What I actually use at the office (and what's a waste of money)

Last year I spent $3,000 on software I barely used. A render subscription that looked amazing in the demos. An AI plugin that promised to revolutionize my workflow. An “enterprise” management tool that was overkill for a 6-person firm.

I learned the hard way: the best tool isn’t the most complete. It’s the one you actually use.

So instead of listing everything on the market (you can Google that), I’ll tell you what actually works day to day. With real prices, real limitations, and opinions that might irritate some vendors.

About BIM: yes, you need it. But maybe not Revit.

I’ll be direct: if you’re still working only in 2D, you’re losing projects. 68% of the market already uses BIM. It’s not a differentiator anymore. It’s table stakes.

But that doesn’t mean you need Revit.

Revit costs $380 per month. For a small firm, that hurts. And the learning curve is brutal. I’ve seen firms buy licenses and abandon them in 3 months because nobody had time to learn it properly.

If you work on large projects, collaborate with engineers, or your clients require IFC, okay. Revit makes sense. The AEC Collection ($460/month) includes AutoCAD and is better value.

But for residential and small commercial? SketchUp Pro at $349 per year handles 80% of cases. It’s not real BIM, but it models in 3D, generates reasonable documentation, and everyone learns it in a week.

ArchiCAD is a serious alternative to Revit, especially if you’re on Mac. More intuitive interface, less headache. The problem is fewer people use it in the US, so finding tutorials and support is harder.

Rendering: where money goes down the drain

This is where most firms mess up badly.

V-Ray is spectacular. Unmatched quality. But it costs $800 per year, needs a powerful computer, and each render takes time. For final presentation images? Worth every penny. For day-to-day work? Impractical.

The combination that works: Enscape for daily use, V-Ray for finals.

With Enscape you model and see results instantly. Literally instantly. Changed a wall, see the impact. Client asks how it looks with darker flooring, show them in 30 seconds. Version 4.4 improved lighting significantly and has an AI enhancer that cleans up quick renders.

But if you’re starting out and don’t want to spend anything: D5 Render has a free version. Real-time rendering, actual ray tracing, syncs directly with SketchUp and Revit. The community is smaller, but for the price (zero), what it delivers is absurd.

Lumion I find overpriced. Eats GPU like there’s no tomorrow, and for most projects D5 or Enscape do the same for less.

AI in architecture: where it shines

46% of architects already use AI at work. And it makes sense. It accelerates certain phases dramatically.

Midjourney generates inspiring images in seconds. Perfect for mood boards and initial concepts. I show clients at the start of a project to align style expectations. What used to take hours of reference research now takes minutes.

PromeAI transforms sketches into renders quickly. Great for validating ideas with clients before investing time modeling. Huge savings on rework.

ArchiCAD has an integrated AI visualizer now. Works really well for initial studies and quick iterations.

My approach: AI to accelerate concept work, traditional tools for technical documentation. Explore ideas with Midjourney, refine in SketchUp, finalize in V-Ray. Each tool doing what it does best.

ChatGPT Plus ($20/month) has become essential at the office. I use it to organize briefings, structure proposals, even to think through design solutions. The integrated DALL-E helps for quick visual references.

Project management: where most firms fail

I’ll be honest: most firms still use spreadsheets and text messages to manage projects.

Does it work? Sort of. Until the day you need to prove what was agreed with the client. Or find that photo of the problem someone sent 3 months ago. Or generate a report on how much time you spent on each project.

Text messages and group chats are great for quick communication. Terrible for traceability. Information gets lost in the flow. Photos scattered across 47 different conversations. And when problems arise, it becomes “he said/she said.”

For small firms, Asana or Monday.com work well. Visual, easy to customize, functional free version. Zoho Projects is even cheaper if you need budget features.

For those who work on construction, you need something specific. Autodesk Construction Cloud is complete but costs $4,500+ per year per seat. Procore is the standard for large contractors, but enterprise pricing.

The gap in the market has always been accessible construction management for architects. Solutions exist for large contractors. Generic project management solutions exist. But something designed for the architect who manages construction? Hard to find.

Storage: don’t overcomplicate

Google Drive works. $6 per user per month, 2TB of space, real-time collaboration.

If your firm already uses Microsoft 365, OneDrive comes included and does the same thing.

Dropbox is more expensive ($15/user/month) but syncs large files better. Useful if you work with lots of heavy renders.

You don’t need an enterprise solution. You don’t need a local server. Cloud solves it, costs less, and you access from anywhere.

Communication: depends on your clients

If your clients use Teams, you’ll use Teams. No discussion.

If you have freedom to choose: Slack is more pleasant to use, lighter, better organized. But the free version has annoying limitations (limited history).

For video conferencing, Zoom is still the most stable. Google Meet has improved a lot and is free. Teams works but sometimes stutters.

Solo or micro practice (1 to 3 people): SketchUp Pro + free D5 Render + Google Drive + free Asana. Total investment: less than $50 per month. Seriously. You can start spending almost nothing and get professional results.

Small firm (4 to 10 people): Revit or ArchiCAD + Enscape + Monday.com + Google Workspace. Around $200 per user per month. Not cheap, but that’s the cost of operating professionally.

Medium firm (10+ people): AEC Collection + Enscape + V-Ray + Autodesk Construction Cloud + Microsoft 365. At this scale you need enterprise tools and costs rise to $500 to 700 per user.

What I wouldn’t buy again

That premium render subscription I mentioned at the start? It was software that promised V-Ray quality with Enscape speed. In practice, it did neither well.

AI plugin that “automates documentation”? Generated floor plans that needed so much adjustment it was faster to do from scratch.

“Complete” management tool with 47 modules? We used 3. The other 44 just cluttered the interface.

The lesson: start simple. Add complexity only when the current tool no longer solves the problem. And be skeptical of anything that promises to do everything.

That $3,000 I lost? I consider it tuition. Expensive, but I learned.

Planno was born from this frustration with construction management tools. Simple, focused on what architects actually need: visit timeline, automatic documentation, issue tracking. Without 47 modules you’ll never use. Try it free.