Last updated: 28 September 2026
Short answer: for a single commercial seat in 2026, expect to pay roughly $700 a year for Autodesk Fusion, $1,500 to $2,500 for Onshape, around $2,100 for full AutoCAD and $2,800 to $6,500 for SolidWorks on subscription. Perpetual licences still exist for SolidWorks and some alternatives such as BricsCAD, but you pay maintenance each year to stay current. Over five years, the cheapest option is usually the tool that matches your actual work, not the one with the lowest sticker price, and free tools such as FreeCAD and KiCad now cover more professional work than ever.
Prices are list prices in US dollars as of September 2026, from the vendors or, where vendors do not publish prices, from authorised resellers. Many vendors negotiate, especially for several seats; always get a quote.
Why has CAD become a subscription business?
Autodesk stopped selling new perpetual licences for most of its products in 2016, and has since retired maintenance plans and multi-user licences, moving customers to named-user subscriptions. Other vendors have followed with cloud-connected subscription products, even where perpetual licences remain available. For vendors, subscriptions mean predictable revenue; for users, they mean lower upfront costs but a bill that never ends and often rises. Autodesk has raised subscription prices several times since 2024, and has changed how renewals and multi-year discounts work.
What does each major tool cost?
Autodesk
| Product | Price | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| AutoCAD | $2,095/year, or $260/month | Includes industry toolsets and web and mobile apps |
| AutoCAD LT | about $70/month | 2D drafting only |
| Fusion | $680/year | CAD, CAM, simulation and PCB design in one cloud-connected product |
| Fusion for personal use | Free | Non-commercial use only, with a limit of 10 editable documents |
| Inventor, Product Design & Manufacturing Collection | Several thousand dollars a year | Quote from Autodesk or a reseller |
Fusion is the standout for small firms and freelancers doing mechanical design and CNC work: it is a fraction of the price of traditional desktop CAD, although it depends on a cloud account and Autodesk's continued pricing.
Dassault Systèmes SolidWorks
SolidWorks is sold through resellers, and Dassault does not publish list prices. Current US reseller price lists show the cloud-connected SolidWorks subscription at about $2,820 a year for Standard, $3,456 for Professional and $4,716 for Premium. Perpetual licences are still sold, typically from around $4,000 for Standard, plus an annual maintenance subscription for updates and support.
For hobbyists, SolidWorks for Makers costs under $50 a year, but is limited to non-commercial use.
PTC Onshape and Creo
Onshape is fully cloud-based and publishes its prices: $1,500 per user per year for Standard and $2,500 for Professional, which adds release management and approval workflows. Its free plan is for non-commercial use only, and every document on it is public, so it is not suitable for client work. PTC's Creo is sold through resellers at prices comparable with SolidWorks.
Siemens Solid Edge and NX
Siemens now sells Solid Edge under its Designcenter brand with four subscription tiers; its pricing page invites you to start with a low-cost trial month. A free Community Edition exists for non-commercial use, and Siemens offers a free start-up programme for young companies.
What about free and low-cost alternatives?
- FreeCAD: the open-source parametric modeller reached version 1.0 in November 2024, fixing long-standing stability problems, and the current release is 1.1.3. It is realistic for many mechanical parts and assemblies, but file exchange with commercial tools is limited to neutral formats such as STEP.
- KiCad: the free electronics design suite is at version 10 and is widely used commercially for PCB design.
- LibreCAD: free 2D drafting for DXF files.
- BricsCAD: a DWG-compatible alternative to AutoCAD that is still sold as both a subscription and a perpetual licence. Its store lists annual prices from about €330 per seat for BricsCAD Lite to €710 for Pro, well below AutoCAD.
- DraftSight: a DWG editor from Dassault, sold on annual subscriptions from about $295.
For simulation, Synopsys, which completed its acquisition of Ansys in July 2025, offers the free Ansys Student edition for learning only, and SimScale's cloud platform has a free Community plan whose projects are public.
Subscription or perpetual: which costs less?
Take a single seat over five years, using list prices and before any increases:
| Option | Year 1 | Five-year total |
|---|---|---|
| Fusion subscription | $680 | about $3,400 |
| Onshape Standard | $1,500 | $7,500 |
| AutoCAD subscription | $2,095 | about $10,500 |
| SolidWorks Standard, subscription | $2,820 | about $14,100 |
| SolidWorks Standard, perpetual + maintenance | about $4,000 + maintenance | depends on maintenance; lower if you stop paying it |
Three points change the picture:
- Price increases compound. A 6 to 9% rise at each renewal adds roughly 25 to 40% to the annual price over four renewals.
- Perpetual licences keep working if you stop paying maintenance; you simply stop receiving updates. That makes them attractive for stable, long-running workflows, but you may need to pay to rejoin maintenance later.
- Subscriptions include things perpetual licences may not, such as cloud storage, web access and the latest file-format support, which matters when you exchange files with clients on current versions.
How are the two treated for tax?
This depends on your country and structure, so ask your accountant. In the US, the IRS's Publication 946 states that off-the-shelf software, meaning software available to the public under a non-exclusive licence and not substantially modified, can qualify for the Section 179 deduction, or otherwise be depreciated over 36 months. Subscription fees are usually treated as ongoing business expenses.
What are the licensing risks?
- Compliance audits. Autodesk and other vendors, sometimes through the industry body BSA, audit companies they suspect of unlicensed use, including old installations nobody uninstalled. Keep a simple register of every installation, the licence it uses and who uses it.
- Losing access to your files. When a subscription lapses, you lose editing access, but your files remain yours. Free viewers such as Autodesk Viewer and DWG TrueView and eDrawings let you open drawings without a licence. For long-term archives, also export key designs to neutral formats such as STEP and PDF.
- Public free tiers. Free plans such as Onshape Free make your designs public. Never use them for client or proprietary work.
How can a small firm control CAD costs?
- Match the tool to the work. Many firms pay for full AutoCAD but use only 2D drafting that AutoCAD LT or BricsCAD covers.
- Count the seats you actually use. Named-user subscriptions are cheap to cut; review them before every renewal.
- Compare renewal quotes. Resellers still compete on price and services even where the vendor bills you directly.
- Use free tools for the right jobs: KiCad for PCBs, FreeCAD for simple parts and fixtures, free viewers for people who only need to look at drawings.
- Plan hardware and software together. A well-chosen workstation runs any of these tools; my guide to picking a laptop for engineering work covers the specifications, and monitors for engineering and coding covers the screen.
AI features are now appearing inside CAD tools too; I looked at what they change for documentation in how AI is changing engineering documentation and quality work.
FAQ
Can I still buy AutoCAD with a perpetual licence?
Not new from Autodesk. It stopped selling new perpetual licences in 2016. DWG-compatible alternatives such as BricsCAD are still sold with perpetual licences.
Is Fusion free?
Only for personal, non-commercial use, with limits. Commercial use requires a paid subscription, about $680 a year.
Is FreeCAD good enough for professional work?
For many parts, fixtures and simple assemblies, yes, especially since version 1.0. It lacks the large-assembly performance, integrated simulation and support of commercial tools, and file exchange with clients is limited to neutral formats.
What happens to my files if I stop paying for a subscription?
They remain yours and stay wherever you stored them, but you cannot edit them in that software. Free viewers let you open and print them, and exporting to STEP or PDF keeps them usable long term.
