The surface offset command is basically the surface counterpart of the standard offset command used in 2D drafting. To start the surface offset command, you can type SURFOFFSET (or just use the short version and type SURFO) and then press Enter. Alternatively, the Offset surface tool button is located in the Create panel on the Home tab in the 3D Basics workspace, and if you are using the 3D Modeling workspace, you can find it in the Create panel on the Surface tab, as shown in the following screenshot:

Just like the 2D offset command, the surface offset command can be used to create an offset surface in a specific direction and with the desired offset distance, as shown in the following example:

1. After starting the surface offset command, select the surface(s) you want to offset and then press Enter to end the selection stage.
2. Notice that the offset direction will be shown with small arrows on the surface, and you will be prompted to enter the offset distance. Type the offset distance value using the keyboard and then press Enter.
3. Once you press Enter, the offset surface will be created and the command terminates.

The following diagram is an illustration of the previous steps:

In the previous example, a planar surface was used with the offset command. The following diagram shows examples of other surfaces that can be used with the offset command:

The surface offset command has a number of different methods/options that appear in the command bar right after you select the surface(s) to be offset. There are four options, as shown in the following diagram:

The first option is called Flip direction. To select this option, click on the option name in the command bar, or you can type F and then press Enter. This option allows you to change the offset direction. Just activate the option and you will notice that the direction arrows will flip, as shown in the following diagram:

The second option is called Both sides. To activate it, click on the option name in the command bar, or you can just type B and then press Enter. This option will offset the surface in both sides at the same time.

The third option is called Solid. To select it, again click on the option name in the command bar, or you can type S and then press Enter. This option will create a solid between the original and the offset surface, as shown in the following diagram. This option is very helpful with general curved surfaces, like the one shown in the following example, since the extrude and sweep commands will not produce a solid with curved surfaces:

The last option is called Connect. This option can be activated by clicking on the option name in the command bar or by just typing C and then pressing Enter. The connect option has two settings – "Yes" or "No", and it can be used in cases where you have multiple connected surfaces. You can select whether the offset of each surface will be independent or connected, as shown in the following example:

Now that we have learned about different methods to create surfaces, let's have a look at the commands dedicated to surface editing in AutoCAD.