Electrical Design Software

What is electrical design software, and how do I choose the right one?

Electrical design software is a tool for helping electrical engineers and designers create wiring diagrams, circuit designs, and other technical drawings. 

Most electrical design software products are priced “per month” basis, and their entry-level pricing plan ranges from $29 to $200+*. An enterprise product priced higher may include additional features such as 

First-time buyers consider budget, user needs, and integrations when evaluating options. To identify the best system for your needs, consult stakeholders on key vendor questions: 

Is the software compatible with the current hardware?

What are the available electrical design capabilities?

Does the tool support specific industry standards to ensure compliance?

What is electrical design software?

Electrical design software is a tool that helps an electrical engineer and designer create wiring diagrams, circuit designs, and other types of technical drawings and electrical diagrams. This type of software simplifies the process by offering predesigned symbols for various devices, such as switches or sensors, which can be dragged and dropped into place on your diagram.

Electrical design software allows simulating circuits to test their performance before actual electrical installation. It automates complex calculations related to voltage drops, load capacity, or power factor corrections, making planning more efficient and accurate. All these features make electrical drawing software an essential tool for designing safe and effective electrical systems efficiently, whether they are small home setups or large industrial installations.

What are the core features of electrical design software?

• Symbol library: Access a collection of electrical symbols, icons and shapes for creating professional-looking diagrams and schematics. These libraries are often customizable to suit unique project needs or industry standards. A symbol library simplifies the design process by providing ready-to-use elements that represent various electrical components including, resistors, capacitors, switches, etc., directly within the software interface.

• System design tools: Enable engineers to create, modify, and analyze electrical system designs. The feature standardizes the process of creating schematic diagrams with drag-and-drop components or predefined templates. It also allows for easy sharing and collaboration on design projects among team members.

• Compliance management: Ensure all electrical designs comply with industry standards and regulations. Compliance management automatically checks the design against preset rules to avoid any violations, ensuring safety and reducing the risk of non-compliance penalties during installation or operation stages.

What are the benefits of using electrical design software?

• Automates complex calculations: Electrical design software automates complex calculations involved in designing electrical systems. The software instantly calculates parameters, such as voltage drop, load flow analysis, or short-circuit levels, with a high degree of accuracy. This frees up engineers' time for more critical tasks, such as design optimization. With automated electrical calculation features, accuracy is assured while maintaining efficiency and productivity, helping designers deliver reliable designs faster.

• Enhances design accuracy: The software provides precise design tools that minimize errors and enhance design accuracy. It allows for schematic drawing, circuit simulation, and testing of electrical component placement, which reduces the chances of mistakes in real-world applications. This software helps to ensure safety compliance and efficiency before actual implementation begins.

• Speeds up the design process: Electrical design software automates complex design tasks, reducing the time spent on manual calculations and drafting. It provides tools for automatic generation of wiring diagrams, schematics & panel layouts, which accelerates the overall process. Also, easy modifications in designs facilitate swift iterations leading to a faster completion of projects.

• Enables quick project revisions: Engineers can easily alter designs, make updates, or correct them without having to redraw entire schematics each time there's a change. The tool can store previous design versions, enabling changes without redoing complex calculations manually. This saves a lot of time in the product development cycle while maintaining accuracy and efficiency throughout the redesign process.

What are the potential issues with electrical design software?

• Compatibility issues: If the software doesn't integrate smoothly with other business tools, or if it's not compatible with the hardware setup, this could lead to workflow disruption and inefficiencies. Engineers will spend most of their time troubleshooting problems rather than focusing on the core task of designing electronic components.

• High learning curve: Such specialized software often includes complex features and tools that require considerable time to master, which could slow down productivity initially. This can be particularly challenging for new or less tech-savvy users who may struggle to adapt to the complexity of such a platform.

• Limited customization: Limited customization in electrical design software can be a potential issue as it restricts the ability to tailor designs based on specific project needs. This could result in inefficiencies, errors, or sub-optimal solutions due to the tool's inability to adapt to unique requirements, which may affect overall performance and productivity.

How much does electrical design software cost?

Most electrical design software product pricing is available upon request from the member. The base plan mostly includes the essential electrical design features such as design and editing tools, documentation, and a symbol library. An enterprise product priced higher may include additional features such as simulation, 3D drawings, and integration with other business applications.

*The pricing included is for the entry-level/lowest-priced offerings found on vendor websites as of August 14, 2024.

What is electrical design software used for?

Electrical design software helps businesses create effective and error-free circuit designs. Depending on the data fed into the system and the available software features, it can have multiple use cases.

• Electrical documentation: The tool automates generating bills of materials (BOM) that list all components required for the electrical project. Users can also access and customize the available documentation templates to shave off some time working from scratch. The tool offers a centralized repository to store and manage all the design documents, including schematics and layouts. Its version control and collaboration features further enable users to track document changes via audit trail and share them with other team members via link sharing. 

• Analysis and simulation: The tool helps analyze the circuit behavior under various conditions (AC, DC, or transient). Based on the insights analyzed, users can calculate the voltages, currents, power dissipation, and other electrical parameters. They can also analyze electromagnetic fields and their interactions with components to evaluate signal integrity, power integrity, and electromagnetic interference (EMI). 

• Team collaboration: The tool offers a centralized repository for storing and accessing electrical design files. Users can make changes to the design and save a newer version to prevent overwriting and ensure everyone works on the latest version. Some electrical design tools enable multiple users to work on the same design simultaneously, facilitating real-time collaboration and reducing conflicts. Team members can review changes, provide feedback, and suggest changes directly within the software.

Which software tools integrate with electrical design software?

An electrical design tool integrates with various solutions for data export and import. We looked across thousands of reviews from the software users to identify the products users frequently mentioned they integrated with their tools:

• Ansys Discovery simulation tool and electrical design software integration enable testing electrical systems in a real-world environment to test their efficiency. Engineers can make real-time changes to the created simulations to test the system under different scenarios and find the best one where the system shows optimal efficiency.

• Autodesk Construction Cloud is a field service management system that integrates with electrical design software to efficiently manage field technicians working on design projects. The integration enables automating design workflows to assign tasks to the engineers and track their progress for changes and updates. Field technicians get all the updates on their mobile devices for quick and on-time access to the latest project development or issue resolution. 

• Microsoft Excel is a productivity tool that integrates with electrical design software to provide a repository for design parameters, component specifications, and calculation results. Users can also perform complex calculations and statistical analysis in spreadsheets to ensure a smooth and efficient design process. 

• Adobe Photoshop is a graphic design tool and electrical design software integrate to create realistic visualizations of electrical systems, making it easier for clients, stakeholders, and even technicians to understand complex designs. The integrated photo editing tools can also be used to trace editing electrical systems from photos, providing a starting point for design modifications. 

• Vuforia Studio is collaboration software that integrates with an electrical design tool. It enables engineers and designers to manage processes such as remote assistance when sharing designs with other team members working from different locations. They can draw digital annotations on desktop or mobile screens to provide the required instructions to technicians via real-time video communication.

*We identified these integrations mentioned most often in verified reviews of energy management software published on GetApp within the past two years (as of August 14, 2024).

Key considerations when purchasing electrical design software

• Evaluate its compatibility with current hardware: Hardware compatibility is important when purchasing electrical design software because the performance and functionality of such applications can be greatly affected by the existing system. Check for the tool’s hardware requirements and match them with the available options within the business. If they're not compatible, you may face issues such as slow processing speed, frequent crashes, or even the inability to run the program at all.

• Consider the range of electrical design capabilities: The range of electrical design capabilities is crucial as it determines the complexity and variety of projects you can handle. It allows for versatility in designing different types of electronic circuits or systems, from simple to complex ones. If the work requires advanced features, such as 3D modeling, circuit simulation, or multi-board layout, ensure that these are included. A greater range increases flexibility and future-proofs your investment. Therefore, ensure the software choice supports a wide array of such abilities.

• Check the software's support for industry standards: Support for industry standards in electrical design software ensures that your designs comply with established safety and quality norms. It also promotes interoperability, making it easier to collaborate or share files across different platforms without losing data integrity. This can save time, reduce errors, and facilitate regulatory compliance.

Sources

Products evaluated for the pricing calculation were taken from GetApp’s electrical design software directory. The pricing ranges exclude freemium versions of the products. The features highlighted were identified based on their relevance and the percentage of products in GetApp's directory that offer them. 

Disclaimer

This electrical design software buyers guide was authored by GetApp's content team. We develop our guides using the author's expertise, insights from 2M+ unique user reviews, and our proprietary data science algorithms to identify trends in user sentiment, preferences, and priorities. Some text was generated with assistance from artificial intelligence tools.