Altium Develop vs. Autodesk Tinkercad

Autodesk Tinkercad

Overview
Product	Rating	Most Used By	Product Summary	Starting Price
Altium Develop	Score 9.0 out of 10	N/A	Altium Develop is a platform that unifies multidisciplinary teams across engineering, sourcing, and manufacturing to support seamless co-creation. It provides real-time visibility into designs, requirements, and supply chain data, enabling contributors to work together concurrently rather than in silos.	N/A
Autodesk Tinkercad	Score 6.6 out of 10	N/A	Autodesk offers Tinkercad, a 3D modeling and design tool available free for educational purposes. Shapes are the building blocks of Tinkercad. Users can add pre-existing shapes, or import them. To adjust objects, users can rotate the workplane to adjust shapes or change views and input exact dimensions with the ruler. Custom shapes can also be created by combining elements.	N/A

Pricing

Altium Develop

Autodesk Tinkercad

Editions & Modules

No answers on this topic

Offerings

Pricing Offerings
Altium Develop	Autodesk Tinkercad
Free Trial
Yes	No
Free/Freemium Version
No	Yes
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
No	No

Entry-level Setup Fee

No setup fee

Additional Details

Altium Develop is offered as an annual subscription starting at $1,990 per year, which includes one Altium Designer ECAD Design Author and a shared workspace for projects, libraries, and collaboration. The subscription provides unlimited workspace users at no additional cost, enabling broad participation in reviews, commenting, task management, BOM access, and change workflows. Teams can add up to four additional Altium Designer ECAD Design Authors for $995 per Author per year, allowing organizations to scale active design capacity while keeping contributors and collaborators included at no extra charge.

—

More Pricing Information

Pricing Info

Community Pulse
	Altium Develop	Autodesk Tinkercad
Considered Both Products	Altium Develop Verified User Anonymous Chose Altium Develop The PDM system in solid works is generally superior to Altium 365. I often find the project version in lacking in comparison. Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose Altium Develop Moved away from Eagle after Autodesk takeover. KiCad is a powerful tool, and very usable for hobbyist grade designs, but component management, lifecycle management, footprint importing, and version control are all much more easily controlled in Altium. Incentivized Helpful? EE Eric Emens Senior Electrical Engineer Chose Altium Develop Altium is easier to use and more intuitive. Altium provides more feature updates. Autodesk Fusion was technically Eagle when I used it. Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose Altium Develop Altium is rapidly losing ground to Kicad and Allegro. The cost of Allegro is not significantly different from that of Altium now, and Cadence still offers perpetual licenses, whereas Altium mandates a subscription. KiCad offers a powerful and free alternative that rivals Altium … Incentivized Helpful? KZ Kirill Zadoika Electronics Design Engineer Chose Altium Develop Altium Develop is a lot better than the PADS version the company had. The PCB view interface is a lot better in AD; PADS seemed very old (although we did not have the latest version). There was not 3d viewer with actual components in PADS; Altium has this feature, which means … Incentivized Helpful? JW Joseph Wierzbicki Engineering Manager Chose Altium Develop Altium being the professional defacto software is the main thing that it has got going for it. It is more stable than KiCAD Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose Altium Develop Altium is more powerful than KiCAD and a cleaner implementation of UI controls. KiCAD does have a wonderful interactive HTML BOM output that combines an assembly drawing and BOM that highlights components between the two views and is a standalone document not needing additional … Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose Altium Develop Allegro/Orcad is the old way of doing things - it's unintuitive, clunky, and has poor community support. EasyEDA is basically just an online copy of Altium - many of the hotkeys/features are in the same places. Altium is by far the best of the three. Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose Altium Develop I have used other software's in the past, but I feel altium is very comprehensive. I am unable to do a fair comparison now, since I don't use them now Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose Altium Develop Much better. I transitioned my previous company from Orcad to Altium Develop and it really helped development efficiency once everyone got on board and trained and all our libraries got converted over which was pretty easy to do. Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose Altium Develop KiCAD and EasyEDA are much better for simple designs with only one engineer. EasyEDA works well especially if you are using a service like JLCPCB or LCSC since the integrate seamlessly and can be run in the web browser. That being said, they have a lot of limitations in … Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose Altium Develop Altium has the best feature set among EDA software suites, but it is a bit harder to use out of the box than EasyEDA. KiCAD is powerful, but it takes a lot more effort to get working well. Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose Altium Develop Altium is considered "professional" software and has a better narrative when delivering eCAD artifacts and projects to end clients. Incentivized Helpful? MC Mike Chrisco Owner Chose Altium Develop Altium Develop gave the most cohesive experience compared to other platforms. Most others feel like several pieces of software kludged together (and often are). Altium Develop was clearly a unified system and felt like a much more modern piece of software. At the time it was … Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose Altium Develop Previously used both products listed. When selecting a product at this company, I decided upon Altium Develop as it appeared to be the most common platform utilized in this area by other companies. This would mean that new-hires were more likely to be familiar with the software. Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose Altium Develop Altium Develop seems like it will be much better for library management, schematic capture, and 3D file generation. However, it is not as intuitive and easy to use when creating layouts. We chose Altium Develop because we believe the time savings of the areas where Altium is … Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose Altium Develop It's better for collaboration and version control Incentivized Helpful? MS Myles Scott Principle Electrical Engineer Chose Altium Develop Altium is much easier to use and faster to learn. Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose Altium Develop Much more professional, the library management is much easier on Altium Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose Altium Develop Altium definitely has a more rounded capability than KiCad and a better pricepoint than Cadence, but that gap is closing with KiCad. Incentivized Helpful? Chuck Todd Electrical Engineer Chose Altium Develop There is no comparison between Altium Develop and Autodesk Fusion. Altium Develop is light years ahead of Autodesk Fusion in every aspect. There is no way I would ever go back to Autodesk Fusion after switching to Altium Develop. Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose Altium Develop Generally, KiCad is missing the component management system that Altium has. It really is very useful. Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose Altium Develop We were already using Altium Designer with all of the libraries andprijects in Altium, so it will take too much time to convert to other software at this point. Incentivized Helpful? MO Markus Olsson R&D Manager Chose Altium Develop Price Ease of use 3D functionality Incentivized Helpful? Zachary Gillan Engineer Chose Altium Develop PADS feels like Solidworks - the legacy system that works well but hasn't moved forward with everything else. Altium Develop feels like OnShape - another large provider but much effort spent on modernization and upkeep of the technology. Incentivized Helpful?	Autodesk Tinkercad Verified User Anonymous Chose Autodesk Tinkercad Autodesk Tinkercad is by far the most user-friendly 3D modeling program I have used, especially for basic 3D modeling tasks. Meshlab and Meshmixer have similar functions but are far more complicated to navigate and difficult to use. These programs also tend to crash frequently, … Incentivized Helpful? Doug Mancosky Chief Science Officer Chose Autodesk Tinkercad Tinkercad has a fraction of the capabilities but is also a fraction of the price. Most of the tools of SOLIDWORKS are overkill for the average user anyway. The software is also much more intuitive comparatively without the need for training (like we're talking there are … Incentivized Helpful? Karee Smith Stem teacher Chose Autodesk Tinkercad PTC creo is a more professional software and is great and I used it for many years at my old job, but tinkercad is great for younger students in my opinion and it is nice that it can be accessed online and as a teacher it seems easier to manage. It also has more kid friendly … Incentivized Helpful? Nathan Morimitsu Social Media and Marketing Adminstrator Chose Autodesk Tinkercad Tinkercad is free and easy to use. It's a great place for people to start learning about 3D Design before they invest time and money in professional-level tools. Incentivized Helpful? Melissa Hill Adjunct Assistant Professor Chose Autodesk Tinkercad The alternative programs are all Autodesk programs and they are great and have many more functions than Tinkercad but are much harder and time consuming to learn. Tinkercad requires no downloading and is the most basic CAD program I have found on the market. It is also free and … Incentivized Helpful?

Best Alternatives
	Altium Develop	Autodesk Tinkercad
Small Businesses	SOLIDWORKS Score 8.7 out of 10	Onshape Score 6.5 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies	SOLIDWORKS Score 8.7 out of 10	Onshape Score 6.5 out of 10
Enterprises	Autodesk Fusion Score 7.8 out of 10	Rhino Score 8.4 out of 10
All Alternatives	View all alternatives	View all alternatives

User Ratings
	Altium Develop	Autodesk Tinkercad
Likelihood to Recommend	9.1 (0 ratings)	9.8 (0 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew	7.0 (0 ratings)	- (0 ratings)
Usability	8.2 (0 ratings)	- (0 ratings)
Availability	6.4 (0 ratings)	- (0 ratings)
Performance	7.3 (0 ratings)	- (0 ratings)
Support Rating	4.6 (0 ratings)	- (0 ratings)
Online Training	9.1 (0 ratings)	- (0 ratings)
Implementation Rating	7.2 (0 ratings)	- (0 ratings)
Product Scalability	2.7 (0 ratings)	- (0 ratings)

User Testimonials
	Altium Develop	Autodesk Tinkercad
Likelihood to Recommend	Altium is my 4th PCBA layout tool used and was very easy to learn how to use and more powerful than the others (except for MentorGraphics Expedition). it is well suited for schematics and layouts for simple to complex boards handling multi-hundred element schematics and placements while easily keeping track of items. Incentivized Verified User Anonymous Read full review	Tinkercad is such a great program and I would recommend the program to anyone who wants an introduction to a simple CAD program. I have another colleague that is now using it in her classroom due to my recommendation. I have had students start with me in Tinkercad and eventually work their way up in skill and purchase other Autodesk products because of the enjoyment and opportunity that Tinkercad provided. Incentivized Melissa Hill Adjunct Assistant Professor Read full review
Pros	BOM management - with just a little bit of extra care any designer produces a usable bom along with their pcb design ready to be ordered 365 - being able to view and review (placing comments) projects without the need to have the software installed locally Multi-pcb projects Incentivized Verified User Anonymous Read full review	Tinkercad is very easy to use. Most of the 3d design software have steep learning curves. It is compatible with 3d printing. It is a proper tool which gives you solid 3d files needed for 3d printing. Tinkercad is fun to use. There are tones of 3d models created by the community. You could share your designs or even collaborate on designs. Must have tool for STEM teachers. It provides both electronics and coding features in a proper way. Oral Tosun Business Owner Read full review
Cons	The move to constraint management vs. design rules is half-baked. requiring saving separate constraints to schematics vs. PCBs results in constraints being overwritten constantly when pushing updates. Forcing subscriptions - removing the option for perpetual licenses. Integrated simulation is still un-intuitive and difficult to use. Requirements management feels completely separate, and I forget it's even part of Altium. No easy way to manage or layout schematics with "generic components" - every item is forced to be a manufacturer part at design time, slowing down initial schematic capture. Verified User Anonymous Read full review	The Tinkercad provided projects were upgraded in some aspects but the text for the projects has not and can cause confusion. Tinkedcad works best in Google Chrome on a windows machine but most of my students have Macs and even when using Chrome they run into issues that Windows users don’t Tinkedcad is browser-based but, to have a program that would be tablet compatible would be invaluable. So far it has only really worked on a Surface Pro 3. Incentivized Melissa Hill Adjunct Assistant Professor Read full review
Likelihood to Renew	ALTIUM DESIGNER is the reference tool in the electronic circuit design sector, its use is widespread worldwide. Although there are other alternatives, some of them free do not rival ALTIUM DESIGNER in terms of features and reliability. It is also very practical to request quotes with ALTIUM DESIGNER BOM reports since all suppliers are accustomed to using the tool. Incentivized Jose Perri Director of Engineering and Product Development Read full review	No answers on this topic
Usability	I originally chose Altium Develop for its superior usability. All operations being handled in one cohesive platform greatly improves efficiency. When handling many different designs, project setup and component creation eat into every project's productivity. Templates, defaults and design reuse all speed up design. I hold back from a higher rating because development focus on those usability features seems to have stagnated a bit. Simple missing features requested seem to remain missing. New collaboration features, simulation and sourcing features are released, but I just want to be able to draw dashed lines! I think this reflects a general focus on the 10% of datacenter/AI/smartphone customers over the 90% of 2-4 layer designs. The lack of information available during the platform transition gave me significant pause before buying in as well. Incentivized MC Mike Chrisco Owner Read full review	No answers on this topic
Reliability and Availability	Not very stable. Sudden lack of functionality when the license expires is not indicated clearly and can lead to loss of work. Incentivized Verified User Anonymous Read full review	No answers on this topic
Support Rating	I use the educational Program. And so far is the best technical support. Every time that I need one or I have a question. They respond so far and with excellent advice. Incentivized Hugo Macias Professor Read full review	No answers on this topic
Online Training	easy to follow, Good technical materials. good videos The platform is easy to use. Incentivized Hugo Macias Professor Read full review	No answers on this topic
Implementation Rating	Overly complex, not designed for small organizations, core functionality poorly implemented to focus on flashy features. Incentivized Verified User Anonymous Read full review	No answers on this topic
Alternatives Considered	Altium Develop is a lot better than the PADS version the company had. The PCB view interface is a lot better in AD; PADS seemed very old (although we did not have the latest version). There was not 3d viewer with actual components in PADS; Altium has this feature, which means that we can share 3d images of the PCB with customers before manufacturing. Incentivized KZ Kirill Zadoika Electronics Design Engineer Read full review	Autodesk Tinkercad is by far the most user-friendly 3D modeling program I have used, especially for basic 3D modeling tasks. MeshLab and MeshMixer have similar functions but are far more complicated to navigate and difficult to use. These programs also tend to crash frequently, which has never been a problem with Tinkercad. The fact that you can use Tinkercad without downloading any software also makes it far more accessible, as you can log into your account and edit your models from any computer. I use 3ds Max for more complex 3D modeling, but for small tasks I always choose Tinkercad. Incentivized Verified User Anonymous Read full review
Scalability	Because, in my opinion, usage for small organization is poor, it is difficult to set up initial configuration to support scaling. Incentivized Verified User Anonymous Read full review	No answers on this topic
Return on Investment	Quick PCB design allows for quick sales, thus generating a large ROI for a company Altium Designer's built in BOM price tracker allows the user to have a general idea of the cost of their PCB, so they can plan accordingly when budgeting In addition to the BOM, Altium Designer provides different manufacturers and their part numbers for different components so the user can choose the cheapest option to move forward with Incentivized Verified User Anonymous Read full review	Autodesk Tinkercad has enabled us to engage our customers further by offering enrichment programs for their children which will help to inspire them into STEM careers Incentivized Nathan Morimitsu Social Media and Marketing Adminstrator Read full review
ScreenShots	Altium Develop Screenshots