If you’re banging your head against the keyboard because Blender’s extrusion tool isn’t doing what you expect, you’re not alone. Every Blender user—beginner or experienced—has hit that moment of confusion where something as simple as extruding a shape turns into an unexpected mess. Before you rage-quit your project or launch your keyboard out the window, there’s a quick fix that can save your sanity.
Let’s break down exactly what’s going wrong, and how to fix it with a simple yet powerful tool inside Blender: Extrude Manifold.
Why Your Extrusion Looks Broken
You’ve selected a bunch of faces, you hit E to extrude, and suddenly your geometry looks like it was mangled by a toddler with a glue stick. Weird overlapping faces, gaps, or disconnected edges might appear. This is a common frustration when extruding multiple faces or complex surfaces at once.
The Usual Mistake
Most users instinctively hit E and move the mouse. While this works in some cases, it doesn’t account for connected geometry and doesn’t maintain proper topology, especially when extruding from multiple directions at once.
That’s where Extrude Manifold comes in.
The Fix: Use Extrude Manifold
Here’s what to do when you run into this problem:
- Go into Edit Mode (Tab key).
- Select the faces you want to extrude.
- Press Alt + E.
- From the menu, choose Extrude Manifold.
That’s it. This tool calculates the extrusion while keeping the mesh “watertight” and clean, avoiding overlapping faces or disconnected edges. It’s especially useful for extruding from corners, L-shaped geometry, or any situation where multiple faces point in different directions.
What Makes Extrude Manifold So Useful?
Blender’s Extrude Manifold tool is designed to maintain mesh continuity. It understands the shape of your mesh and tries to preserve clean connections between faces as you pull them out. This means:
- No internal faces that you’ll later need to delete.
- No tearing or gaps between surfaces.
- Cleaner geometry for subdivision or sculpting.
If you’re modelling something mechanical, architectural, or anything that needs sharp clean edges, this tool should be your default.
Pro Tips to Avoid Future Headaches
- Use wireframe or X-ray mode to better see face selections.
- Check for double vertices before extruding (use M > Merge by Distance to clean them up).
- After extruding, always inspect your geometry using Face Orientation (found in the viewport overlays) to catch flipped normals or strange overlaps.
- Save before making large changes. Blender’s undo history is good, but it’s not perfect.
Still Stuck or Curious?
Ask your questions in the comments. Got a specific extrusion issue that’s not solved by this? Let’s figure it out together.
Keep Learning with Us
Blender is powerful, but it has a steep learning curve. If you found this post helpful:
- Subscribe to the blog for more Blender tips.
- Share this post with a friend who’s learning Blender.
- Bookmark this post and check back for updates and more fixes.
And remember: you’re not doing it wrong—you’re just learning something new. Keep your head up, champ.
