Best Mechanical Engineering Software

Compare the Top Mechanical Engineering Software as of January 2026

What is Mechanical Engineering Software?

Mechanical engineering software enables mechanical engineers to design products with detailed accuracy and specifications for the manufacturing and engineering processes. Mechanical engineering software, also known as mechanical CAD (MCAD) or mechanical design automation (MDA), streamlines all aspects of the mechanical engineering and product design process of structures and mechanical parts and products. Compare and read user reviews of the best Mechanical Engineering software currently available using the table below. This list is updated regularly.

  • 1
    CMS IntelliCAD

    CMS IntelliCAD

    CAD-MANUFACTURING SOLUTIONS INC

    CMS IntelliCAD® is the intelligent, powerful and affordable full-featured CAD Software and is fully programmable with hundreds of third party solutions. CMS IntelliCAD also offers a full suite of 2D and 3D AutoCAD® compatible drawing tools! It is the smartest choice for engineers, architects and consultants, or anyone who communicates using CAD drawings. It is designed to give you the best unrivaled compatibility and a true CAD Software alternative to Autodesk® AutoCAD® software and is fully programmable with hundreds of third party solutions. CMS IntelliCAD also offers DWG file extension native support! And now also with Microstation DGN file support.
    Leader badge
    Starting Price: $149.95/one-time/user
  • 2
    PataBid

    PataBid

    PataBid

    PataBid Quantify is a powerful mechanical/electrical estimating software used to help contractors find, bid and win more work. Contractors can search for public tenders, and also build estimates accurately and swiftly through the use of automated quantity takeoff, pricing/labour features, quick item pads, PDF extraction, labour notes, blueprinting, pre built assemblies and more. Contractors can even do manual drafting for design/build work and change orders. PataBid's items database (35,000+items) and cloud based design make Quantify an out of the box estimating software for small contractors. Finally, a software platform designed to help you grow your business and bid electrical work reliably. Designed with the small contractor in mind, Quantify is an affordable, value-packed estimating software for electrical contractors and mechanical contractors. Make your jobs more predictable and profitable. Quantify a winning bid today!
    Leader badge
    Starting Price: $1,200 USD/year
  • 3
    SketchUp

    SketchUp

    Trimble

    Design delightfully, collaborate clearly, and build better buildings. The joy of drawing by hand. The ease of super-smart 3D modeling software. Make sustainable buildings. Change the world, hundreds of professionally-developed extensions at your fingertips. Design in 3D. Document in 2D. Make work easier, bring efficiency to your team and the 3D community. A great idea can be its best with the right technology. Draw in 3D, analyze and improve your building’s performance, and creatively document and share your ideas with your class. Integrated with Google Drive and Microsoft OneDrive. Works on Chromebooks or any Internet-connected computer. Students have access to free and intuitive 3D modeling tools. Positioning-centric information is changing the way people, businesses and governments work throughout the world. By applying Trimble's advanced positioning solutions, productivity increases and safety improvements are being realized.
    Starting Price: $119 per year
  • 4
    AutoCAD Mechanical
    Design faster with an industry-specific toolset for mechanical engineering, including 700,000+ intelligent parts and features. Isolate and restore layer groups and specify linetypes and lineweights. Update geometry automatically when changes occur. Minimize manual redraws. Produce accurate drawings with standard components. Efficiently analyze designs, including shaft, spring, belt, chain, and cam generators. Detail native Inventor part and assembly models. Use intelligent drafting tools made for mechanical design. Custom content library and publishing. Create and save custom content. Preview fillet, chamfer, and offset commands. Take the power of AutoCAD® wherever you go. Smart mechanical engineering dimensions. Create dimensions using abbreviated dialog boxes. 2D DWG with a view of the standards tab on the open options panel. Support for international drafting standards. Deliver standards-based design documentation.
    Starting Price: $220 per month
  • 5
    E3.series
    A comprehensive electrical and fluid planning software environment for advanced requirements. E3.series is a true concurrent electrical engineering environment supporting advanced requirements for electrical documentation, cabinet and wire harness design and manufacturing outputs. E3.series facilitates an efficient and accurate design and manufacturing process for electrical and fluid planning, cable planning, and wire harness and cabinet layout. Its object-oriented architecture provides an integrated and consistent design approach to help eliminate errors, improve quality and reduce design time. Consistency of all design phases through object orientation. Powerful automated operations and electrical checks. Comprehensive outputs for manufacturing and documentation. Native format library and design data management. Circuit diagrams, connection lists, layout plans and reports always up-to-date and synchronized.
    Starting Price: £80/€90/CHF110 per month
  • 6
    Rocky DEM
    Rocky DEM quickly and accurately simulates the flow behavior of bulk materials with complex particle shapes and size distributions. Only in Rocky DEM can you combine the processing power of several GPU cards to accelerate your simulations, enabling you to work with higher volumes of data in less time. Rocky DEM allows modeling of accurate particle shapes which includes custom 3D bodies, 2D shells and fibers which can be made rigid or flexible. Enable your equipment components to move freely in response to forces such as particle contacts, gravity, and more. Rocky DEM’s Application Programming Interface (API) is based on the most-recent technology for customization and user experience integration. The result delivers unique usability, portability and, above all, solver performance. Fully integrated with Ansys Workbench (Fluent, Mechanical, Optislang and DesignXplorer). Includes both one-way and two-way coupling abilities with Ansys Fluent providing physically consistent results.
  • 7
    Dymola

    Dymola

    Dassault Systèmes

    Dymola, dynamic modeling laboratory, is a complete tool for modeling and simulation of integrated and complex systems for use within automotive, aerospace, robotics, process and other applications. Rapidly solve complex multi-disciplinary systems modeling and analysis problems, using Dymola's best-in-class Modelica and simulation technology. Dymola is a complete environment for model creation, testing, simulation and post-processing. Dymola, Dynamic Modeling Laboratory, is a complete tool for modeling and simulation of integrated and complex systems for use within automotive, aerospace, robotics, process and other applications. Developed by domain specialists, these libraries are used in conjunction with Dymola or 3DEXPERIENCE Dymola Behavior Modeling to quickly and easily model and simulate the behavior of complex systems that span multiple engineering disciplines. FMI allows any modeling tool to generate C code or binaries representing a dynamic system model.
  • 8
    Altair Inspire
    Applied early in the product development lifecycle, Inspire accelerates the creation, optimization, and study of innovative, structurally efficient parts and assemblies through collaboration. Inspire's award winning user experience for geometry creation and modification can be learned in just a few hours, and delivers dependable Altair solver power. Structural analysis with the speed and accuracy of Altair® SimSolid®, as independently validated by NAFEMS, provides the ability to analyze large assemblies and complex parts. Dynamic motion simulation, including loads extraction, using the reliable multi-body systems analysis of Altair® MotionSolve®. The industry standard for structural efficiency, topology optimization by Altair® OptiStruct®, for the generative design of practical, viable, and manufacturable geometry. Inspire enables both simulation analysts and designers to perform what-if studies faster, easier, and above all earlier, encouraging collaboration.
  • 9
    SolveSpace

    SolveSpace

    SolveSpace

    SOLVESPACE is a free (GPLv3) parametric 3d CAD tool. Modeling 3d parts, drawing with extrudes, revolves, helixes and Boolean (union/difference/intersection) operations. Modeling 2d parts, draw the part as a single section, and export DXF, PDF, SVG; use 3d assembly to verify fit. 3D-printed parts, export the STL or other triangle mesh expected by most 3d printers. Preparing CAM data, export 2d vector art for a waterjet machine or laser cutter; or generate STEP or STL, for import into third-party CAM software for machining. Mechanism design, use the constraint solver to simulate planar or spatial linkages, with pin, ball, or slide joints. Plane and solid geometry, replace hand-solved trigonometry and spreadsheets with a live dimensioned drawing. Sketch sections using lines, rectangles, datum lines and points. Sketch circles, arcs of a circle, datum circles, cubic Bezier segments, C2 interpolating splines, and more.
  • 10
    Moldflow

    Moldflow

    Autodesk

    Moldflow® simulation software lets you troubleshoot problems with plastic injection and compression molding. Advanced tools and a simplified user interface help you address manufacturing challenges, such as part warpage, cooling channel efficiency, and cycle time reduction. Connect product design teams, minimizing delays and rework costs. Autodesk Drive and shared view enable content collaboration. In-product Fusion 360 push for quick geometry changes. Automation tools reduce setup and post-processing. Expand solver flexibility to improve capacity. Minimize solver hardware limitations by using Moldflow Insight. Mesh and solve Insight jobs with local, remote, and secured cloud server options. Run multiple simulations concurrently with remote server and cloud solving. Securely store, preview, and share design data. Quickly and securely share work with stakeholders. Upload a .csv file to add and assign a large number of users at once.
  • 11
    Ansys Vista TF
    2D throughflow simulation is a critical step in the rotating machinery design process. Vista TF provides you with quick answers and can grant a better insight to your design or expose unexpected issues. Perform initial design iterations in 2D before moving to detailed 3D analysis to reduce development time and engineering resources. Achieve stronger insight to your rotating machinery design with Ansys Vista TF. This software provides detailed 2D flow simulation and enables you to refine product performance in early design stages. A high-performance turbocharger is a critical component for engine performance. The engineers at PCA were looking for a way to optimize turbocharger performance while simultaneously finding the most efficient approach to their problems. Ansys Vista TF quickly proved to be the best answer, as it offered fast, high-quality answers contained in a streamlined workspace.
  • 12
    Luminary Cloud

    Luminary Cloud

    Luminary Cloud

    Luminary Cloud is the world’s first modern computer-aided engineering SaaS platform that provides engineers insights in minutes, allowing for quick simulation, analysis, and iteration that were once impossible. Experience the magic of running simulations in minutes on the most advanced GPUs in the cloud. Securely store, access, and analyze all your raw simulation data to discover insights and optimize engineering designs. Run experiments faster for better product design and quality while reducing the chance of defects. Accelerate time to market by optimizing engineering efficiency and dramatically lower hardware, prototyping, and physical testing costs. Empower your team to create their best designs with faster insights and results, with the most accessible simulation platform. Run fast simulations at any scale, collaborate around the world with project sharing, and start analyzing results instantly.
    Starting Price: $5 per credit
  • 13
    ICEM Surf

    ICEM Surf

    Dassault Systèmes

    Often described as the reference system for the creation of Class-A surfaces, ICEM Surf is the industry-leading curve and surface explicit geometry modeling tool for defining, analyzing and performing high-end visualization of complex free-form shape CAD surface models to the highest quality. Used in product design processes throughout automotive, aerospace, consumer goods and press-tool design industries, providing solutions for direct surface modeling, refinement, reconstruction and scan modelling. Advanced tools such as Global modelling and industry-defined analysis tools enable designers to detect subtle surface problems and check for compliances with regulations, whilst simultaneously performing high precision surfacing and experiencing real-time 3D visualization. With the core module you can define complex free-form shapes of a desired aesthetical high end Class-A quality, create, modify and diagnose surfaces and existing designs.
  • 14
    Abaqus

    Abaqus

    Dassault Systèmes

    Today, product simulation is often being performed by engineering groups using niche simulation tools from different vendors to simulate various design attributes. The use of multiple vendor software products creates inefficiencies and increases costs. SIMULIA delivers a scalable suite of unified analysis products that allow all users, regardless of their simulation expertise or domain focus, to collaborate and seamlessly share simulation data and approved methods without loss of information fidelity. The Abaqus Unified FEA product suite offers powerful and complete solutions for both routine and sophisticated engineering problems covering a vast spectrum of industrial applications. In the automotive industry engineering work groups are able to consider full vehicle loads, dynamic vibration, multibody systems, impact/crash, nonlinear static, thermal coupling, and acoustic-structural coupling using a common model data structure and integrated solver technology.
  • 15
    Creo Elements/Direct
    Direct modeling allows you to quickly and easily create one-off designs or radically repurpose existing designs—even if you don’t know how they were made. In fact, most companies add 3D modeling to their product design process to help them shorten time to market, meet customer demands for new products, and satisfy increasingly complex customer requirements. With direct modeling, even those who are infrequent CAD users can make changes to geometry quickly and easily, while CAD experts appreciate the direct modeling flexibility to design large assemblies in record time. Creo Elements/Direct Modeling is the most comprehensive direct modeling system on the market, with a full range of extensions to meet your specialized needs. So, bring on your most radical design change or that one-off product: the software is intuitive, robust, and up to the task even with massive assemblies. Moreover, you or anyone on your team can pick up and work on a direct 3D product with minimal ramp-up time.
  • 16
    AMOB 3D Curving
    EL SOFTWARE DE CURVADO AMOB 3D se encuentra en la vanguardia de aplicaciones informáticas. Muy fácil de manejar, permite la programación directa con coordenada XYZ y LRA o la importación de ficheros CAD. Entre otras funciones permite la compensación automática de elasticidad del tubo, biblioteca de utillajes y su configuración. Realiza test de anti-colisión para ver la viabilidad de producción, sin necesidad de pruebas y desperdicio de material. Gracias a su interface intuitivo, este software de programación secuencial y extremadamente fácil de usar, incluso por operadores sin gran experiencia.
  • 17
    Vention

    Vention

    Vention

    Vention MachineBuilder is the fastest and easiest way to design and order factory equipment. Loaded with thousands of modular parts, smart design tools, and real-time pricing, automated equipment, robot cells and tooling, can be created in minutes, from anywhere, on any web browser. Create automated equipment, robot cells and tooling in minutes with the only CAD software built exclusively for the factory floor. Don’t spend days learning another CAD software. Smart design tools, in-CAD support and an intuitive interface make equipment design easy for everyone. Access a curated library of industrial-grade, modular automation components. From structural framing, to linear motion and robotics, leverage parts that have been tested for compatibility across Vention and trusted-partner brands. Real-time pricing as parts are added to the design.
  • 18
    nanoCAD Mechanica
    Mechanica is nanoCAD’s 2D drafting and 3D mechanical design module. It is based on an advanced parametric engine and works with a large library of standard parts. It enables users to carry out fast development of high-quality mechanical engineering drawings and project documentation. nanoCAD platform provides you with a full set of basic and advanced design tools for creating and editing 2D/3D objects. It offers multiple drawing and editing methods for most geometric elements. nanoCAD platform is the base on which you build a more powerful CAD system to your specifications. Mechanica extends the nanoCAD platform with an array of mechanical drawing and engineering calculation utilities coupled with a vast library of standard and user-defined parts. The synergy speeds up the parametric drafting process. Advanced tools for designing shafts and pipelines. Drawing projections made with engineering standards.
    Starting Price: $199 per year
  • Previous
  • You're on page 1
  • Next