SOLIDWORKS Tops Crowdsourced Review of 3D CAD Software

Recently G2 Crowd, a business software review site that uses crowdsourcing to rank products, released its first Grid report that ranks product and machine design software. Topping that list in the Winter 2015 report, which ranks a total of seven products, is SOLIDWORKS 3D product design software.

The goal of the report, says its publisher, is to guide users in their purchase decisions. The report is based on more than 170 reviews written by business and engineering professionals. The Grid report was created using G2 Crowd’s software review platform, which factors in customer satisfaction reported by users and vendor market presence determined from social and public data to rank products.

Product and machine design software is a subcategory of computer-aided design (CAD) software, targeted specifically toward designers and engineers across a number of disciplines, including manufacturing, product design, automotive, and aerospace. These tools allow users to generate precision 3D models of parts, components, and assemblies to aid in engineering, manufacturing, and design processes.

To qualify as a Leader, a product must receive a high customer satisfaction score and have substantial market presence. Five CAD providers were named as Leaders in the report, however SOLIDWORKS earned the highest overall customer satisfaction score.

Across all product and machine design platforms, reviewers reported the product they use meets their requirements at an average rate of 82%, and on average reviewers said they were 80% likely to recommend the product they use.

Hear what the users said

The following was taken from SOLIDWORKS user reviews used in the report.

“SOLIDWORKS is extremely easy to use. It’s very intuitive, efficient, and powerful software. I have used it to design complex surface parts, basic machined parts, complex sheet metal, buildings, and more.”

Aaron Jackson, Design Engineer at Spray Equipment and Service Center

“The software is simple enough to deduce and work with limited to no experience but still powerful enough to model any engineering problem that might crop up. The intuition in using the features and design modeling is spot on and does not prove to get too confusing while working in the environment.”

Jonathan K, Mechanical Engineer at Technetics Group

“If you’re looking for the most complete, overall best value, from one user to a mid-size company, I will highly recommend to go with SOLIDWORKS. Simply put, it can do most of what the big guys likes Pro/E and CATIA can do, yet it’s relatively easy to use and support.”

Israel P, CAD Administrator, Raytheon

Of the nearly 20 software vendors listed in G2 Crowd’s Product and Machine Design category, the seven ranked products each received 10 or more reviews to qualify for inclusion on the Grid.

Satisfaction rankings are generated from the user reviews, and market presence is calculated from vendor size, market share, and social impact. Based on a combination of these scores, each software solution is categorized as a Leader, High Performer, Contender, or Niche.

Future refreshes of the Grid will provide updated rankings based on the latest reviews and social data. You can check out the overview of the G2 Winter 2015 report here.