Rigid Body Physics in Blender: Make Objects Fall, Bounce and Collide

Blender rigid body physics is the fastest way to bring a scene to life, turning ordinary objects into things that fall, slide, bounce and slam into each other without a single manual keyframe. If you have ever wanted a tower of blocks to tumble realistically or a wrecking ball to swing into a wall, this is the system to learn. The core idea is simple: every object gets physical properties, Blender simulates how they interact over time, and with one click you bake the whole result into stable keyframes. Here is how to make objects fall, bounce and collide from scratch.

What Rigid Body Simulation Is (and Is Not)

A rigid body is an object that does not deform during the simulation. Unlike cloth or soft body physics, a rigid body keeps its shape and only moves: it falls, collides, slides and bounces as a solid whole. This is one of the most common physics types in Blender and in games, and it is the right tool whenever you want hard objects interacting.

Active vs Passive objects

The first decision is whether an object is Active or Passive. An Active body is driven by the simulation, so gravity and collisions push it around. A Passive body, like a ground plane or a wall, stays static and simply pushes back when something hits it. Getting this distinction right from the start is the single most important setup step, because a floor that is Active will collapse and an object you want to fall that is Passive will hover.

When to reach for rigid bodies

Reach for rigid bodies any time you want realistic motion of solid objects: things falling off a table, stacks collapsing, debris and destruction, dominoes tipping, or chains and doors connected by constraints. The classic beginner projects are a Galton board and a wrecking ball, both of which show off falling, bouncing and momentum beautifully.

Blender Rigid Body Physics: The World and Gravity

Every rigid body simulation lives inside a Rigid Body World, which you enable from the Scene properties. This world holds the global settings that apply to all your bodies.

Scene gravity and the simulation clock

The world defines gravity, which pulls Active bodies downward by default, and it also controls the simulation clock that steps through time as your animation plays. If you want a low-gravity feel or a slower, more deliberate tumble, you can tune the gravity values or adjust how the simulation steps to match the mood of your scene.

Collision Shapes: The Hidden Performance Switch

Here is the part most tutorials skip: the collision shape is not the visible mesh. Blender uses a simplified shape behind the scenes to calculate collisions, and choosing the right one is the biggest lever on both stability and speed.

Box, Sphere, Capsule, Cylinder, Cone

For simple objects, Blender offers basic shapes: Box, Sphere, Capsule, Cylinder and Cone. These are the fastest to simulate because they are mathematically cheap. If your object is roughly one of these shapes, using the matching shape gives excellent results at almost no performance cost.

Convex Hull: the safe default for complex objects

For anything with irregular geometry, Convex Hull is the smart default. It wraps your object in a tight convex shell that handles most shapes well, and it stays fast and stable. It does not handle concave hollows accurately, but for the vast majority of objects it is the right balance of speed and accuracy.

Mesh shape and compound parents: when precision beats speed

When you truly need exact surfaces, you can use the Mesh shape, which collides with your actual geometry. It is more accurate but slower and can behave unpredictably. A better middle ground for complex assemblies is to group parts under a Compound parent, which treats several simple colliders as one object and gives you precision without the cost of a full mesh collision.

The collision margin and stability

Every collision shape has a margin, a small threshold distance near the surface where a collision is still registered. It exists to improve performance and stability. For Box, Sphere, Capsule, Cylinder and Convex Hull, the margin is built into the shape, but for a Mesh collider it creates a visible gap you will need to tune carefully. Keep the margin small but non-zero for the most stable results.

Mass, Friction and Bounciness

The three settings that most directly control how things move are mass, friction and bounciness.

What each setting does (with real values)

Mass decides how heavy an object feels and how it responds to collisions: a heavy crate pushes a light ball aside, not the other way around. Friction resists sliding, so a value near 0 makes objects skid and a value near 1 makes them grip. Bounciness, which runs from 0 to 1, controls restitution, or how much energy bounces back. A bounciness of 0 gives a dead, heavy impact and 1 gives an almost perfectly elastic bounce.

Damping: linear and angular

Damping is what slows motion down over time. Linear damping gradually reduces an object's velocity so it settles instead of rolling forever, while angular damping does the same for rotation. Small amounts of damping make simulations feel natural and keep objects from jittering forever.

Constraints and Connections

To connect bodies together, you use constraints rather than parenting them.

Point, hinge and motor constraints for chains and doors

A Point constraint pins two objects together at a single location, ideal for chains and pendulums. A Hinge constraint allows rotation around one axis, perfect for doors or the pivot of a wrecking ball. A Motor constraint adds powered rotation to drive wheels or spinning parts. These turn a pile of loose bodies into a connected, mechanical system.

Baking the Simulation to Keyframes

Once the simulation looks right, you should always bake it.

Bake All Dynamics and why you should always bake

The standard action is Bake All Dynamics, found in the Rigid Body World panel. Baking converts the simulation into real keyframes, so playback becomes stable and frame-rate independent, and you can scrub through the timeline and inspect any frame reliably. Unbaked simulations can look different every time you run them; baking locks the result so your animation is dependable.

Performance and Stability Tips

A few habits keep even busy simulations running smoothly:

• Prefer Convex Hull over Mesh colliders for most objects
• Keep collision margins small but non-zero
• Use deactivation settings so idle objects stop jittering
• Use the simplest collision shape that fits your object
• Bake the simulation once it looks right
• Keep the Rigid Body World settings tuned to your scene scale

The whole idea is that you set physical properties once and let Blender do the falling, bouncing and colliding for you. If you want to skip the setup entirely, the quickpoly shop has props and physics-ready scene packs designed for exactly these rigs, so you can jump straight into building domino chains, collapsing towers and wrecking ball demos. For the full reference on shapes, margins and every rigid body setting, the Blender manual on rigid body collisions is the authoritative source.