# Civil 3D Reviews **Vendor:** Autodesk **Category:** [Civil Engineering Design Software](https://www.g2.com/categories/civil-engineering-design) **Average Rating:** 4.4/5.0 **Total Reviews:** 304 ## About Civil 3D Autodesk® Civil 3D® software is a civil engineering design and documentation solution that supports Building Information Modeling (BIM) workflows on civil infrastructure projects, including roads and highways, rail, site development, airports, and water. Civil 3D helps civil infrastructure professionals improve project delivery, reduce risk, errors, and omissions, and respond faster to project changes. Additionally, users can streamline time-consuming tasks such as corridor design, (road and rail), intersection design, parcel layout, site grading, and piping design with specific tools and customizable design standards.  Civil 3D pricing starts at $275.00 per month, per user. Civil 3D does offer a free trial. Flexible subscription options available. Talk to sales at: (818) 797-9909 ## Civil 3D Pros & Cons **What users like:** - Users highlight the **exceptional design capabilities** of Civil 3D, especially for site development and construction documentation. (2 reviews) - Users value the **customizable design tools** in Civil 3D, enhancing speed and accuracy in civil engineering projects. (2 reviews) - Users value the **versatility** of Civil 3D, excelling in diverse projects while ensuring precise georeferenced solutions. (2 reviews) - Users appreciate the **customizable designs** in Civil 3D, enhancing speed and accuracy in civil engineering projects. (1 reviews) - Users value the **road design and feature line modelling functions** of Civil 3D for their precision and efficiency. (1 reviews) - Users value the **geolocation mapping** feature of Civil 3D, ensuring precision in site planning and construction. (1 reviews) - Intuitive (1 reviews) - Modeling (1 reviews) - Powerful Fun (1 reviews) - Software Power (1 reviews) **What users dislike:** - Users report experiencing **data loss** due to crashes and unsaved files, leading to concerns during project work. (2 reviews) - Users report **performance issues with large file sizes** , hindering workflow and causing slowdowns or crashes during complex projects. (2 reviews) - Users often face **performance issues** with Civil 3D, especially during large projects, leading to crashes and slowdowns. (2 reviews) - Users often face **slow performance** issues with Civil 3D that hinder productivity, especially with complex projects and larger files. (2 reviews) - Users experience **app stability issues** with Civil 3D, especially when using multiple grading tools in their models. (1 reviews) - Export Issues (1 reviews) - High Hardware Requirements (1 reviews) - Revit Compatibility (1 reviews) - Slow Loading (1 reviews) - Software Instability (1 reviews) ## Civil 3D Reviews ### 1. Civil 3D - Great product to speed up Civil Engineering workflow **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Joseph L. | Project Manager, Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** April 23, 2026 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** Civil 3D is great for creating surfaces, profiles, proposed grading, etc. Definitely speeds up the process as compared to the old way by hand. **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** The hardest part is the initial setup to make your finished product look like the way you have been doing it by hand for years. However, once it is setup, it definitely speeds up the process. The other negative is the price as compared to traditional AutoCAD. It is worth it once the staff is all up to speed using the program though. **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** It really speeds up the process of generating surfaces, profiles and proposed grading. Before we used to have to do the calculations, draft the polylines for the contours, add text for the labels and also manually label the spot shots. Now it generates all of that for you in one step. ### 2. Efficient Workflow with Powerful 3D Design Tools **Rating:** 4.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Kevin G. | Engineering in Training, Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** April 28, 2026 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** I love how Civil 3D is a huge time saver, especially with the creation of plan and profiles for 3D pipe networks. The corridor design capabilities and grading creation tools are impressive as they save a ton of work when designing 3D surfaces and cut out a lot of time compared to work that would normally be done with feature lines. I also found the initial setup simple, thanks to the online download process. **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** I don't like the transferring of pipe networks with external programs. It would be amazing if the process was made such that all the pipe features are transferred to the external program. **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** Civil 3D is a huge time saver for creating plans and profiles for 3D pipe networks. The corridor design and grading creation tools save a ton of work in designing 3D surfaces, reducing the time that would be needed with feature lines. ### 3. Dynamic Design Automation and BIM Integration That Keeps Projects in Sync **Rating:** 4.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Astile Sebas J. | BIM Engineer, Enterprise (> 1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** May 05, 2026 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** Civil 3D is best liked for its dynamic design automation and BIM integration, which allow any changes made to surfaces, alignments, or profiles to update automatically across the entire project **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** Civil 3D is often disliked for its frequent software crashes and heavy hardware demands, which can lead to significant lag when working with large, complex files **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** Civil 3D solves manual design rework through dynamic modeling, benefiting you by drastically reducing drafting time and ensuring consistency across all project documentation ### 4. Easy to Use and Makes Highway Design Simple **Rating:** 4.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Runmeet C. | Highways Engineer, Enterprise (> 1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** March 22, 2026 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** It’s easy to use and makes 3D highway design relatively straightforward. **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** It can’t properly handle larger models, and it crashes a lot. **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** Designing highways in 3D using standards has clear benefits, especially because it helps you see and understand the challenges early. By reviewing the design in 3D before moving into the construction stage, it becomes easier to identify potential issues ahead of time and address them during the design process. ### 5. Civil 3D is a vital tool in the field of Civil Engineering **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Vincent Jude G. | Civil Drafter, Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** March 21, 2025 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** It helps make designs for civil engineering projects faster and more accurate. What I like most are its customizable designs and tools, which make difficult processes like grading, roadway design, and pipe networks easier. Using GIS data and tools to create surfaces and terrains also makes the work more comfortable for me. **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** Civil 3D has many good features, but there are some challenges that users experience. It needs a powerful computer to work properly, especially for big projects. Sometimes, it crashes when too many files are open, and there are times when files do not save. **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** Creating manual designs and grading can be a time-intensive and complex process that requires precision and attention to detail. Civil 3D, however, revolutionizes this by automating many of these tasks and providing tools that streamline workflows. Its features enable engineers to design surfaces, create grading plans, and simulate real-world conditions with greater accuracy and efficiency. By reducing manual calculations and repetitive tasks, Civil 3D allows engineers to focus more on problem-solving and innovation, ultimately making their work more productive and their projects more successful. ### 6. An excellent software for designing, supervising, and controlling civil road works. **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** carlos l. | Administrador, Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** January 27, 2025 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** The management of data allows for the combination of points, surfaces, project axes, and profiles in a methodical and fluid manner. It integrates perfectly with construction and field data that come from surveying equipment. You obtain data for field staking and surface comparisons quickly. Implementing it is easy since the work routines allow the user to quickly learn how to use it. The work environment is AutoCAD, so integrating it with users of this popular software happens seamlessly. **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** One of the weak points is the autosave; if you're not careful, you have to repeat the work again. The weak side of Civil 3D is the export to the IFC format; if you require data in this format, you will have to edit it with other software. **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** The terrain surface creation tools are very powerful, I can obtain data from practically any source, from contour lines to point clouds. It helps me a lot in surveying tasks. ### 7. The industry standard for Civil Designers **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Daniel A. | Engineer, Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** June 07, 2025 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** Whether doing site development, municipal roadways, or utility design Civil 3D is the industry standard for design and production of construction documents **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** The design or sites still requires for exporting data sometimes through manual copy/paste to exterior software for analysis. It is not yet a holistic design software. **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** It creates automatic construction documents utilizing a standard model for roads, sites, and utilties. ### 8. Civil 3D a high precision software for construction projects **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Aneurys Nicanor A. | Project Manager, Civil Engineering, Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** October 02, 2024 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** What I like most about Civil 3D is its versatility to work with dynamic modeling and at the same time the precision of working with georeferenced points to mark them in the field, guaranteeing the accuracy of the location of the buildings to be built. **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** One drawback of Civil 3D in my case is its tendency to experience performance issues with large file sizes. This makes it difficult for me to work with complex projects with detailed surfaces, alignments, and point clouds; the software can slow down a bit or even cause my laptop to freeze, especially when I work from computers with low processing power. **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** One of the problems that this software helps me solve is its ability to visualize 3D models and point clouds with their final result and at the same time detect possible problems in the early stages of design. This helps me to carry out pre-reviews and design presentations to experienced engineers, which improves team communication and minimizes design errors. ### 9. Civil 3D - Great Tool **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Claudio B. | PV Designer, Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** February 14, 2025 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** I use Civil 3D daily and I have to say that it is an exceptional tool. The functions for designing civil works are unlimited. The grading part is excellent and the optimization is very intuitive. **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** I find no limit in the use of Civil 3D. **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** Quick response, special to use ### 10. Great **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Airlines/Aviation | Enterprise (> 1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** April 09, 2025 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** It has everything you could think of, all tools for grading, drainage, marking design **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** It can lag at times and give a fatal error. **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** Marking, drainage, grading, site layout designs ### 11. Must have for designers and engineers **Rating:** 4.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Civil Engineering | Enterprise (> 1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** October 01, 2024 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** Autodesk Civil 3D has made significant strides since the problematic 2018 version The software crashes less frequently, offering a more stable experience It remains a powerful tool for civil engineering design projects **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** Opening files takes noticeably longer, slowing down workflows The integration with Autodesk Construction Cloud (ACC) is still incomplete A lack of true coordination between Revit and CAD often results in large, cumbersome files that can be difficult to manage **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** Civil 3D helps us from the start by optimizing grading, balancing the site, and setting the finished floor elevation. It enables good coordination with the BIM and construction teams. Revisions to drawings are straightforward if done correctly, though there's a risk of crashes if revisions aren't handled properly ### 12. Civil 3D is a must have **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Mari S. | Civil Engineer, Enterprise (> 1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** November 17, 2024 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** The road design and feature line modelling functions **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** You habe to be very carefull using the gradung tools, if you have a lot of them in your model, C3D tends to bomb out **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** Seeing the whole design in a 3D environment helps to see the project holistically and hiw objects interact with each other ### 13. Civil 3D - A great experience for design **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Felipe M. | Rail Designer, Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** May 28, 2024 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** The great interconnection between platforms provided by Civil 3D can only be compared to how intuitive its tools are to use. With daily use, I can say that the help forum this program has is an infinite library of questions and answers. Use C3D in a multidisciplinary project; it is an extraordinary experience because with the shortcuts set for the entire project, it greatly helps to integrate everything and implement at the same time. **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** The design of pressure and gravity pipelines is an activity that has been improving with each version (user of 2023). I have read that with 2024, design elements from both can be mixed. **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** So far, I have only noticed one flaw in the program when it comes to changing an entire coordinated system project. ### 14. A great option for designing. **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Enrique A. | Civil Engineer, Civil Engineering, Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** March 26, 2024 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** Civil 3D has a graet interface to you can use it in the best way. You can have acces to install and implement the program from Autodesk website without any complication, as well you have acces to customer support from this website. I use everyday Civil 3D for my work, I can draw plans, design pipe networks systems, create surfaces and corridors, etc. So you can do a lot of design work with almost no limitations, and because of that you have a real good integration for the program. **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** Because of the big range of uses, there are programs which can be more especialized in one area or one topic. **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** Design for industrial parks, most of it pavements, water systems, storm systems, sanitary systems, and of course the drawings in which I show the client how to built what i have designed. ### 15. Civil 3D as AutoCAD for computer-aided design **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Arturo G. | BIM RESIDENT, Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** September 30, 2024 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** It is just as simple as AutoCAD, works very easily in conjunction with Autodesk software, and has excellent support. **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** The cost of the license is high for small businesses. **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** Having easy-to-use software to assist in civil engineering work ### 16. design and deliver land development, water and wast water projects **Rating:** 4.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Tushar L. | draughtsman, Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** June 14, 2024 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** best way to autodesk civil 3d is easily to import autocad file to google earth **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** multipal file open then if you woking then suddenly fatle errrer are comes every time **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** some times i import to autocad drawing in google earth then lat long is not that location, ### 17. Great productivity for Civil Engineers, its also a great tool to extract civil and survey data **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Architecture & Planning | Enterprise (> 1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** November 29, 2023 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** Similar to CAD, I am able to onboard and train myself to using Civil 3D easily. With the many years of forums, I am able to seek support on any issues I have. It already has functions to integrate for Revit which is a plus if your Civil Engineers are not readily available/ **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** No real downside. Everything is easy to navigate **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** When Civil Engineers are not available, I can easily extract coordinates to input into Revit as Project base points. I can easily export a topo file to link into Revit ### 18. Great for Highway Design **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Civil Engineering | Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** November 28, 2023 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** Civil 3D is versatile and capable software. The learning curve is steep but after you've mastered it, anything is possible. **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** The learning curve is steep. There is also maybe too many features embedded in the software, making it difficult to navigate, troubleshoot, etc. **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** 3D Highway Design and Grading. The biggest benefit is the ability to generate corridors to confirm grading and materials / earthworks volumes. ### 19. CIVIL 3D review **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Naveen K. | Highway Design Engineer, Enterprise (> 1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** October 31, 2023 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** I love the most in civil 3D is the interface and the user friendly options **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** The fatal error accur due to file size increase and due to suddenly use of two options too fastly **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** It's helps in solving and creating the levels required for road constructions and pond and other drainage utilities. Helps in analysing the earthwork quantity and material quantity ### 20. Civil 3D **Rating:** 4.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** SONU j. | Project Manager, Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** August 10, 2023 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** It can make an absolute contours within a topographical data and can make 3D objects with easy tools.It can use in an addition of AutoCAD 2D.it is very easy to use. **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** It can't work with point cloud data.So that, this software is missing many of the scopes and uses of civil engineering and structural modelling works.Thats it only dislike. **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** It can solve many structural datas as well as it can make a 3 dimensional structures within a computer frame and can make levelling post works with the help of ease tools. ### 21. Advanced software with user friendly interface **Rating:** 4.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** KAPIL S. | Senior Drainage Engineer, Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** February 01, 2023 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** Autodesk civil3D has the most common user interface yet is so advanced. Civil3D has the capability of handling and converting commonly known formats of input data. I have been using civil3D for the past five years. The input to the software is straightforward, and the exporting and production of the drawing are just a click away. The template setting, corridor modeling & profile generation are so realistic in the software. BIM modeling can be quickly done through the inbuilt tools. **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** Handling the large surface can be made hassle-free. Sometimes software collapses while 3D viewing it through the orbit. Unknown errors cause lag in the software, which needs to be solved in the long run by reopening the file or with AUDIT command. SQL or programming should be integrated for developers to modify the data. **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** Our requirement is to create 3D solids of the open channel parallel to the road. I updated the corridor using a subassembly composer with all the required input. Within the timeframe, I could export the 3D solids for BIM modelling. ### 22. Civil 3D empowers the engineers to tackle complex design challenges **Rating:** 4.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Ankit P. | Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** June 07, 2023 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** Its efficient Design driven environment, reducing the rework & errors and sharing of data by means of available common IFCs. Also, it maintains the standards as well as accuracy while sharing data. **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** I believe the costing of the product should be reduced so that every designer can afford purchasing the premium version and make designs more accurately without any hassle. **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** It helps us design roads and highways wiht quit high accuracy. Also, it aids us in the design of complex structures and layouts with advanced architectural designs. ### 23. design software **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** ZAHIRUDDIN S. | Owner, Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** July 21, 2023 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** Civil 3d is a very usfull tool to design infrastructutr and utilities under ground **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** civil 3d is not very usefull above ground structures. **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** surface design to be used for roads and underground utilities. Once the surface is created you can design underground utlities ### 24. Used Civil 3D for 3D Models, Analysis of surfaces and designing road and highways **Rating:** 4.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Civil Engineering | Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** June 28, 2023 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** Civil 3D's dynamic model-based approach allows for efficient and parameters design changes, saving time and effort in project iterations. **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** Software can't handle file size more than 200 mb properly. It lags and freezes frequently. Civil 3D need to improve on that part. **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** Working on land development and development projects with ease. ### 25. Collaboration Thru Civil 3D **Rating:** 4.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Construction | Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** May 02, 2023 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** Civil 3D provides intelligent design tools that we can use to create a complex civil model for roads, highways, and pipelines. It facilitates collaboration among project members through a platform for sharing design data and collaborating in real-time. **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** Learning Civil 3D requires a steep learning curve for anyone to master. However, once you master the software, it will provide you with the best visualization that is needed for your project. It can be costly, particularly for smaller construction firms. **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** Collaboration. It provides the user a platform for which all project stakeholders may collaborate on design information in real-time. It also can be integrated with ArcGIS. ### 26. Dedicated Civil Engineering tool for BIM and Dynamic Integration. **Rating:** 4.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Sagar V. | Civil Structural Engineer, Civil Engineering, Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** July 28, 2022 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** Enables the Dynamic Integration for my projects of building and roads and enables the presentation in the realistic world with easily available inbuilt tools and addon options to create the project with cost and time cutting. Once I create my library for BIM it helps in all projects and makes work very presentable to every client and engineer. It is dedicated to special civil engineering works that make my work very dedicated to the field as there are so many alternatives inbuilt featured. **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** Sometimes Data integration or collaboration with the old version of Autodesk-Autocad shows the issue but once I cracked that now it is not a problem in the long term. **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** With Every update they are including a library for example in a new update they have included labels for RAIL LABELS firstly I need to create that on my own but now it's already inbuilt options so options and integration in BIM make work very easy after use. ### 27. Advanced Civil3d User **Rating:** 4.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Civil Engineering | Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** November 09, 2022 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** Civil3d is a huge program. It covers many disciplans so most users only scratch the surface of its cababilities. Civil3d is the gold standard for doing grading work. You create "surfaces" that can be exported directly to civil contractors who will sculpt a site to match your design. It has special modules for roadwork which we use regularly. **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** As grading surfaces become more and more complex, getting the surface to look the way you are expecting can be challenging. There are techniques to achieve this but future upgrades to the software should improve these issues. **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** Civil3d is 3 dimensional so grading, channels, and pipes can all be represented and analized for interferences. It is a process to make this happen but this is the best tool available on the market right now. ### 28. we get an overall picture of the product before the use **Rating:** 4.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Sourabh P. | Civil Engineer, Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** February 07, 2023 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** The reality it bring into the plan.People can actually visualize the end product and how will it look when it is completed **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** It takes a lot of time and a lot of detailing is to be considered **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** It is giving the customer the clear picture of the ideas and plans that we have in reality ### 29. Best, most comprehensive civil design software on the market **Rating:** 4.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Michael S. | Senior Design Technology Specialist, Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** October 04, 2022 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** It comes with many features out of the box, I can use with other autodesk products and the construction cloud. The software team is constantly improving where as other software brands for civil design have stagnated. **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** Sometimes elements are released without full functionality. It is difficult at times to coordinate with Revit if not sharing coordinates. **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** It is able to create 3D models and content for civil sites that can be shared with contractors and other disciplines ### 30. Best software for infrastructure modeling **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Sherif M. | BIM Mechanical Engineer, Enterprise (> 1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** January 24, 2023 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** Easy to use with unlimited learning resources **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** Poor calculation and simulation features **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** Modeling infrastructure networks very easy ### 31. Civil 3d review **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Ghulam S. | Officer Draftsman, Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** February 12, 2023 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** Civil 3d helpful software in BIM technology (Geo-tech, Civil & Infrastructure) I understand the contour point in 3d but do not understand it in the 2d point of view. **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** Civil 3d similar the AutoCAD. AutoCAD and Civil 3d commands also same **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** no any problems ### 32. The best civil engineering detailing software on the market. **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Luis Guilherme B. | Solar Engineer, Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** September 02, 2022 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** Its map features and mainly the way it makes it easy to generate road profiles perfectly adapted to the terrain. **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** The frequency of clashes even when using high-end hardware, and it's difficult to deal with big files.s **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** It helps us to assess if it will be possible or not to transport all parts of a wind turbine to the points indicated by our wind models. ### 33. My User Experience with Civil 3D **Rating:** 1.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Avikar M. | Professional Engineer, Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** February 16, 2022 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** Civil 3D is great at managing surfaces, merging, duplicating and exporting is quite good. My primary use for the software is for road geometric design, for all level of projects from municipal to national roads. **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** The roads design module, it's horrible, road edges were not linked to the main alignment, if they are they could not easily be moved or manipulated, also there's no control of the road crossfall if you do not have any curves, sometimes you need to move a road crossfall for drainage purposes in low speed environments. The so called advantage of designing in a drafting software is pointless because a draughter if working on your drawing has direct access to your model files! **Recommendations to others considering Civil 3D:** Do your research, a lot of big firms are using the software due to their reputation but I believe there are much better alternatives out there **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** Road and infrastructure design, worked on a multitude of projects from bulk earthworks for water treatment plants to municipal developments and national roads. Business performance has definitely decreased and we switched back to old software. ### 34. My experience on civil 3D **Rating:** 4.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Akhilesh S. | Process Executive, Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** July 28, 2022 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** It has many shortcuts comparing to other software's We can repeat the command by just pressing enter key or space key **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** There are few command which we can not repeat by space or enter keys And also few commands don't have shortcuts **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** To make layout of the whole property using points data ### 35. Great software but there's no escaping the bugs **Rating:** 4.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Civil Engineering | Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** October 20, 2022 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** Civil3D is extremely customizable, with hundreds of add-ons to meet your specific design needs. Civil3D's suite of features provides an unparalleled set of tools for all forms of civil design. **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** The bad side of Civil3D is stability. Unfortunately, while using this software, you will encounter fatal errors regularly, potentially wasting hours of drafting time. **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** Civil3D is solving the problem of design accuracy and time. Using Civil3D has drastically reduced the time necessary for a variety of projects, from survey drafting to land development. ### 36. Excellent product **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Nikhil D. | Team Lead, Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** July 26, 2022 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** Geolocation feature with the current map. **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** Application tends to have a mind of its own at times, like snapping turns off by itself, scaling needs to be adjusted manually at times. **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** Plotting land survey drawings which involves bearing and dimensions which can be somewhat tricky in other applications. ### 37. Huge capability and an industry leader, but needs time to be learnt! **Rating:** 4.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Mike H. | GIS Specialist, Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** November 28, 2016 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** The wide-ranging ability to digitally create anything in 3d form, but not losing the capacity for intricate detailing. Bringing in survey data is very easy and allows you to quickly model real surfaces. **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** The scrollbar on almost every sub-menu is tiny and very hard to use as it does not respond to arrow keys! The program is not always intuitive (typing the name of an instruction can be a guessing game) and often there are too many ways of doing the same task with different names! **Recommendations to others considering Civil 3D:** Invest in certified training. This is not MS Office and will not be learnt overnight with the aid of the internet. That said, there are very good resources online on the Autodesk website for tutorials and help, but these work best as a complement to existing knowledge and training, not as an introduction. If you do not need to work in 3D, then Civils 3D may be more than you need, and it is likely that both in terms of pricing and ease of operability, it would be more beneficial to select a simpler AutoCAD package. **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** We needed Civils 3D for two main problems. Firstly to visualise renewable energy projects in 3D in photomontages - a task well served by other programs for conventional wind and solar technologies, but not for more complex installations such as green gas or battery storage. Secondly, we needed to arrange infrastructure at the micro-scale (less than 1m) amongst civil engineering features such as drainage, holding ponds, earthworks and road layouts. All these civil aspects needed modelling in 3D and were subject to constant changes that affected the infrastructure pieces. Civils 3D allowed us to deal with both these problems as well as realise additional benefits such as earthworks volume calculations, surface rendering, Highways gradient and turning radius checks. ### 38. Great addition to workflow **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Civil Engineering | Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** June 22, 2022 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** The ease of creating cross sections - it saves me time. **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** Sometimes the cross sections don't make sense. **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** It's allowing me to create cross sections quickly and saving me time. ### 39. Simply amazing, easy to use hard to master **Rating:** 4.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Aric S. | Computer Aided Design Technician, Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** November 30, 2021 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** The ability to create your 3d surfaces, editing and modifing your 3d surfaces and contours. The interface is good.if you have used a acad software before the interface is almost exactly the same. **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** Sometimes creating your surfaces can be tricky snapping to different elevations, and generating a wild surface with huge elevation changes. But then to edit these are super easy to change. **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** 3d surface generation for cur and fill calculations, site development and site configuration for clients. This has made this work exceedingly easy with more and more use. ### 40. A powerful engineering design software **Rating:** 4.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Shaya M. | Environmental Engineer, Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** November 18, 2021 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** When it comes to engineering design, civil 3D does it for use. It is powerfully engineered to anticipate all my engineering design needs. It has built-in features and tools that help streamline the whole engineering design process. For architects and engineers, this is a must-have. **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** Civil 3D is not the most accessible software to learn and to use. Getting to the point where you can use all features and functions to their optimum performance takes time and great practice. **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** Civil 3D is a powerful design software that helps in planning and carrying out of projects. Its helped streamline and accelerate the whole process in ways and it integrates vey well with other design software. ### 41. A great engineering design solution **Rating:** 4.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Angelito M. | Civil Engineer, Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** December 21, 2021 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** The software is a significant engineering design solution that is expertly built with customizable tools and features that bring every engineer's vision to life. It is a very intuitive software that adapts to every user's needs and anticipates every user's needs as well. **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** Civil 3d is not the easiest solution to learn and to use. The learning curve, like so many other engineering design software like autocad, is quite steep. **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** We use civil 3D for all our engineering design work when we are planning projects. It helps us to create and map out our vision. ### 42. Adequate engineering tool **Rating:** 4.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Mahmoud o. | Mechanical Engineer, Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** September 06, 2021 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** You can open any Cad file using civil3D. In addition, creating profiles, designing the infrastructure including embankments &roads &rails **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** Sometimes it lags and takes a lot of time to publish one pdf. For a certain project I have worked on, it took me 10-15 minutes per sheet, although the file was heavy, but publishing these pdfs was time consuming. **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** Using for land development " infrastructure ", designing water & transportation realted projects. One of the huge advantages that I realised was creating many profiles for pipe networks without wasting time, showing the levels accurately along other component. ### 43. Great software! **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Adam L. | Design Engineer, Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** October 19, 2021 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** It makes my job as a Civil Designer so much easier! I can quickly do things that would otherwise take a lot more time and effort. **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** There are always minor bugs in the software that can sometimes cause it to crash or not do what it is supposed to do. **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** We solve all of our work-related problems with this software. Grading, drainage, erosion control, road design, OWTS designs, etc. ### 44. Civil 3d **Rating:** 4.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Motasem Ghanem M. | Senior Project Controls, Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** March 02, 2022 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** I like the capability of calculating the cut and fill quantities automatically **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** I dislike the new arrangment of command lines **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** Design of roads and calculation of quantities ### 45. AutoCAD Civil 3D Review **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Transportation/Trucking/Railroad | Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** February 07, 2017 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** -great tool for transportation design -multiple people can work simultaneously on the project and all the work can be share on data shorcuts -modeling from survey data is very easy **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** -fatal errors very common specialty when you have bigger drawings -Triangulation of the surface sometimes are doing funny things **Recommendations to others considering Civil 3D:** Recommended mostly for Civil Engineering Design **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** Design transportation and I transfer from Land Development Desktop to Inroads and currently I am working in Civil 3D. So far Civil 3D is my favorite as is faster to model and share information. ### 46. Extensive user for site development projects **Rating:** 4.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Kevin K. | Project Engineer, Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** January 24, 2018 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** It's powerful tools for grading, site modeling, and earthwork. **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** It has it's moments where it will lock up and crash. **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** Whether a site is feasible to be developed and show through 3D modeling how the end product will look. The 3D modeling gives the designer assurance of their work by being able to visualize what is shown on plan view. ### 47. overall review **Rating:** 4.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Benny H. | Senior Project Manager, Land Development, Enterprise (> 1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** January 18, 2022 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** You can do many 3D designs if you know what you are doing. **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** too many tool bars, should simply things. **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** civil engineering design. more automatic than LDD. ### 48. Civil 3D Review **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Civil Engineering | Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** November 23, 2021 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** Dynamic editing and all the data points are connected. **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** To view in 3D you need to open a specific window. **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** Infrastructure design: Roards, water pipe networks. The benefits are faster design, editing, and data exporting due to a dynamic connection between all data points. ### 49. An infinite program **Rating:** 4.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Architecture & Planning | Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** July 22, 2021 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** The multiple tools for elevating land and marking contour lines. The number of tools it has is impressive. It seems like you could be using it all day and not explore all the functions it has. **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** The multitude of tools makes it difficult for you to find some that you might have created in the past. The program requires many resources from your computer to function 100% well. It's expensive to get such a PC. **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** I have used this program solely to survey land and create contour lines. I did it for university projects and I am already using it with my clients. ### 50. Designer **Rating:** 4.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Justin V. | Electrical Designer/BIM Manager/Coordinator, Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** November 24, 2020 **What do you like best about Civil 3D?** I learned Civil 3D in 2013. I first used it with HNTB in doing bridge design for 3 bridges in Massachusetts in a contract/temp. position. I loved it and it was definitely a challenge for me at the time. I later used it with Golder Associates both with bridge design and landfill comparisons between each quarter of the year. This was more advanced for me as I used more of the 3D features. It was fun. **What do you dislike about Civil 3D?** I don't really have a lot of complaints about Civil 3D or using it. I enjoyed using it and would like to do so again in the future. It was a lot to learn but, I like to learn. **What problems is Civil 3D solving and how is that benefiting you?** I used it in doing land comparisons of land fills, bridge design, grading of a site that was being filled in and grading and re-design of the land roads of a construction site as the job was being done. ## Civil 3D Discussions - [how to get civil 3d software training?](https://www.g2.com/discussions/47606-how-to-get-civil-3d-software-training) - 1 comment, 1 upvote - [Filter the tiles of LiDAR](https://www.g2.com/discussions/filter-the-tiles-of-lidar) - 1 comment, 1 upvote - [What is Civil 3D used for?](https://www.g2.com/discussions/civil-3d-what-is-civil-3d-used-for) - 1 comment - [Is Civil 3d free for students?](https://www.g2.com/discussions/is-civil-3d-free-for-students) - 2 comments - [Is Civil 3d a BIM?](https://www.g2.com/discussions/is-civil-3d-a-bim) - 2 comments - [View Civil 3D pricing details and edition comparison](https://www.g2.com/products/civil-3d/reviews?section=pricing&secure%5Bexpires_at%5D=2026-05-28+16%3A18%3A20+-0500&secure%5Bsession_id%5D=31f49975-9231-4572-ba43-ea7c7cdac805&secure%5Btoken%5D=3b6d3b70081ac6cb576bfbe8a619aa20e6274d1ffc458035b291a2183c2a39ef&format=llm_user) ## Civil 3D Integrations - [AutoCAD](https://www.g2.com/products/autocad/reviews) - [Bluebeam](https://www.g2.com/products/bluebeam/reviews) - [GeoHECHMS](https://www.g2.com/products/geohechms/reviews) - [GeoHECRAS](https://www.g2.com/products/geohecras/reviews) - [GeoSTORM](https://www.g2.com/products/geostorm/reviews) - [HEC-RAS](https://www.g2.com/products/hec-ras/reviews) - [InfoSWMM](https://www.g2.com/products/infoswmm/reviews) - [Microsoft Excel](https://www.g2.com/products/microsoft-excel/reviews) - [Revit](https://www.g2.com/products/revit/reviews) ## Civil 3D Features **Design** - Visualizing - Rendering - Drawing - Editing - Dynamic Updating **Plan** - Documentation - Annotate - Collaborate **Collaboration** - Multi User - File Import/Export - Annotating **Design** - 3D Modeling - 3D Rendering - Drawing - Editing **Construction** - Grading - Earthwork **Construction** - Grading - Earthwork **Engineering** - Hydraulic engineering - Hydrologic engineering - Transportation engineering **Generative AI** - AI Text Generation - AI Text Summarization - AI Text-to-3D **Common Data Environment (CDE) - Building Design and Building Information Modeling** - Role-Based Access - Centralized Data Management **Cost Estimation - Building Design and Building Information Modeling** - Lifecycle Cost Tracking - Quantity Takeoff & Cost Estimation **Electrical & Circuit Design - Building Design and Building Information Modeling** - Clash Detection - Electrical System Modeling - MEP Coordination - Load Calculation & Analysis - Interoperability with BIM & CAD - Circuit Design Integration ## Top Civil 3D Alternatives - [SketchUp](https://www.g2.com/products/sketchup/reviews) - 4.5/5.0 (1,296 reviews) - [MicroStation](https://www.g2.com/products/microstation/reviews) - 4.0/5.0 (403 reviews) - [Archicad](https://www.g2.com/products/archicad/reviews) - 4.6/5.0 (284 reviews)