Better bang for your buck!
I would say about 90% of the company has upgraded from Adobe to Bluebeam. I have the basic program and there are definitely some pros and …
Bluebeam Revu
Bluebeam Revu
Overview
Reviews
Popular Features
View all 16 featuresPlan markups & sharing (49)
9.7
97%
Plan distribution & viewing (47)
8.9
89%
Document sharing (43)
8.7
87%
As-built drawings (41)
8.2
82%
Reviewer Pros & Cons
View all pros & cons
Heather MacLean
Administrative Assistant
Strategic Construction, Ltd. (Construction, 51-200 employees)Pricing
View all pricingRevu Standard
$349
On Premise
per seat
Revu CAD
$449
On Premise
per seat
Revu eXtreme
$599
On Premise
per seat
Entry-level set up fee?
- No setup fee
For the latest information on pricing, visithttps://www.trustradius.com/buyer…
Offerings
- Free Trial
- Free/Freemium Version
- Premium Consulting / Integration Services
Features Scorecard
Construction Project & Field Management
8.2
82%
Estimating
8.9
89%
Product Details
What is Bluebeam Revu?
For those who design, engineer, bid and build our world, Bluebeam Revu is how professionals get more done. Since 2002, Bluebeam has made smart and simple desktop, mobile and cloud-based solutions that utilize the construction documents themselves to share metadata, hyperlinks, bookmarks, images, attachments and 3D data downstream. More than 1.3 million AEC professionals worldwide trust Revu to elevate project efficiency and collaboration, streamlining critical processes to get more done in less time.
Bluebeam Revu Features
Construction Project & Field Management Features
- Supported: Plan distribution & viewing
- Supported: Plan markups & sharing
- Supported: Document sharing
- Supported: Issue tracking & punchlists
- Supported: Photo documentation
- Supported: Jobsite reports
- Supported: RFI tools
- Supported: Collaboration & approvals
- Supported: As-built drawings
- Supported: Mobile app
- Supported: Submittal design and management
Estimating Features
- Supported: Takeoff tools
- Supported: Bid creation
Additional Features
- Supported: Digital stamps and signatures
Bluebeam Revu Screenshots
Bluebeam Revu Video
What Does Bluebeam Do for You?
Bluebeam Revu Competitors
Bluebeam Revu Technical Details
| Deployment Types | On-premise |
|---|---|
| Operating Systems | Windows |
| Mobile Application | Apple iOS |
| Supported Countries | USA, Canada, United Kingdom, Germany, Sweden |
| Supported Languages | English, German, French, Spanish, Italian, Danish, Dutch, Norwegian, Swedish, Finnish, Japanese, Korean |
Alternatives
View all alternatives
Frequently Asked Questions
What is Bluebeam Revu?
Bluebeam Revu is a PDF management, control, and editing tool. It enables collaboration and markup within shared documents across projects’ life cycles and has takeoff and bid creation capabilities.
What are Bluebeam Revu's top competitors?
What is Bluebeam Revu's best feature?
Reviewers rate Plan markups & sharing highest, with a score of 9.7.
Who uses Bluebeam Revu?
The most common users of Bluebeam Revu are from Mid-size Companies and the Construction industry.
Reviews and Ratings
(60)
Ratings
Reviews
(1-25 of 60)Companies can't remove reviews or game the system. Here's why
July 23, 2021
Better bang for your buck!
- When I have different tabs open, it reverts back to the main or first tab which is helpful when I am moving documents around.
- There are for sure a ton of more options even on the basic version.
- Exporting to folders is super easy and separates the documents in order.
- If you have several tabs open and you try to drag one out for a side by side view then you do not have all the modification options and you have to combine them back together.
- There is a lag time when hitting the print option.
- There is also a lag time when opening files, sometimes I think the window is frozen.
- I wish the basic version also had basic file editing, as in editing a document as Adobe does.
January 10, 2022
A Fantastic PDF Markup & Sharing Tool
- PDF markup
- Multiple users of the same file
- Cloud document management
- More advanced drawing tools - the pencil is rather rudimentary
- Easier to pick up for first time users
May 06, 2021
Markup Majesty - Bluebeam Rules
- Clear and easy viewing of project plans.
- In depth and extremely detailed mark up tools and sketching tools.
- Excellent help and support services.
- The sketch to scale tools are minimal and could be expanded.
- The group editing and selection is not the easiest to use.
- I think drawing tools could be improved in placing and editing line dimensions.
April 08, 2021
Bluebeam Revu for project QA&QC is great!
- Ease of use
- Wide range of tools
- Clean and clear results
- Lacks PDF editing tools seen in other vector based softwares.
- Newer version changed a lot from the previous version.
- Can at times be slow.
March 09, 2021
Bluebeam in a nutshell
- Recent and recall of PDFs that you had open so you can easily flip back in forth between files all within the same window.
- Instant access to a list of tools and setting of the defaults.
- At times it is difficult to find out where a certain function is.
- Some secure files won't open in Bluebeam and must be used in Adobe.
- The comparisons feature has difficulties with scanned documents.
January 23, 2020
A must-have PDF software!
- Bluebeam Studio is number one for PDF sharing.
- Cropping pages and inserting PDF files is really easy.
- Making PDF sharing more faster than it is right now.
- Opening multiple PDF files and viewing them is a little difficult.
January 24, 2020
All the bang for the buck
- Ease of use.
- Speed. It allows the user to access and edit documents much faster.
- At first it might be intimidating if you have never used it.
- Sometimes too many options.
January 24, 2020
Great for scaled markups
- Great fast PDF viewer with better editing tools than Adobe Acrobat.
- Useful feature set for architects, such as setting drawing scale, distance and area measurement tools.
- I wish the drawing tools had 'snapping' options.
- There should be more control over dimming backgrounds and flattening/unflattening markups so you can be sure your recipient is seeing the same thing.
January 23, 2020
Great for architects and designers
- Marking up drawings to communicate quick revisions.
- Moving around, adding or deleting sheets.
- Could have even more editing things, more shapes, symbols, etc.
January 15, 2020
Revu can handle all PDF related tasks with ease.
- General PDF viewing: it seems to have the best PDF engine for speed and accuracy.
- Redlining PDFs: it's simple to use and can create custom stamps easily.
- REVU for ipad is not as easy to use as the desktop application.
- The recent change of the user interface when going to the 2018 version was somewhat confusing. We have users on both older and newer versions.
December 07, 2019
Bluebeam Gets It Done
- Easy surface-level use but can become a deep and powerful tool if you invest in learning all its features.
- Perfect for editing PDFs, stamping, markups and creating templates.
- Well equipped for simple or complex take-off methods.
- Lots of customization for layout and tool ribbons.
- I would like to see better Excel integration and exporting.
- Id like to see a web app and cloud version to use on Chrome and also a Chrome preview extension
- It would be nice to see integration into Microsoft Office
October 24, 2019
Bluebeam - One stop for PDF collaboration
- It is relatively easy to use - without formal instruction.
- It easily allows you to grab PDF documents and edit them.
- It allows you create canned tools, like stamps, so data editing can be standard.
- Although it is relatively easy to use, the editing tools do not exist in drop down menus. I wish the interface were more similar to other Windows programs.
May 15, 2019
Bluebeam leaves Adobe in the dust!
- Adding text
- Marking up a document
- Doing take-offs for estimating purposes
- It launches slowly (which is why I personally don't have it as my default launcher for PDFs that I view only).
May 15, 2019
Bluebeam rocks
- Dimensioning scaled PDF documents is one of the things I use the most. I can get an accurate measurement where one has not been provided
- Editing PDF documents- there are documents that are automatically created through systems software that may need to be edited to me to the specific needs of a particular project. With Bluebeam, you could do this with ease.
- Document control is a major strength of Bluebeam. I have used Bluebeam on a project that had over 18,000 drawings. We also used the link feature to hyperlink each page that had a fallout.
- The iPad is where Bluebeam has the most room to improve upon. I have used Bluebeam to record punch list as it is easy to create punch items but is not as simple to update the punch list status.
- Creating reports is also not a strength of Bluebeam. You cannot create a report to tell you what items are linked to each other.
- Storage, editing, and navigation are strengths of Bluebeam. But tracking document status is not a strength of Bluebeam.
January 17, 2019
Bluebeam Revu: A nice interface and a powerful PDF handler
- Once you set Bluebeam Revu as your default PDF handler, it launches immediately when clicking a PDF to open. The speed with which it opens documents is impressive.
- Creating PDF's out of other documents, such as Word, Excel, JPG's, etc. is simple.
- Digitally signing documents is a simple, secure process. You can keep your signature password-protected, yet still access it quickly.
- The Bluebeam Revu mobile application ( I use the iOS version on an iPad Pro), is awesome. Not only does it handle PDF's like you would expect it to, it allows for effortless digital signing of documents on the fly. Nice to be able to quickly sign a document and email right back out from the tablet no matter where I am.
- The textbox and the typewriter tools, while functional, could be easier to use. It can be fiddly to get the typewriter insert where you need it, sometimes it doesn't want to move just a little (it can be a tiny bit or a big move). This can make it tough to get an "x" to line up with a box on a form. The textbox tool allows for plenty of customization, but can still be cumbersome when the form lines are small.
- On some documents it is necessary to "flatten" the document, or it comes across via email too large or with extraneous information. The process of flattening them seems a bit too laborious. Perhaps there is a default setting to make it do so automatically, but I haven't been able to locate it.
- The "create stamp" process has a lot of steps and could be macro automated to speed things up. It is so time-consuming that we only have one or two people that have fully figured it out, and they are tasked with creating new stamps for everyone.
- Draw on PDFs. No other software I've ever used is better at this, and I've used Photoshop, Illustrator, and Adobe Acrobat. Revu molds together the best features in CAD (powerful drawing capabilities, point snap abilities, extreme accuracy) with a great PDF viewer. Very much worth it.
- Mark up / annotate PDFs. Typing on Revu is very easy via the text box tool or the typewriter tool. You can choose from a variety of fonts, opaque or transparent backgrounds, any color--the possibilities are endless.
- Combining and rearranging PDFs. You can easily move pages around, combine separate files, and flatten files.
- A feature I would add -- a command line. The shortcuts are good, and in the latest version of Revu you can create your own which makes things easier. But I have used CAD and I find the command line much faster than dropdown menus.
- Something that could be better -- PDF compression. Revu files, when marked-up, can be massive, and there's not a clear enough way to shrink the file down by reducing clarity, etc. I understand this is a vector program--not rasterized--and vectors can be far more complex, especially with patterns and such. But compression would be nice.
- Features I'd like--enhanced vector abilities. Feathering lines, precise arc drawing, etc. Similar to Illustrator.
April 07, 2019
Bluebeam: Best PDF Document Management tool.
- Drawing markup. There are multiple ways to markup files from revision clouds, hyperlink tools, various shapes, and lines. All of these markups can also be counted and sorted for estimating takeoff style markups.
- Compiling and organizing. Bluebeam Revu also is a PDF authoring tool. You can create and export PDFs from anywhere there is a 'print' feature, or even convert filetypes directly to PDF. Multiple different PDFs can easily be combined, split apart, or rearranged.
- File distribution. The Studio Project and Studio Session feature allow for teams to have a cloud storage resource to share files with various permission and viewing abilities.
- It really is a great product and there really isn't a con that I can think of. Sometimes very large files struggle to refresh on a screen, but that is to be expected.
February 26, 2019
TIME SAVER!
- Easy to use. No need to convert files. You can work on a PDF file directly.
- You can directly export the quantity to MS Excel.
- You can write comments in the drawings.
- I want a Keyboard shortcut to reuse the previous command as I use the same few commands repeatedly. I didn't find any shortcuts online. In AutoCAD, by pressing enter or space bar you are allowed to use the previous command.
February 22, 2019
Bluebeam makes documents easy
- Applying stamps or any other markup to multiple pages in a document set is very easy.
- Having the ability to "flatten" all markups in a document so the user who you're sending the document to can't edit what you've added is very helpful.
- Bluebeam does a good job of providing add-ins to the popular design tools.
- Working with many pieces of small text can be tedious.
- Creating and using spaces can be confusing at times.
- There should be more generic markup options in the tool bin.
February 11, 2019
Great tool for Field Superintendents
- I like that Bluebeam is able to convert JPG files and word documents to PDF.
- I love that Bluebeam helps with my take-offs on jobs using the integrated measuring tools.
- I love that Bluebeam allows me to modify text on existing documents to be used in new presentations or RFI’s.
- I would like if Bluebeam was able to convert a wider range of files to PDF format.
- I would like if Bluebeam was able to be used cross-platform with documents on multiple devices.
January 11, 2019
Best in Class
- Revision control
- PDF viewing
- PDF editing
- Markup
- Comment sharing
- Takeoff - the features work for a single goal but for multiple items, it is difficult to organize.
December 07, 2018
Bluebeam Revu is an awesome tool for professionals in many fields.
- Great tools in Bluebeam to edit documents.
- I love that this software has the ability to flatten sheets!
- I think this software is wonderful for anyone who is in construction looking at plans.
- I think it would be better if the take off portion was better.
- I think it would be better if there were other editing tools.
- I would like to see the opening of two sheets look a little cleaner. It is really awkward.
September 14, 2017
Bluebeam Power
- Hyperlink the drawings quickly
- Name each page in a set of drawings based on the drawing name. This can VERY quickly
- Collaborate with other people working on the same project, especially when people are in different offices
- Marking up PDFs
- The takeoff function needs some work. It's main competitor (OST) is a much easier and user-friendly tool for doing large, detailed takeoff.
November 07, 2017
Construction Project Engineer's Review of Bluebeam Revu
- Combine, split, extract, reorder, markup, flatten, scale, compare and distribute PDFs - Pretty much anything you want to do with a PDF can be done in this software. The key aspect here is the user friendliness of the document controls. No training is needed to get started with the basics.
- Toolchests for all general scopes of work. Electrical, plumbing, HVAC, sitework, structural, and architectural symbols are just some of the many available toolchests that markup a drawing for quick and easy takeoffs from design drawings.
- Document management with slip sheeting. Easily add new PDFs into the current contract documents in the correct locations while ensure the outdated documents are logged for future reference if needed.
- RFI's and submittals tools are OK if your company uses them but there are better systems out there. There are quite a few steps involved in sending an RFI through Bluebeam that are unnecessary with other programs.
August 30, 2017
Bluebeam the Great!
- When reviewing drawings, the markup tools are very easy to use. It is a snap to markup a document then forward on to another party.
- The way the snapshot tool helps take information from one document and paste it into another helps us to be more efficient.
- Being able to add photos to a drawing is great for project reviews. Our guys will walk the site and take photos and then in Bluebeam select all the photos and add them to a drawing by just click and dragging the photos adding them for an owner to see. This really helps to give a person the to see where and what they are looking at.
- While creating forms it would be nice if when you copy a form field all the properties transfer when you paste them.