General Backward Compatibility Considerations COMSOL 5.2a is backward compatible with COMSOL versions 4.0–5.2. To open models created using COMSOL version 3.5a in version 5.2a, follow these steps: 1 Open and save the COMSOL 3.5a mode using any of the COMSOL versions 4.0–4.4. 2 Open the model saved in versions 4.0–4.4 in COMSOL 5.2a.