Autodesk Inventor vs. Figma

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Autodesk Inventor
Score 8.3 out of 10
N/A
Autodesk Inventor 3D CAD software offers professional-grade 3D mechanical design, documentation, and product simulation tools. These blend parametric, direct, freeform, and rules-based design capabilities. Inventor includes integrated tools for sheet metal, frame design, tube and pipe, cable & harness, presentations, rendering, simulation, and machine design. It also features TrustedDWG® compatibility and Model-Based Definition capabilities for embedding manufacturing information directly in…
$300
12 days over 1 year via Flex pricing 100 tokens
Figma
Score 9.0 out of 10
N/A
Figma, headquartered in San Francisco, offers their collaborative design and prototyping application to support digital product and UI development.
$15
per month per editor
Pricing
Autodesk InventorFigma
Editions & Modules
Subscription - Monthly
$305
per month per user
Subscription - Yearly
$2440
per year per user
Subscription - 3 Years
$7320
3 years per user
Professional
$144
per year
Organization
$540
per year
Starter
Free
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
Autodesk InventorFigma
Free Trial
YesNo
Free/Freemium Version
NoYes
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoNo
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
Additional DetailsAlso available for limited use through tokens on a Flex plan.
More Pricing Information
Features
Autodesk InventorFigma
Computer-Aided Design Software
Comparison of Computer-Aided Design Software features of Product A and Product B
Autodesk Inventor
6.8
2 Ratings
4% below category average
Figma
-
Ratings
3D Modeling8.52 Ratings00 Ratings
2D Drafting6.02 Ratings00 Ratings
Rendering and Visualization6.52 Ratings00 Ratings
Parametric Design7.52 Ratings00 Ratings
Collaboration and Sharing6.02 Ratings00 Ratings
Compatibility with other software and formats7.02 Ratings00 Ratings
Assembly Design6.52 Ratings00 Ratings
Simulation and Analysis5.52 Ratings00 Ratings
Documentation and Annotation6.52 Ratings00 Ratings
Customization and Extensions7.52 Ratings00 Ratings
Best Alternatives
Autodesk InventorFigma
Small Businesses
Onshape
Onshape
Score 9.4 out of 10
OmniGraffle
OmniGraffle
Score 9.2 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies
Onshape
Onshape
Score 9.4 out of 10
OmniGraffle
OmniGraffle
Score 9.2 out of 10
Enterprises
Rhino
Rhino
Score 8.8 out of 10
OmniGraffle
OmniGraffle
Score 9.2 out of 10
All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
User Ratings
Autodesk InventorFigma
Likelihood to Recommend
8.0
(27 ratings)
9.1
(200 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
9.2
(2 ratings)
10.0
(7 ratings)
Usability
10.0
(1 ratings)
8.6
(32 ratings)
Availability
-
(0 ratings)
5.5
(1 ratings)
Performance
-
(0 ratings)
8.2
(1 ratings)
Support Rating
8.1
(12 ratings)
5.0
(17 ratings)
In-Person Training
6.0
(1 ratings)
9.1
(1 ratings)
Online Training
-
(0 ratings)
6.4
(1 ratings)
Implementation Rating
10.0
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Configurability
10.0
(1 ratings)
6.4
(1 ratings)
Contract Terms and Pricing Model
-
(0 ratings)
7.3
(1 ratings)
Ease of integration
-
(0 ratings)
6.4
(1 ratings)
Product Scalability
-
(0 ratings)
7.3
(1 ratings)
Professional Services
-
(0 ratings)
8.2
(1 ratings)
Vendor post-sale
-
(0 ratings)
7.3
(1 ratings)
Vendor pre-sale
-
(0 ratings)
7.3
(1 ratings)
User Testimonials
Autodesk InventorFigma
Likelihood to Recommend
Autodesk
Autodesk Inventor is a great tool for students and faculty for engineering areas that don't require great precision or development of more thorough scientific results. Is you are conducting research, or deal with very intricate and complex systems I would recommend a more robust platform that complies more to industry standards.
Read full review
Figma
Figma is a solid design tool to craft the UX design concepts/solutions for digital products. For printed marketing materials such as brochures, marketing flyers, press releases, etc, other design tools such as Adobe Illustrator, Photoshop, or InDesign might make more sense to use for those use case scenarios.
Read full review
Pros
Autodesk
  • The program is very good at simplicity. Each of the buttons, menus, and options has an explanation of exactly what the feature does, and even a more advanced description if you desire to learn more about what each one does.
  • Autodesk Inventor is a very fast program. Everything renders extremely quickly and there are no delays when examining a 3D model, part, or assembly. This is especially useful when giving a presentation about a product or design, and you need to be able to show a concept to an audience in real time.
  • The software has an extremely accurate simulation feature that lets users do stress analysis on a 3D model. It can calculate precisely where the stress concentrations are going to be in a particular model and even give you an accurate depiction of where the part could likely fracture and/or fracture during loading.
Read full review
Figma
  • Detailed enough to create pixel perfect designs with total control over the outcome
  • Creating and implementing design systems to improve consistency and speed up design work
  • Robust prototyping tools to create simple animations or to connect various pages
  • I love autolayout, which improves design spacing and responsiveness
Read full review
Cons
Autodesk
  • most if it still runs on a single core. Please fix this
  • Crashes. In our experience, too many crashes. We have high end machines and crashes are way too common.
  • Autosave. I think it is simply unacceptable that Autodesk Inventor combines common crashes with no autosave functionality. We feel this pain all the time.
Read full review
Figma
  • Prototyping in Figma is pretty much nothing more than a glorified slide show. Sure, variables, etc are available but it takes way to long to set them up and even more time when there are revisions needed.
  • It would be helpful if there were a contextual help system for various functionality. For example, advanced autolayout (like space between) can become very tricky to implement sometimes. I often wish there were an AI assistant to ask for help. I often use ChatGTP to help me through these times.
  • Searching layers needs to be much easier and more intuitive.
  • I would like to be able to make groups like the layers palette in Photoshop. That would help with organization and speed a lot.
Read full review
Likelihood to Renew
Autodesk
Inventor continues to meet our enterprise needs. I don't see a need to change unless we change our business model significantly.
Read full review
Figma
Figma is a pretty cool tool in many areas. My team almost uses it on daily basis, such as, brainstorming on product/design topics, discussing prototypes created by designers. We even use it for retrospectives, which is super convenient and naturally keeps records of what the team discusses every month. Furthermore, I do see the potential of the product - currently we mainly use it for design topics, but it seems it is also a good fit for tech diagrams, which we probably will explore further in the future.
Read full review
Usability
Autodesk
It’s easy and very good for mechanical design
Read full review
Figma
It's easy to use for designers who are familiar with design terms and functions from Photoshop and Illustrator. However, non-tech and non-designer collaborators have a hard time figuring out how to leave comments and apply changes, compared to other online design tools like Canva and Squarespace. Even simple drag-and-drops and rearrangement of certain blocks become too complicated due to uncommon functions like Hug and Lock.
Read full review
Reliability and Availability
Autodesk
No answers on this topic
Figma
The only regret I have is, its not available when there is no internet
Read full review
Performance
Autodesk
No answers on this topic
Figma
I think its great, As there are many other software or systems which can be integrated with it as plugins or API's
Read full review
Support Rating
Autodesk
I think the support for Autodesk Inventor is very good. The staff at our reseller were very knowledgable and able to walk us through problems pretty easily. The training we received was very good also. I will say that there were a couple of times we reached out to support with a question or challenge we had, and the support agent was not able to resolve our problem, and after touching base back we found out that there was not a solution for the problems we were experiencing. One of them was just how Inventor represents colors inconsistently at times, all things being equal. Another was that Inventor would not let decals on parts transcend to the assembly level. they just would not show up.
Read full review
Figma
I haven't used their support lately but in the past, they had a chat that I used often. They often responded in a few hours and were able to give a satisfactory solution. I would imagine it's less personal now but the community has expanded drastically so there are more resources out there to self serve with a bit of Google magic.
Read full review
In-Person Training
Autodesk
I got the training during college, so mostly i learned on my own
Read full review
Figma
In-person training has its own benefits - 1. It helps in resolving queries then and there during the training. 2. I find classroom or in-person training more interactive. 3. Classroom or in-person training could be more practical in nature where participants can have an hands on experience with tools and clarify their doubts with the trainer.
Read full review
Online Training
Autodesk
No answers on this topic
Figma
Online training has its own merits and demerits - 1. Sometimes we may face issues with connectivity or the training content 2. The way training is being delivered becomes very important because not everyone is comfortable taking online training and learning by themselves. 3. With the advancement of technology online training has become popular but there is a segment of people who still prefer class-room training over online one.
Read full review
Alternatives Considered
Autodesk
When it comes to solid modeling, the bad choices died out years ago. So we looked at the total ecosystem and chose Autodesk Inventor because of the integration with Nastran, HSM (machining), Autodesk CFD, MoldFlow, and AutoCAD. This means our legacy data (2D) is still a valid part of our design methodologies going forward, and we have the full breadth of engineering tools at our disposal. Other solutions in this space have similar offerings but not nearly as potent of a portfolio in total. It's worth saying that we do not consider Inventor in the same space as CATIA or NX, but that the entire Autodesk portfolio (e.g. Alias, PowerMill, etc) includes a total toolset that exceeds these industry giants.
Read full review
Figma
Figma compared to other tools has user friendly UI which is very easy for all levels of designers. Compared to Adobe XD and Sketch Figma is stable, while in other tools I have faced software crashing in the middle of the work which resulted in loss of data/design. Compared to other tools it's fast and shows less lag. Collaboration in Figma is very easy as it is cloud based but in XD it's not that smooth working with other designers.
Read full review
Scalability
Autodesk
No answers on this topic
Figma
I think this is great and as I mentioned at ADP we use Figma extensively whether by designers, researchers or content writers
Read full review
Return on Investment
Autodesk
  • Working on a project designed with Inventor provides a modular design platform that can quickly be configured or changed as required. This allows for the quick turn around time for the design and revision of drawings.
  • We've used Inventor over the years (since 2013) and the updates and newly released versions of Inventor do not require re-training or restrict use.
  • Autodesk follows an intuitive approach and users or designers who have worked on other design platforms like SolidWorks can transition easily to Inventor.
Read full review
Figma
  • Allows us to get funding for further phases of the project (which is uncountable)
  • Well, it lets us show off when needed due to well suited UI-oriented character
  • Easily approachable by anyone (browser use)
  • User friendly interface
  • More advanced cooperation requires some of the users to have a license
Read full review
ScreenShots