Construction estimating software

With the advent of computers in business, estimators began using spreadsheet applications like VisiCalc, Lotus 1-2-3, and Microsoft Excel to duplicate the traditional tabular format, while automating redundant mathematical formulas.

[2][3] Many construction cost estimators continue to rely primarily upon manual methods, hard copy documents, and/or electronic spreadsheets such as Microsoft Excel.

As a result, commercial cost estimating software applications were originally created to overcome these errors by using hard-coded formulas and data structures.

[5] As cost estimating programs became more and more popular over the years, more advanced features, such as saving data for reuse, mass project-wide changes, and trade-specific calculations, have become available.

Owners, contractors, architects and engineers are moving to advanced cost estimating and management systems, and many oversight groups such are beginning to also require their use.