There are various benefits to rendering using the command line instead of though Maya and this tutorial will guide you through the process on a windows operating platform. If you have a scene that is particularly complex scene or render then having the extra available memory that Maya would have been using if it were open can really help. Using the command line method is also a quick way to change settings for your rendering of multiple files. If you needed to render a low-res preview for a client for example you could do that using this rendering technique rather than having you open up a series of files to edit them all individually.

The feature about rendering from the command line that personally I find to be most valuable is that it allows you to set-up a render queue. You can have multiple scene files, for example different shots or render passes and have them render one after another. So you don’t need to baby-sit your computer while rendering.

Download Command Line Rendering in Maya