Quoting.ai vs PlanSwift
Verified against the live products on 2026-07-05.
PlanSwift, owned by ConstructConnect, is the incumbent Windows desktop takeoff and estimating tool, $2,000 per year published, trusted by a huge installed base and recently retrofitted with Takeoff Boost AI: auto takeoff, auto count, auto scale, and auto bookmark, announced April 2026. Quoting.ai Takeoff runs in the browser on WebGPU, reads the full set including the schedule and legend, and cross-checks all three sources for omissions. PlanSwift is the proven multi-trade workhorse for Windows-based desks; Quoting.ai is the specialist for Division 8 scopes where workstation lock-in and missed openings both cost real money.
Pick Quoting.ai when
- You want takeoff from any machine, including a Mac or a job-site laptop: browser-based, no install. Workstation lock-in is PlanSwift users' most-cited complaint on Capterra.
- You need omission detection, not just measurement automation: Takeoff Boost speeds up drawing measurement; it does not reconcile schedule against plans against legend.
- Division 8 depth matters: schedule attributes, hardware groups, and apartment-based numbering for submittals.
Pick PlanSwift when
- You bid trades Quoting.ai does not cover yet, concrete, drywall, flooring, painting: PlanSwift covers roughly 13 trades with assemblies-based estimating today.
- Your team already knows PlanSwift, works Windows-first and often offline, and values 15 years of trainers, tutorials, and plugins.
- You want one inexpensive, proven tool for both takeoff and cost estimating at a published $2,000 per year.
Is Takeoff Boost the same kind of AI?
No, and the difference is worth being precise about. Takeoff Boost automates geometry: measuring, counting, scaling, bookmarking, real accelerations of the click-by-click desktop workflow, backed by ConstructConnect and a Google Cloud partnership. Quoting.ai automates comprehension for two trades: it parses the door and window schedules as documents, indexes the legend, detects plan symbols, and reconciles the three. Faster measuring and verified counting solve different problems. Faster wrong is still wrong.
Common questions
PlanSwift costs $2,000 a year. Is Quoting.ai comparable?
Try before comparing: live trades are free to run on your own set, and production pricing per estimator seat is on the pricing page. The honest comparison is discrepancies caught per bid, not list price.
We run PlanSwift for everything. Worth switching?
Not wholesale. If Division 8 is a sideline, PlanSwift plus care may be enough. If openings are your business, run one set through both and count what each one missed.
Settle it with your own work
Demos flatter every tool. Your real RFQs and your real plan sets are the honest benchmark.