LGPL	Free	Linux, Unix, Mac OS X, Windows
HiFlow3	HiFlow3 is a multi-purpose finite element software providing powerful tools for efficient and accurate solution of a wide range of problems modeled by partial differential equations (PDEs). Based on object-oriented concepts and the full capabilities of C++ the HiFlow³ project follows a modular and generic approach for building efficient parallel numerical solvers.	HiFlow3 Team	1.5	2015	LGPL	Free	Linux, Unix, Mac OS X
JuliaFEM	The JuliaFEM software library is a framework that allows for the distributed processing of large Finite Element Models across clusters of computers using simple programming models. JuliaFEM is written using Julia programming language.	JuliaFEM contributors	0.3.3	2015-05	MIT	Free	Linux, Unix, Mac OS X, Windows
Mathematica	General purpose computation software.	Wolfram Research	14.1.0 (July 31, 2024 (2024-07-31)) [±]	Regularly	Proprietary		Linux, Mac OS X, Windows, Raspbian, Online service.
MoFEM JosePH	Mesh Oriented hp-FE code, written in C++	University of Glasgow	0.6.8	2017-11-16	LGPL	Free	Unix, Mac OS X
OOFEM	Object Oriented Finite EleMent solver, written in C++	Bořek Patzák	2.4	2016-02-15	GPL Version 2	Free	Unix, Windows
OpenFOAM	Primarily a finite volume code for CFD, but includes a small amount of finite element analysis through tetrahedral decomposition of arbitrary grids	OpenFOAM Foundation	4.1	2016-10-13	GPL	Free	Unix, Linux
OpenSees	Open System for Earthquake Engineering Simulation				Non Commercial	Free	Unix, Linux, Windows
Z88/Z88Aurora	Freeware finite element package; The present version Z88Aurora V3 offers, in addition to static strength analysis modules such as non-linear strength calculations (large displacements), simulations with non-linear materials, natural frequency and static thermal analysis.	Frank Rieg	Z88 V14, Z88Aurora V3	2015-03	Custom	Free	Linux, Windows, Mac OS X
Abaqus	Advanced Franco-USA software from SIMULIA, owned by Dassault Systemes	Abaqus Inc.	6.14-AP	2014-11	Proprietary commercial software		Linux, Windows
CONSELF	CAE simulation from your browser	CONSELF SRL	2.9	2015-10	SaaS	Freemium	Web browser
FreeCAD	FreeCAD is a parametric 3D modeler with add-on FEM module		0.16.670	2016-07	LGPL		Linux, Windows, Mac OS X
HyperMesh	Finite element pre- and post-processor. (Hypermesh is a product within the HyperWorks suite)	Altair			Proprietary commercial software		Linux, Mac OS X, Windows
ADINA	Finite element software for structural, fluid, heat transfer, electromagnetic, and multiphysics problems, including fluid-structure interaction and thermo-mechanical coupling	Developer			Proprietary commercial software
Advance Design	BIM software for FEM structural analysis, including international design eurocodes	GRAITEC	2014	2013-09	Proprietary commercial software
Autodesk Simulation	Finite Element software of Autodesk	Autodesk			Proprietary commercial software		Windows
ANSYS	US-based and -developed full CAE software package	Ansys Inc.	18.2	2017-08-21	Proprietary commercial software	Free student version available, up to 32,000 nodes/elements	Windows, Linux
KEYCREATOR Analysis	KEYCREATOR Analysis Multiphysics Finite Element Analysis FEMLAB	KEYCREATOR Inc.	5.3	2017-04-25	KUBOTEK EULA		Windows
COMSOL Multiphysics	COMSOL Multiphysics Finite Element Analysis Software (formerly FEMLAB)	COMSOL Inc.	5.3	2017-04-25	Proprietary EULA		Linux, Mac OS X, Windows, Web browser
CosmosWorks	Part of SolidWorks	Dassault Systèmes SolidWorks Corp.			Proprietary commercial software		Windows
Quickfield		Tor Cooperative	6.1	2015-12-22	Proprietary EULA		Windows
LS-DYNA	Best known for explicit dynamics / crash analysis	LSTC - Livermore Software Technology Corporation	R8.0	2015-03	Proprietary commercial software		Linux, Windows
Mecway	Inexpensive, comprehensive, user friendly FEA package with a focus on mechanical and thermal simulation; CalculiX interoperability	Mecway Ltd.	8.0	2017-11-02	Proprietary commercial software	Free demo version up to 1,000 nodes; license: $350 US (one user)	Windows
Nastran	Originally developed for NASA, now available commercially from several software companies	MSC NASTRAN, Siemens PLM NX Nastran	2014	2014	Proprietary EULA		Linux, Mac OS X, Windows
RFEM	3D finite element analysis software	Dlubal Software	5.06	2016-02	Proprietary commercial software	Free student license available	Windows
SimScale	German 100% web-based CAE platform	SimScale GmbH	14	2013-07	SaaS	Free community version available	Web browser
VisualFEA	Finite element software for structural, geotechnical, heat transfer and seepage analysis	Intuition Software	5.11	2016-01	Proprietary software	Free educational version available	Mac OS X, Windows
JCMsuite	Finite element software for the analysis of electromagnetic waves, elasticity and heat conduction	JCMwave GmbH	3.6.1	2017-01-27	Proprietary EULA		Linux, Windows
CAEplex	A really easy web-interface for FEA	Seamplex	N/A	2017-02	SaaS for GNU GPL Back-end	Free plan available	Web browser
JMAG	2D and 3D finite element analysis software for electromagnetic field, thermal, structural	JSOL	17.0	2017-12	Proprietary commercial software		Linux, Windows

Feature comparison

This is a wiki table generated by FEA-compare project. Please, contribute changes directly to the project instead of editing the table below. The project also provides an HTML version with the first row and Feature column being fixed for ease of table exploration.

Feature	Code_Aster	GetFEM++	Deal II	Elmerfem	FEniCS	FEATool Multiphysics	Firedrake	libMesh	COMSOL(R)
website:	https://www.code-aster.org	http://home.gna.org/getfem/	[www.dealii.org www.dealii.org]	https://www.csc.fi/elmer	http://fenicsproject.org/	https://www.featool.com/	http://firedrakeproject.org/	https://libmesh.github.io/	https://www.comsol.com
license:	GPL	LGPL	LGPL	GNU (L)GPL	GNU GPL\LGPL	Proprietary	GNU LGPL	GPL	Proprietary
GUI:	Yes (Salome-Meca)	No	No	Yes, partial functionality	Postprocessing only	Matlab and Octave GUI	No	No	Yes
Community:	discussion forum, Bitbucket forge	Mailing list	Google Group	1000's of users, discussion forum, mailing list	Mailing list	Mailing list	Mailing list and IRC channel	mail lists
Documentation:	user manual, theory manual, verification manual, developer manual (more than 25000 pages both in French and English with machine translation)	User doc, tutorials, demos, developer's guide	50+ tutorials, 50+ video lectures, Doxygen	ElmerSolver Manual, Elmer Models Manual, ElmerGUI Tutorials, etc. (>700 pages of LaTeX documentation)	Tutorial, demos (how many?), 700-page book	Online FEATool documentation, ~600 pages, ~20 step-by-step tutorials, and 85 m-script model examples	Manual, demos, API reference	Doxygen, 40+ example codes
Mesh
mesh elements:	segments (1d), triangles, quadrilaterals (2d), tetrahedra, pyramids, wedges, hexahedra (3d)	intervals, triangles, tetrahedra, quads, hexes, prisms, some 4D elements, easily extensible.	intervals (1d), quads (2d), and hexes (3d) only	intervals (1d), triangles, quadrilaterals (2d), tetrahedra, pyramids, wedges, hexahedra (3d)	intervals, triangles, tetrahedra (quads, hexes - work in progress)	intervals, triangles, tetrahedra, quads, hexes	intervals, triangles, tetrahedra, quads, plus extruded meshes of hexes and wedges	Tria, Quad, Tetra, Prism, etc.
mesh high-order mapping:	Quadratic		any order	Yes, for Lagrange elements	(Any - work in progress)		(Any - using appropriate branches)		Any? Second-order is the default for most cases.
mesh generation:	Yes (Salome-Meca)	Experimental in any dimension + predefined shapes + Extrusion.	external+predefined shapes	Limited own meshing capabilities with ElmerGrid and netgen/tetgen APIs. Internal extrusion and mesh multiplication on parallel level.	Yes, Constructive Solid Geometry (CSG) supported via mshr (CGAL and Tetgen used as backends)	Integrated DistMesh, Gmsh, and Triangle GUI and CLI interfaces	External + predefined shapes. Internal mesh extrusion operation.	Built-in	Built-in
mesh adaptive-refinement:	h-refinement	Only h	h, p, and hp for CG and DG	h-refinement for selected equations	Only h			h, p, mached hp, singular hp	generate new mesh with variable density, no(?) p-refinement.
mesh input\output:	unv, gmsh, MED, aster	gmsh, GiD, Ansys			XDMF (and FEniCS XML)	FeatFlow, FEniCS XML, GiD, Gmsh, GMV, Triangle
mesh check:	limited features (double nodes, degenerated elements)	?			intersections (collision testing)
CAD files support:	Yes (Salome-Meca)	No	IGES, STEP (with OpenCascade wrapper)	Limited support via OpenCASCADE in ElmerGUI					STEP, IGES and many others.
mesh operation:	Yes (Salome-Meca)	Extrude, rotate, translation, refine				Merge, join, extrude, and revolve operations		distort/translate/rotate/scale
Parallel possibilities
automatic mesh partitioning:	Yes for parallel calculations (PTScotch, ParMetis)	Yes (METIS)	yes, shared (METIS/Parmetis) and distributed (p4est)	partitioning with ElmerGrid using Metis or geometric division	Yes (ParMETIS and SCOTCH)		Yes
MPI:	Yes	Yes	Yes (up to 147k processes), test for 4k processes and geometric multigrid for 147k, strong and weak scaling	Yes, demonstrated scalability up to 1000's of cores	Yes, DOLFIN solver scales up to 24k		Yes, Scaling plot for Firedrake out to 24k cores.	Yes	Almost ideal for parameter sweep? For large scale simulations Comsol 4.2 bench by Pepper has 19.2 speedup on 24 core cluster (0.8 efficiency).
threads:	Yes		Threading Build Blocks	threadsafe, limited threading, work in progress				Yes
OpenMP:	Yes	Yes	Yes (vectorization only)	Yes, partially			Limited
OpenCL:	No	No	No	No
CUDA:	No	No	work in progress	No
Solver
Dimension:	0D/1D/2D/3D (dimensions may coexist)	Any, possibility to mix and couple problem of different dimension	1/2/3D	1D/2D/3D (dimensions may coexist)	1/2/3D	1/2/3D	1/2/3D	2D\3D
FE:	Lagrange elements (isoparametric), mixed elements, structural mechanics elements (beam, plate)	Continuous and discontinuous Lagrange, Hermite, Argyris, Morley, Nedelec, Raviart-Thomas, composite elements (HCT, FVS), Hierarchical elements, Xfem, easily extensible.	Lagrange elements of any order, continuous and discontinuous; Nedelec and Raviart-Thomas elements of any order; BDM and Bernstein; elements composed of other elements.	Lagrange elements, p-elements up to 10th order, Hcurl conforming elements (linear and quadratic) for	Lagrange, BDM, RT, Nedelic, Crouzeix-Raviart, all simplex elements in the Periodic Table (femtable.org), any	Lagrange (1st-5th order), Crouzeix-Raviart, Hermite	Lagrange, BDM, RT, Nedelec, all simplex elements and Q- quad elements in the Periodic Table, any	Lagrange, Hierarchic, Discontinuous Monomials	in Wave Optics Module: frequency domain and trainsient UI - 1,2, and 3 order; time explicit UI - 1,2,3, and 4 order;
Quadrature:	depending on the type of element (Gauss, Newton-Cotes, etc)		Gauss-Legendre, Gauss-Lobatto, midpoint, trapezoidal, Simpson, Milne and Weddle (closed Newton-Cotes for 4 and 7 order polinomials), Gauss quadrature with logarithmic or 1/R weighting function, Telles quadrature of arbitrary order.					Gauss-Legendre (1D and tensor product rules in 2D and 3D) tabulated up to 44th-order to high precision, best available rules for triangles and tetrahedra to very high order, best available monomial rules for quadrilaterals and hexahedra.
Transient problems:	Yes		Any user implemented and/or from a set of predifined. Explicit methods: forward Euler, 3rd and 4th order Runge-Kutta. Implicit methods: backward Euler, implicit Midpoint, Crank-Nicolson, SDIRK. Embedded explicit methods: Heun-Euler, Bogacki-Shampine, Dopri, Fehlberg, Cash-Karp.			BE, CN, and Fractional-Step-Theta schemes			(?) assume 2nd order leapfrog for wave optics?
Predifined equations:	Yes (mechanics, thermics, acoustics)		Laplace?	Around 40 predefined solvers		Incompressible Navier-Stokes, Heat transfer, convection-diffusion-reaction, linear elasticity, electromagnetics, Darcy's, Brinkman equations, and support for custom PDE equations		No	Yes, via modules
Automated assembly:	Yes	Yes			Yes	Yes	Yes
Visualization:	Paraview (Salome-Meca)	External or with the Scilab/Matlab/Python interface. Possibility to perform complex slices.	External (export to *.vtk and many others)	ElmerPost, VTK widget (but Paraview is recommended)	Buil-in simple plotting + External	Built-in with optional Plotly and GMV export	External	No	Built-in
Output format:	MED, ASCII	vtk, gmsh, OpenDX.	*.dx *.ucd *.gnuplot *.povray *.eps *.gmv *.tecplot *.tecplot_binary *.vtk *.vtu *.svg *.hdf5	Several output formats (VTU, gmsh,...)	VTK(.pvd, .vtu) and XDMF/HDF5	GMV and Plotly	VTK(.pvd, .vtu)
Boundary elements solver:	Yes for Soil-Structure Interaction (Miss3D)	No	Yes	Existing but without multipole acceleration (not usable for large problems)	No		No
Use multiple meshes:	Yes	Yes including different dimensions and taking account of any transformation.	Yes, autorefined from same initial mesh for each variable of a coupled problem	Continuity of non-conforming interfaces ensured by mortar finite elements	Yes, including non-matching meshes		Yes
Linear algebra
Used libs:	BLAS/LAPACK, MUMPS (and SCALAPACK), PETSc	SuperLU, MUMPS, Built-in.	Built-in + Trilinos, PETSc, and SLEPc	Built-in, Hypre, Trilinos, umfpack, MUMPS, Pardiso, etc. (optional)	PETSc, Trilinos/TPetra, Eigen.	Matlab/Octave built-in (Umfpack), supports integration with the FEniCS and FeatFlow solvers	PETSc	PETSc, Trilinos, LASPack, SLEPc
Iterative matrix solvers:	GMRES, CG, GCR, CR, FGMRES (via PETSc)	All Krylov	All Krylov (CG, Minres, GMRES, BiCGStab, QMRS)	Built-in Krylov solvers, Krylov and multigrid solvers from external libraries		Matlab/Octave built-in		LASPack serial, PETSc parallel
Preconditioners:	ILU, Jacobi, Simple Precision Preconditioner (via MUMPS)	Basic ones (ILU, ILUT)	Many, including algebraic multigrid (via Hypre and ML) and geometric multigrid	Built-in preconditioners (ILU, diagonal, vanka, block) and		Matlab/Octave built-in		LASPack serial, PETSc parallel
Matrix-free
matrix-free:	No	No	Yes	Experimental implementation			Yes
matrix-free save memory:	No	No	Yes
matrix-free speed-up:	No	No	Yes
Used language
Native language:	Fortran 90, Python	C++	C++	Fortran (2003 standard)	C++	Matlab / Octave	Python (and generated C)	C++
Bindings to language:	Python	Python, Scilab or Matlab	No		Python
Other
Predefined equations:	linear quasistatics, linear thermics, non-linear quasistatics, non-linear dynamics, eigen problem for mechanics, linear dynamics on physical basis and modal basis, harmonic analysis, spectral analysis	Model bricks: Laplace, linear and nonlinear elasticity, Helmholtz, plasticity, Mindlin and K.L. plates, boundary conditions including contact with friction.
Coupled nonlinear problems:	thermo-hydro-mechanical problem for porous media, coupling with Code_Saturne CFD software for Fluid-Structure Interaction via SALOME platform	Yes
Binary:	Yes for Salome-Meca (Linux)	Linux (Debian/Ubuntu)	Linux, Windows (work in progress), Mac	Windows, Linux (launchpad: Debian/Ubuntu), Mac (homebrew) (all with MPI)	Linux (Debian\Ubuntu), Mac	Windows, Linux, Mac	No. Automated installers for Linux and Mac
fullname:	Analyse des Structures et Thermo-mécanique pour des Études et des Recherches (ASTER)			Elmer finite element software
Testing:	More than 3500 verification testcases covering all features and providing easy starting points for beginners		3500+ tests	More than 400 consistency tests ensuring backward compatibility
Symbolic derivation of the tangent system for nonlinear problems:		Yes
Support for fictitious domain methods:		Yes
Wilkinson Prize:			2007		2015 for dolfin-adjoint
scripting:						Fully scriptable in as m-file Matlab scripts and the GUI supports exporting models in script format
multiphysics:						Arbitrary multiphysics couplings are supported
Optimization Solvers:								Support for TAO- and nlopt-based constrained optimization solvers incorporating gradient and Hessian information.