# What are the best takeoff tools for estimators working from drawings of inconsistent quality?

<p class="elv-tracking-normal elv-text-default elv-font-figtree elv-text-base elv-leading-base elv-font-normal" elv="true">Half the drawing sets that arrive are properly scaled PDFs. The other half are scans of scans, missing dimensions, with the scale bar cut off, and the bid is still due Friday.</p><p class="elv-tracking-normal elv-text-default elv-font-figtree elv-text-base elv-leading-base elv-font-normal" elv="true">Given that, I would value a read from the<a class="a a--md" elv="true" href="https://www.g2.com/categories/takeoff"> </a><a class="a a--md" elv="true" href="https://www.g2.com/categories/takeoff">takeoff</a> reviewers here on what actually copes. Three that come up most:</p><ul>
<li>
<a class="a a--md" elv="true" href="https://www.g2.com/products/constructconnect-on-screen-takeoff/reviews"><strong>On-Screen Takeoff</strong></a> (4.4) is the long-standing option, and reviewers describe it as deliberately unsimplified: a real learning curve, but faster and more precise once mastered. They also note it is heavy on the machine, and that its automated Boost feature works best when everything needed sits on a single page, which is rarely the case on messy sets.</li>
<li>
<a class="a a--md" elv="true" href="https://www.g2.com/products/stack-takeoff-estimate/reviews"><strong>STACK Takeoff &amp; Estimate</strong></a> (4.5) organises project documents alongside the takeoff and shows the estimate updating live as measurements are made. Reviewers coming from paper report large productivity gains, and ask for more built-out assemblies for specific trades.</li>
<li>
<a class="a a--md" elv="true" href="https://www.g2.com/products/bluebeam/reviews"><strong>Bluebeam</strong></a> (4.5) is the widely used PDF and markup tool that many estimators already have open, which matters when a set needs cleaning up before it can be measured.</li>
</ul><p class="elv-tracking-normal elv-text-default elv-font-figtree elv-text-base elv-leading-base elv-font-normal" elv="true">For the estimators here: when a set is genuinely bad, do you fix the drawing or work around it in the software?</p><p class="elv-tracking-normal elv-text-default elv-font-figtree elv-text-base elv-leading-base elv-font-normal" elv="true"></p><p class="elv-tracking-normal elv-text-default elv-font-figtree elv-text-base elv-leading-base elv-font-normal" elv="true"></p>

##### Post Metadata
- Posted at: 9 days ago
- Author title: Tech Consultant
- Net upvotes: 1


## Comments
### Comment 1

&lt;p&gt;&lt;span style=&quot;background-color: transparent; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);&quot;&gt;Takeoff tool reviews on G2 treat a messy drawing set as a workflow problem to route around, not something any single tool actually fixes. On-Screen Takeoff&#39;s Boost feature, needing everything on a single page to work well, is a real limitation worth naming plainly, since that&#39;s exactly the condition a messy, inconsistent drawing set is least likely to meet, which means the feature most built for speed is also the one most likely to underperform on the hardest sets. Bluebeam is the tool many estimators already have open matters specifically for messy sets, since cleaning up a bad scan, straightening a page, and adding a missing dimension is markup work that happens before a takeoff tool would even be useful on that sheet.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;span style=&quot;background-color: transparent; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);&quot;&gt;STACK&#39;s live-updating estimate is a genuine strength once measurements are reliable, but that strength depends on the input being trustworthy in the first place, so it doesn&#39;t really help with the initial problem of a scan missing its scale bar. The post&#39;s own question gets at the real fork in the workflow, since fixing the drawing first and working around it in software are fundamentally different strategies, and which one an estimator picks probably depends more on how close the bid deadline is than on which tool they&#39;re using.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;br&gt;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;br&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

##### Comment Metadata
- Posted at: 6 days ago
- Author title: Marketing





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