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Pros:

The ease of integration, no software to install locally.

Cons:

There is no 'back' button to help you correct mistakes - you have to rely on not saving changes which is not ideal.

Countfire ratings

Average score

Ease of Use
4.7
Customer Service
5.0
Features
4.6
Value for Money
4.4

Likelihood to recommend

9.4/10

Countfire has an overall rating of 4.7 out 5 stars based on 209 user reviews on Capterra.

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Filter reviews (209)

Kelly
Kelly
Commercial Manager in UK
Verified LinkedIn User
Construction, Self Employed
Used the Software for: 2+ years
Reviewer Source

Amazing Software - Would definitely recommend!!

5.0 2 years ago

Comments: Great, efficient, time saver!!

Pros:

Easy & straightforward to use. Great user interface. Reliable automated counting (if drawings are half decent!)

Cons:

Copying symbol selection over to new drawings & also reviewing later revisions of drawings does not always work as it should with no real explanation as to why apart from it being something related to the drawing

Countfire Response

last year

Thanks Kelly - appreciate you leaving this review! Really glad to hear you're getting on with Countfire so well. You're correct, copying symbols doesn't always work. Occasionally the revised drawings have been created slightly differently - there are usually 2 reasons why Countfire will not automatically find matches: 1 - The drawings have been converted to an image, removing the drawing layers - which means the symbols are not selectable 2 - When the original drawing was revised the symbols have been drawn differently or changed (i.e. the make-up of the symbols has different - for example the shape of a light fitting has changed).

Josh
Director in UK
Construction, Self Employed
Used the Software for: 2+ years
Reviewer Source

Game changing!

5.0 last year

Comments: Fantastic!!Been using countfire for 4 years now and its made estimating a lot less laborious

Pros:

The constant improvements and the ease of accurate take offs! Countfire team are always looking for ways to improve the software and take on customer feedback very well!Its also a massive bonus for my business model that all take offs can be done online and no need for a printer! Enables the company to operate from anywhere very easily..

Cons:

A live catalogue of materials would complete this software. It would cut down time going out to get live prices on materials.

Alternatives Considered: Ensign

Reasons for Switching to Countfire: The take off element is currently superior to theirs.

Countfire Response

12 months ago

Game changing – Awesome! Thanks Josh You're spot on 👍. At Countfire we work on 2 week cycles, releasing hundreds of platform enhancements each year. Great to hear you're also benefitting from being able to log in and operate from anywhere. It would definitely be useful to have access to a live catalogue of materials. We have a feature request for this – your vote has already been added to it. Brilliant that you've been onboard for 4 years – looking forward to continuing our journey together!

Brody
Estimator in US
Construction, 51–200 Employees
Used the Software for: 6-12 months
Reviewer Source

Great quality product

5.0 9 months ago

Pros:

The ability to select 1 symbol and count fire counts all of them.

Cons:

Either the loading time or the fact that sometimes it messes up the background and believes it is not background. Though I understand this is probably due to the drawings rather than countfire.

Countfire Response

8 months ago

Many thanks for your review Brody. Absolutely – when selecting your symbols Countfire searches for matches across all drawings in your discipline. When backgrounds aren't automatically hidden we have a number of options you can use by clicking the down arrow next to the background button. This allows you to: Customise – select parts of the drawing to hide with the default settings of your background. Restore defaults – return to Countfire's standard background settings. Restart – removes all background settings and allows you to start from scratch.

Jake
Pre Construction Manager in UK
Construction, 11–50 Employees
Used the Software for: 6-12 months
Reviewer Source

Taking off made easy!

5.0 2 years ago

Pros:

Automatically counting multiple drawings at the same timeAbility to identify any issues/errorsConstantly adding new features

Cons:

So far we have had no issues wit the software. The only very minor issue was not receiving a notification of duplicate symbols on a set of drawings but still not really an issue

Countfire Response

last year

Thanks Jake - really appreciate you leaving this review! Countfire's auto-counting feature is built on our own proprietary image recognition algorithm, this allows the software to automatically recognise selected symbols/text across all the drawings within that discipline. That's spot on - finding errors is easy! You can hide your counted symbols allowing you to visually check your work in the software. Once your takeoff is processed, we also provide a check sheet and pdf drawings so you can be confident your takeoff is 100% accurate. You're right, we are constantly updating and adding new features. To keep up to date with what we're doing you can read our changelogs here https://feedback.countfire.com/changelog Duplicates are a tricky one as it's essentially due to how the drawing has been created - there can be two separate symbols on top of each other and therefore counts as two in the final quantities. Although it rarely happens, when a project is processed we have safety measures in place that notify us if the software suspects any duplicates in your project. As soon as the duplicates get flagged we send out a message detailing where the duplicates have been found and how to fix them.

Eric
Sr. Lighting Engineer in US
Construction, 10,000+ Employees
Used the Software for: 1+ year
Reviewer Source

CountFire Automated Take-Off Software

5.0 5 years ago

Comments: I could not be more pleased with CounFire. It is fast, accurate, easy to use, and has cut my time to perform a take-off by a factor of 10. Some may question a factor of 10, but try it and see that drawing symbols when counted on one drawing are also counted on all other drawings within the project drawing package automatically. Orientation is not an issue, and items not picked up are easily identified and added to the correct symbol list. Check drawings are also supplied as part of the final report to assure all errors have been resolved.

Pros:

CountFire being a cloud based service gets you up and running quickly. CountFire Sales is there to get you started and introduce you to Technical Assistance and Training. The On-Line Help function is integral to the CountFire Platform allowing you to be able to function seamlessly as you work on projects. I can count drawing elements or make extremely accurate measurements in one tenth of the time I did manually without the cost of drawing reproduction. The Final Reports are perfectly formatted in MSExcel and ready for Bill of Material development.

Cons:

I am still looking for a Con. I thought that since CountFire is in Great Britain that communications might be hampered by five, (5) time zones, but this was not the case. CountFire was there 24X7 to solve my self-inflicted start-up issues.

Alternatives Considered: Autodesk Construction Cloud, Bluebeam Revu and McCormick Electrical Estimating

Reasons for Switching to Countfire: 1. Cloud Based, 2. Price, 3. Ease of Use, 4. Support

Jonathan
Pre-Construction Director in UK
Construction, 51–200 Employees
Used the Software for: 1+ year
Reviewer Source

Best Software in the market

5.0 4 years ago

Comments: It has made our estimating more productive and accurate.

Pros:

Its a lot more intelligent than other software's

Cons:

The cost is slightly higher than we would like to pay.

Alternatives Considered: SketchUp

Reasons for Choosing Countfire: After our demo and because of the clunky software we previously had.

Switched From: Bluebeam Revu

Reasons for Switching to Countfire: It was more intelligent and you can breakdown sections easier.

Billy
Estimator in UK
Construction, 51–200 Employees
Used the Software for: 1-5 months
Reviewer Source

Billy Banyard - Barrie Beard LTD

5.0 7 months ago

Comments: Very positive and likely to use the software going forward as opposed to others

Pros:

Count fires auto count across multiple drawing has sped up the take off procedure, enabling us to spend more time estimating and putting costs to things than counting.

Cons:

Measure facility on things such as containment drawing. Its not a dislike but similar to other software (plan swift)

Countfire Response

6 months ago

Thanks for the amazing review Billy! It's awesome to hear how auto counting symbols across multiple drawings is speeding up your takeoff process, giving you extra time to focus on estimating and costing. We have a feature request for "Improvements to measuring containment", you can add your vote by clicking 'Give feedback' on the orange button at the bottom right corner of Countfire.

Erhan
Quantity Surveyor in UK
Construction, 2–10 Employees
Used the Software for: 6-12 months
Reviewer Source

Absolute time saver

4.0 10 months ago

Pros:

Customer support. Whenever I need to know anything about software, I am answered in 2 mins.

Cons:

I would love to work with dwg. files either. Because sometimes pdf files converted from dwg can be corrupted.

Countfire Response

10 months ago

Absolute time saver – love it, thanks Erhan! Awesome to hear you've had a great experience with our support team – if you ever have any questions, you can send us a message on the orange button in the bottom right hand corner of the app. Files do need to be in PDF format to upload into Countfire. As long as the drawing has been exported to a proper PDF format (rather than a 2D PDF or image format), you shouldn't have any problems using all of the features of Countfire. Unfortunately if the drawing is a 2D format or an image, you're not able to count these with the automatic counting tool but we do have a manual count tool available.

Cliff
Estimator in UK
Construction, 51–200 Employees
Used the Software for: 1-5 months
Reviewer Source

Review of Countfire

4.0 10 months ago

Comments: Still room for improvement however, the product itself makes the life of an estimator easier.

Pros:

Taking off with ease, the zone arrangements and the typical organised nature of the software.

Cons:

Product is a little bit 'choppy'. Requires a more fluid flow especially when panning.

Countfire Response

9 months ago

Thank you for the review – great to hear it's been making your life as an estimator easier! There are a few reasons you may run into "choppy" drawings (lag when zooming in and out or panning the drawing). It's likely to be either internet speed or the complexity of the drawing (i.e. level of detail on the drawing). If you run into this issue definitely contact our support team who will be able to investigate for you – message using the orange button in the bottom right hand corner of the app or email [email protected].

Joshua
Junior Estimator in UK
Electrical/Electronic Manufacturing, 11–50 Employees
Used the Software for: 1-5 months
Reviewer Source

New user of countfire

4.0 9 months ago

Pros:

Being a new user of the program is has been very user friendly and the tutorials were very informative.

Cons:

one con to mention i noticed straight away is you can min/maximise the task bar on the right to view the drawing full page.

Countfire Response

8 months ago

Thanks for the great review Joshua! Awesome to hear you've found the system user friendly and the tutorials have helped you get to grips with Countfire. Thanks for the feedback on being able to collapse the task bar – we have a feature request for 'Ability to customise the sidebar' and I have added your vote. If you have anymore feedback you can 'Send us a message' or click 'Give feedback' via the orange button in the bottom right hand corner.

Andrew
Estimator in UK
Construction, 201–500 Employees
Used the Software for: 2+ years
Reviewer Source

An estimators dream

5.0 last year

Comments: A company that provides a fully supported free trial of their software has confidence in its product. Safe to say that its not miss-placed confidence.

Pros:

Intuitive, accurate, superb customer support, simple to use, fully formatted downloadable reports.

Cons:

Hard to say what I like the least.............. That it wasn't available 30 years ago. :-)

Countfire Response

12 months ago

Thanks for your great review Andrew! It's great to hear that you find Countfire intuitive and simple to use. It would have been great to be around 30 years ago so we could have been helping estimators increase their speed and accuracy for longer – if only we had a time machine 😄 You're right – we are confident that Countfire will help estimators speed up their takeoff and estimating process. We also want our users to get the most out of the software, so we offer free full online training and live support to all of our users – from free trial through to our legacy customers, as we are consistently releasing new features.

Ben
Senior Electrical Estimator in UK
Construction, 51–200 Employees
Used the Software for: 1+ year
Reviewer Source

Impressive Software.

5.0 last year

Pros:

Ability to quickly turn around project quantities and transfer onto Excel for all to use and review.

Cons:

difficulties using the product is when the drawing images are uploaded but each symbol has minor alterations. To the naked eye can't be picked up but the software will, therefore some symbols need multiple take offs done for same image.

Countfire Response

last year

Wow, what a great review - thanks Ben! It's great to hear that you're able to quickly turn around your projects. You're spot on – sometimes symbols can look the same on your drawings but, when the drawings have been created, they have been drawn slightly differently. All you need to do to count all these symbols is make an additional selection. Countfire will then look for your selections across all of your drawings in the discipline. If you do run into this, it's always worth popping our support team a message, they'll usually have some tips to help you get more matches from fewer selections.

Mark
Mechanical Estimator in UK
Construction, 10,000+ Employees
Used the Software for: 2+ years
Reviewer Source

Mechanical take Offs

5.0 2 years ago

Comments: I have found using Countfire really helpful as it is more accurate than printing and marking drawings and also i believe faster

Pros:

I have found that even though it is mainly for the electrical trade i have adapted it with the help of the Countfire Team to mechanical use

Cons:

Nothing. It has suited all my needs and assists in my day to day works

Countfire Response

last year

Thanks so much for your kind review Mark. Yes, although it's not specifically designed for the mechanical trade, Countfire is flexible and you can adapt it to your way of working. It's great you've found using Countfire really helpful and more accurate than printing and marking drawings. I agree, it's definitely faster too as you don't have to worry about adding up your measurements or losing your place if you're interrupted - Countfire keeps a track of all that for you. Once you've finished your takeoff you also get a set of marked up drawings and a spreadsheet splitting out your quantities.

Chris
Director in UK
Computer Networking, 11–50 Employees
Used the Software for: 1+ year
Reviewer Source

Does what it says on the tin

5.0 last year

Pros:

Pure ease of use, does exactly what i need it to do and outputs easily legible tables.

Cons:

Nothing, does exactly what i need with a good price!

Countfire Response

12 months ago

Does what it says on the tin – love it! Thanks Chris. Awesome that you're finding Countfire easy to use and it does exactly what you need. Spot on – Countfire produces a consistent set of outputs for every project. Great to hear that you don't have any cons! If you do ever have any feedback on features you'd like to see, we'd love to hear from you – just use the orange button in the bottom right hand corner of the app.

Katherine
Electrical Estimator in UK
Electrical/Electronic Manufacturing, Self Employed
Used the Software for: 1-5 months
Reviewer Source

Countfire Review - Freelance Electrical Estmator

5.0 2 years ago

Comments: Had a really good experience with the package and the customer service and help I have received has been excellent

Pros:

Take off software is definitely the stand out area of the software compared to others on the market which require you to manually take off items. This allows you to instantly highlight which then follows through to other pages in the same discipline. Cutting the time to do take offs dramatically

Cons:

The kits can take some time to build up when you first start using the software which can be a bit tedious especially if you are used to working on spreadsheets etc. but if you bear with it it does get much easier and quicker to use.

Countfire Response

last year

Great review Katherine - thanks! It's great you've been able to cut the time to complete your takeoffs! You're spot on, when you make a selection Countfire will automatically look for matches across all drawings in your discipline, which significantly speeds up the takeoff process. Also, glad to hear you've had a really good experience with the software and the customer service you've received. I understand where you're coming from, it can take a little time to create your kits while you're building your estimate – but when you create your next estimate, because our powerful auto linking function, Countfire will automatically remember the kits you've previously used and link them to your takeoff items. This also speeds up your estimating process – the more estimates you create, the less work you have to do!

Richard
Electrical Estimating Manager in UK
Construction, 51–200 Employees
Used the Software for: 2+ years
Reviewer Source

Gloster MEP & Countfire

5.0 2 years ago

Comments: We have massively reduced printing output with Countfire, as well as increased speed with take offs over various disciplines.

Pros:

As a Team, we find this tool very useful collectively as we can help each other, assist in various ways and find the output of the take off/marked up drawings symbol checks very useful.

Cons:

In some areas, perhaps an ability to 'copy & paste' information, words etc could be useful.

Neil
Director in UK
Construction, Self Employed
Used the Software for: 2+ years
Reviewer Source

This product has revolutionized the way i run my business...

5.0 2 years ago

Comments: I've found the software brilliant and the customer service exceptional. Its taken my business to the next level and couldn't imagine how i would run my business without it.

Pros:

Easy and quick to use. Absolutely brilliant.

Cons:

It would be nice to be able to copy test off the drawings to paste in the software

Countfire Response

2 years ago

So great to hear Countfire has made such a difference to your business Neil! In terms of copying text from drawings, we're sometimes a little restricted to what's contained within the PDFs and how it's been saved, but I can definitely see how useful it would be. I know we've got a feature request open for it currently.

Terry
General Manager in UK
Construction, 11–50 Employees
Used the Software for: 6-12 months
Reviewer Source

Makes life very easy.

5.0 7 years ago

Pros:

Countfire makes doing takeoffs extremely easy and the amount of time it saves leaves more time to do other things that need doing.

Cons:

not enough colours in the palette, When you measure & ask for itemised it measures every click not just start to finish giving far to many reults

Countfire Response

7 years ago

Thanks Terry! I wanted to let you know we released an update recently to include more colours. With measurements and how they're saved into the Excel spreadsheet, you have a choice between not itemised (just the overall total) and itemised (each individual measurement). Itemising does definitely result in a larger spreadsheet because there's just a lot more information to represent within Excel, however, I also wanted to point you towards a workaround we have which allows you to round & summarise those measurements towards specific lengths (EG: set busbar lengths etc. There's more here: http://help.countfire.com/workarounds/summarising-measurement-items

Jacob
Commercial Manager UK in UK
Construction, 1,001–5,000 Employees
Used the Software for: 1-5 months
Reviewer Source

Countfire Introduction

5.0 last year

Comments: Excellent.Like with any new software it'll take time to get upto speed but the team were literally replying in minutes or seconds in some instances so any challenges or needs were answered immediately.

Pros:

The software is extremely intelligent. Once i had set up one level of drawing for lighting and small power it instantly took to work completing other levels.

Cons:

Ongoing takeoffs as a benchmark when halfway through the estimate. it would be good to see a current line in the sand at any give time.

Countfire Response

12 months ago

Thanks for the great review Jacob! Spot on – when you make a selection of a symbol on one drawing, Countfire will automatically count the symbol across all of your drawings in the discipline, speeding up the completion of your takeoff. We do have progress markers for your drawings. When the work on your drawing is saved, the marker will automatically change to yellow signifying your work is in progress. When you have completed your work and checked all symbols on your drawing have been selected, you can click the dot to change the progress marker to green. You can also change your project status on the main project page as you complete your takeoff and estimate and submit to your client – just click on the drop down menu in the top right corner of the page. It's great to hear you've found the support quick and helpful – we know that your time is valuable so we'll always try to resolve any issues as quickly as possible 👍

Dougie
Electrical Estimator in UK
Construction, 501–1,000 Employees
Used the Software for: 6-12 months
Reviewer Source

Best thing to happen top take-offs

5.0 2 years ago

Pros:

So easy to use and if there is something you're not sure about Support are very quick to respond and walk/ talk you through it

Cons:

Doesnt integrate with 3 party estimation software which would be nice but not essential

Countfire Response

2 years ago

Thanks Dougie! Really glad you're getting on well with the software. In terms of estimating, while we don't yet have integrations with other tools, we do have our own estimating side that would be well worth a look. It learns from previous estimates and does a huge amount of heavy lifting for you—means you don't need to reinvent the wheel with each estimate you do. If you haven't had a demo already, I'd recommend firing us a quick message in-app and one of our product specialists can jump on a call and walk you though it.

Jamie
Estimator in UK
Telecommunications, 51–200 Employees
Used the Software for: 1+ year
Reviewer Source

Countfire review

5.0 5 months ago

Comments: Enjoy using countfire, it is a very handy tool to have for work.

Pros:

Helps produce accurate take offs and minimizes mistakes.

Cons:

Drawings can be very slow to load and can be waiting a while.

Countfire Response

4 months ago

Great review – thanks Jamie! Awesome to hear you're minimising mistakes and improving accuracy with Countfire. Sometimes drawings are very complex and the layout is actually made up of lots of small parts – these drawings can be a little slow to load. If you run into this on any future projects, I'd recommend sending us a message on the orange button at the bottom right hand corner of Countfire. Our technical team can take a look and see if they can improve the drawing quality, speeding up the load time in-app.

Michael
Electrical Estimator in UK
Construction, 51–200 Employees
Used the Software for: 1-5 months
Reviewer Source

Personal view of Countfire after 3 weeks

4.0 6 years ago

Comments: Its quick and easy to use. There are a few things which can be done to make it even better but overall its far more efficient than using paper and coloured pens.

Pros:

It is pretty easy to use once you are using it on a daily basis. It makes the take-off process a lot quicker and doesn't require the need for printing off a Forrest worth of trees for drawings, plus you don't need to keep a whole range of coloured pens handy.

Cons:

I have found that I have gone back to drawings that I have taken off first time around and noticed symbols which I did take off were not highlighted. That could be simply down to me not saving each time. However, I have had to go back through each drawing to make sure I haven't missed anything. There should be something in place to highlight anything that has been missed. It would also be helpful to have an option to pick regularly used symbols and containment so that you can save time not having to manually type them in.

Ciaran
Snr Engineer in Ireland
Architecture & Planning, 11–50 Employees
Used the Software for: 6-12 months
Reviewer Source

Quick, easy,fast and great support

4.0 7 years ago

Pros:

The ability to drag, drop and created elements save days of manual counting on paper. the software can be used anywhere you have internet connection

Cons:

an internet connection is required and a large amount of storage for dropbox also

Countfire Response

7 years ago

Thanks Ciaran! Countfire now automatically frees up space within Dropbox meaning you no longer need to purchase a paid Dropbox account. With regard to needing an internet connection, there are a number of positives to consider too. We're able to provide near instant in-app support right when you need it (our current response time is less than 1 minute). Countfire is definitely not the kind of software you buy and then never hear from us again, and having an internet connection is an important part of us being able to provide that level of support to our customers. Additionally, new updates and features get rolled out immediately and we don't hold these back for a new version of the software, as can happen with traditional / older methods of software distribution. You always have the latest and best version.

Wesley
Mechanical Estimator in UK
Construction, 51–200 Employees
Used the Software for: 1-5 months
Reviewer Source

Countfire for mechanical users

5.0 10 months ago

Comments: The take off package is great and saves times and money on printing endless amounts of drawings. And also great service and very helpful.

Pros:

the main reason for using this is take off package which is very helpful and saves time at tender stage.

Cons:

Estimate side seems a bit over complicated for new users.

Countfire Response

9 months ago

Great review Wesley, amazing news that you find Countfire helpful for mechanical users. Really glad to hear Countfire's been useful during the tender stage– saving you time as well as money! Our support team would be more than happy to help you get to grips with our estimating tool. Please do reach out by using the orange button in-app. The estimating tool will allow you to work faster and increase accuracy.

Gareth
Director in UK
Construction, 2–10 Employees
Used the Software for: 6-12 months
Reviewer Source
Source: SoftwareAdvice

Love this software!

5.0 5 years ago

Comments: I was dubious how well this product would work and how accurately the software would find the symbols for my electrical drawings. I was very surprised and pleased with the outcome it found all the symbols after I was shown via a video how to tweak the symbols. The service from the countfire guys is excellent they would check how I was doing with each project and send a brief ,informative and easy to follow instructions via video to show me how to get the best out of the software. To summarise I haven’t looked back since using Countfire. My tenders are compiled easier, and I now get them in way before deadlines which always looks good in my eyes.

Pros:

Ease of use even for my limited I.T skills. Saves so much time. Compiles the take off for you. The search criteria can be saved and used again this saves even more time. Value for money due to time saved. Customer service is excellent.

Cons:

None! Honestly I can’t think of any cons.