Kuula, CloudPano and 3DVista Against a Gaussian Splat Workflow

Choosing a panorama tour platform used to be a question of price and polish. Kuula, CloudPano and 3DVista each answer it differently, and a fourth path has appeared beside them: reconstructing the space as a Gaussian splat. This post compares the three vendors with that splat workflow, so you can see what each one asks of you and what a visitor gets back.

The short version

If your deliverable is a space a client walks through on their own terms, a splat workflow with Captures Studio is the answer, and it needs no install on the viewer's side. If you shoot stills with a 360 camera and publish dozens of properties a week, CloudPano or Kuula is the quicker lane. If you want to own the software and ship tours as a file, 3DVista is the one built for it.

Each is a fair choice for a different job. The rest of the post shows which job is yours.

How we are comparing them

Five criteria, stated before any product is judged.

1. Capture. What you shoot, and how much of the space the platform needs from you.
2. Editing. Where you build the tour, and what a hotspot can carry.
3. Hosting and branding. Who serves the tour, and whose name is on it.
4. Viewer freedom. Whether the visitor stands on fixed points or moves anywhere.
5. Delivery. Link, embed, offline file or headset.

Viewer freedom is the criterion that separates panorama tours from splat scenes, so it gets its own row. A panorama is a sphere of pixels taken from one spot. A visitor can look around but cannot step sideways. Our longer look at 360 tours against Gaussian splat tours covers that split at the format level. This post stays at the vendor level.

What the visitor can do once inside

The table says "fixed viewpoints" for three columns, and it is worth spelling out what that means in a room. A visitor in a panorama can turn their head and zoom. They can tap a hotspot to jump to the next sphere. They cannot lean toward a window, step behind a sofa or read the label on a shelf that the photographer did not stand close to. Every point of interest has to be planned at capture, because the viewpoint is the whole experience.

A splat scene reverses that. The same hallway is a continuous surface, so the visitor, or your guided camera path, can approach a detail from any side the footage covered. For a client choosing between two apartments, that is the difference between a gallery and a visit. For a quick listing where the buyer only needs a sense of the layout, a well-shot panorama tour platform is often enough, and it costs you far less processing time.

Hotspots narrow the gap from the other direction. All four options let you attach information to a point, but what the point can carry differs: a navigation arrow in a basic panorama, a card or floor plan on a paid Kuula tier, text, image, video or links in a Captures Studio scene.

Captures Studio

Captures Studio turns photos, ordinary video, 360 footage or LiDAR point clouds into an interactive 3D scene using Gaussian splatting. Processing runs in the cloud and takes 10 to 120 minutes, with no local GPU and nothing to install. You edit and publish in the browser.

What it does well is the thing panoramas cannot do. The visitor is not parked on a numbered viewpoint. They move through the room, and you steer them with guided camera paths. Hotspots carry text, images, video and links, and you can place media and 3D objects directly in the scene. A scene can be scaled to real-world size from a reference such as a door or a tape measure, and then measured in 3D. For delivery, one link opens on a phone, tablet, desktop or headset. It also embeds, and it can be shared as a QR code. Enterprise customers get a white-labelled viewer and editor on their own domain, plus an offline viewer.

Where it falls down: a splat is a reconstruction, not a single shutter press. You wait for processing, and your footage has to cover the space well enough to rebuild it. A single 360 still shot in ninety seconds is faster to publish. Our guide to how to convert 360 video to 3D walks through what that footage needs, and the 360 to 3D page covers the same ground for Insta360, Ricoh Theta and GoPro Max owners.

It suits anyone whose client wants to see the space rather than click through it: listings, venues, sites and heritage records.

Kuula

Kuula is a cloud platform for hosting 360 photos and building embeddable tours. Its own site says it accepts any panoramic image, from Ricoh Theta, Labpano and Insta360 cameras to DSLR stitches and 3D renders.

It does one thing cleanly. You upload a panorama, share a link or an embed, and a visitor can open it on a phone, tablet or VR headset with WebXR, with no app. The paid PRO and Business tiers add a tour editor with labels, custom hotspots, nadir and zenith patches, background audio, interactive cards and floor plans. Business adds your own domain, and PRO adds custom branding on embeds.

Where it falls down is the same place every panorama tool does: the visitor sees only from where the photographer stood. The Kuula pages we read on 13 October 2026 do not mention Gaussian splat support, so a splat scene would have to live elsewhere. Several of the tour-building features are also gated to the paid tiers, so check which one you need before committing.

It suits a photographer who wants a fast, embeddable 360 gallery. Searching for a Kuula alternative usually means the reader wants more than a viewpoint, or more than a gallery.

CloudPano

CloudPano is a browser-based platform aimed mainly at real estate photographers and agents. CloudPano's hosting page asks for 360 photos at a 2

aspect ratio, which is the standard equirectangular shape, and it accepts drag-and-drop uploads.

Strengths are workflow and reseller features. You set an initial view per scene, reorder scenes, add navigation hotspots and add your logo, then publish a code-based link that embeds on your own site with no plugin. On Pro Plus, CloudPano lists white-label and bring-your-own-URL options, with CloudPano references removed. It also sells related add-ons such as floor plans with measurements from its Floor Plan Scanner app, and a separate video editing service.

Where it falls down: the hosting terms matter. According to the same page, free tours expire after 120 days, and permanent hosting depends on the paid tier. It does not describe 360 video upload on that page, and it does not mention splats. The tour remains a chain of fixed panoramas.

It suits agents and photographers who deliver high volumes of listings and want a reseller-friendly dashboard. Anyone hunting for a CloudPano alternative is typically asking about expiry, branding tiers or movement inside the scene.

3DVista

3DVista Virtual Tour Pro is desktop software for Windows and Mac. You build the tour locally and publish it as you choose. It is the heaviest of the three and the most controllable.

What it does well is control. One publishing option exports a tour as a single standalone file that runs locally, so an audience can open it without an internet connection. 3DVista also offers an optional hosting service, one-click uploads, and VR support for Quest, Pico and HTC headsets. It ships its own stitcher for building panoramas from any camera and lens, and it publishes directly to Google Street View.

It is also the one in this group that has already met splats. According to 3DVista's own blog, version 2025.0 added Gaussian splat models in PLY and SPLAT formats to the 3D tab, where they can be explored in fly-over, orbit and first-person modes alongside traditional panoramas. A 2025.2 update added SOG support, as reported by Radiance Fields. So a 3DVista alternative may not be needed if you already own the software and your splat arrives from elsewhere.

Where it falls down: it is software you install, learn and update, and you handle hosting and branding yourself, or pay for its service. It does not make the splat for you. The capture and training still happen in another tool.

It suits studios and agencies that want to own the tooling and ship offline files, kiosks and exhibitions. Of the three, it is the panorama tour platform with the longest list of authoring options, and the steepest learning curve to match.

Which panorama tour platform to pick

• The client wants to walk the space, not hop between points. Take Captures Studio. The movement is the product.
• You have 360 footage and no time to retake anything. Take Captures Studio and run the video through the splat pipeline, or take Kuula if a viewpoint gallery is enough.
• You deliver many listings a week as 360 stills. Take CloudPano, and check the expiry and branding tiers first.
• You need a tour on a USB stick or a kiosk with no connection. Take 3DVista, or use Captures Studio's offline viewer on an enterprise plan.
• You already own 3DVista and have a splat. Import it into the 3D tab and keep your existing workflow.

Pricing for the paid tiers changes, so look at each vendor's own page, and see Captures Studio pricing for ours.

FAQ

Are panorama tours still worth making if I can build splats?

Yes, when speed and volume matter more than movement. A single 360 still goes live in minutes and suits routine listings or quick walkthroughs. A splat takes longer to process but lets the visitor move freely. Many teams use both, matching the format to the job.

Can Kuula, CloudPano or 3DVista show Gaussian splats?

Of the three, only 3DVista does, according to its own 2025.0 release notes, which add PLY and SPLAT models to the 3D tab. The Kuula and CloudPano pages we read on 13 October 2026 do not mention splat support. Always confirm against each vendor's current changelog.

Do I need to install anything to view these tours?

No for the viewer. Kuula and CloudPano both state that tours open in a browser without an app or plugin, 3DVista says its tours run on any computer, tablet or phone without installation, and Captures Studio scenes open on phone, tablet, desktop or headset from one link. Installs matter only for authoring in 3DVista.

Can I use my own domain on each of them?

Mostly, on higher tiers. Kuula lists your own domain on Business, CloudPano lists bring-your-own-URL on Pro Plus, and 3DVista leaves hosting in your hands. Captures Studio offers a white-labelled viewer and editor under your brand and domain for enterprise customers.

Can I put a splat tour on my own website?

Yes. A Captures Studio scene embeds on a page with a snippet, the same way a panorama does. Our guide to embedding a 3D tour on a website shows the steps, and you can preview the editor in the Splat Editor.

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Once the feature lists stop mattering, the split is simple. Panorama platforms answer "where did the photographer stand?" and splat workflows answer "what does the room look like from here?" Choose the panorama tour platform or the splat workflow by the question your client is asking, and the rest of the comparison mostly decides itself.