Onshape vs. SOLIDWORKS Quiz

Which CAD Tool Is Right for You?

Answer these questions about your product development to find out.

Our company is in the ________ stage.*

Startup: Lean teams, quick iterationsGrowth: Evolving workflows, expanding requirementsMaturity: Established processes, complex projects
ROI is more of a ________ priority.*

Short-term: We need peak ROI in years 1-5, even if it costs us more later.Long-term: We can invest time & resources now, for greater returns later.Short-term & long-term: Current resources are limited, but we can think one step ahead.

This is who will contribute to our design process:*

Non-designers (review and oversight)Different CAD system usersMultiple designers (per product)External designers (at customers or suppliers)Internal simulation specialistsExternal simulation specialistsInternal manufacturing specialistsExternal manufacturing specialistsNone of the above

A CAD-to-____ system integration will be critical to business growth.*

PDM & PLM: Integration of live CAD into structured data management, task management, configuration management, product definition, and other lifecycle trackingCAE: Two-way integration of CAD data into CAE tools for faster iteration, CAE to CAD in seamless topology optimization, and simulation data into PDM structure.CAM: Integration of CAD data, and its management systems, into machining and robot programming tools.MES: Directly connecting designs to production scheduling, shop floor execution, and trackingERP: Integrating CAD data with inventory, procurement, cost estimation, and planning systemsCRM & CPQ: Linking product data to sales processes, quoting, or customer informationOtherNone

Our product designs (currently or in the future) will...*

Contain thousands of componentsHave organic surfacing or complex geometryIncorporate significant non-mechanical engineering disciplinesHave challenging product performance requirementsCarefully consider specific manufacturing methodsNeed to pass regulatory & compliance requirementsExperience none of these challenges.

Our product engineering will leverage these disciplines:*

We will design for these manufacturing processes:*

Our regulatory, compliance, and certification requirements are ________.*

Extensive: Detailed documentation, full audit trails, rigorous complianceModerate: Formalized processes, clear version control, moderate regulatory documentationBasic: Minimal documentation and version tracking, occasional audits or simple regulatory standards

For our data management and storage, we need...*

A cloud-based system with advanced management toolsAn on-site system for physical ownership of assets and IPA CAD format supporting native offline editingExtensive system customizations and integrationsStrict access control & regulationNone of the above - cloud-only PDM with less configurability will always meet our needs

Our preferred mode of training & support is...*

Streamlined & self-serve: We have few unusual or specialized needs. We prefer speed and automation whenever possible.Individualized & person-to-person: We have unique needs that require special attention. We prefer tailored personal interaction at a slower pace.No preference/it depends

Quiz Complete! Ready for Your CAD Solution Report?

complete the form below to get a copy of your report
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CityState / Province

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Trigger: Disc
Trigger: Mfg
Trigger: Reg
Disc: Fluid mechanics
Disc: Electrical
Disc: Electronics
Disc: Systems
Disc: Other
Mfg: Sheet metal
Mfg: Injection molding
Mfg: Additive manufacturing
Mfg: Welding & structural fabrication
Mfg: Composite layup
Mfg: Electronics integration
Mfg: Inspection & quality control
Mfg: Assembly process planning
Mfg: Other
Dsn: Complex
Final Score
Your Results:

Good Onshape candidate

Your in-depth assessment:
Your Results:

Fair Onshape or SOLIDWORKS candidate

Your in-depth assessment:
Your Results:

Good SOLIDWORKS candidate

Your in-depth assessment:
🔹 Your near-term cost focus.

A browser-based (i.e. no workstation) CAD solution and a monthly subscription expense make sense for those who need to stretch the budget, prioritizing today's finances over tomorrow's.

Be advised:
- Onshape is the best known browser-based CAD, but the SOLIDWORKS brand offers SOLIDWORKS xDesign as well.
- Make sure you won't be buying workstations for other reasons in the near future. This could affect your cost calculations for CAD.
- SaaS "named-user" licensing is usually not sharable, and may be more costly than traditional shareable or permanent licensing, if you have part-time users.
- In a handful of years, it will have been cheaper to purchase CAD software outright than to rent or subscribe.
🔹 Your long-term cost focus.

Old-school purchasing, like with SOLIDWORKS, remains the best way to save money in the long term, if you can support the greater up-front cost and planning.

End-to-end solutions from a single vendor, a SOLIDWORKS advantage decades in the making, can be beneficial on many levels -- easier & high-volume purchasing, simpler implementations, better capabiliities, cleaner workflows.

Be advised:
- Do the math on all "as a service" offerings -- their cost-efficiency is highly dependent on your situation. Some may always be more cost-effective; some may cost more after a handful of years.
- SOLIDWORKS offers perpetual (permanent) licenses that end up costing less than yearly leases after 6-8 years.
- SOLIDWORKS offers quarterly promotions in the forms of discounts, bundles, trade-ins, etc. In contrast, modern SaaS products make it easier to buy them, but at sticker price.
🔹 You do CAD and only CAD.

Onshape and SOLIDWORKS – two powerful mainstream CAD tools

Though it is all the rage now, a unified CAD-CAE-CAM-PLM environment is of limited benefit to a company that just does CAD. Onshape's nascent CAE and CAM capabilities will probably not be a factor right now.

Be advised:
- If you do start doing CAE/CAM in-house, weak integrations will cost you time, money, and results. It's a big deal -- that's why all CAD software companies are developing their own unified platform, Onshape included, although it is currently playing catch-up.
🔹 You're doing simulation.

SOLIDWORKS & 3DEXPERIENCE have simulation for everything.

Any need for simulation creates an advantage for SOLIDWORKS, as its developer is industry-leading in the area. SOLIDWORKS has a huge in-house sim portfolio for all skill levels, all physics, and both desktop and cloud implementations.

Onshape is not focused on developing in-house sim capabilities. There is an open market of CAD-neutral sim tools (which any CAD software can utilize). Some have a CAD integration; others requires an old-school export-import workflow.

Be advised:
- 3D CAD + Simulation is one of the most common SOLIDWORKS promotional bundles.
- The SOLIDWORKS brand offers in-CAD structural FEA, general CFD, and injection molding CFD.
- The 3DEXPERIENCE and SIMULIA sibling brands offer high-end structural, CFD, and electromagnetics, with cloud HPC compute and deep CAD/PDM integration.
- Onshape users can find third-party simulation tools on the Onshape App Store.
- GoEngineer has a special simulation consulting business that does sim project work, software support, mentoring, and training.
- Compare simulation capabilities in detail in our Onshape vs. SOLIDWORKS article here.
🔹 You're doing machine programming.

SOLIDWORKS CAM 2025 in action.

Onshape's CAM solution is currently in beta access with 3-axis milling. If you need 5-axis, mill-turn, swiss, etc., SOLIDWORKS CAM/CAMWorks have offered that for years.

Much like with simulation, there is also the higher-end 3DEXPERIENCE machine programming portfolio which does both NC machines and robotics, with CAD/PDM integration.

Be advised:
- There are many great third-party CAM tools for both Onshape and SOLIDWORKS. They may require a powerful Windows workstation, which may be an issue for an Onshape user.
- Compare CAM capabilities in detail in our Onshape vs. SOLIDWORKS article here.
🔹 Your design needs are mainstream.

You have few complicating concerns in multidisciplinary engineering or specialized manufacturing. Onshape and SOLIDWORKS will both fit the bill, so other concerns besides CAD functionality can guide your decision making.

Be advised:
- If you know your design tasks will evolve, research how both Onshape and SOLIDWORKS will handle the work. There's no other way to know the potential productivity loss or gain.
- Good simulation can dramatic compress design time; consider it part of the CAD toolkit and process.
- Compare CAD capabilities in our Onshape vs. SOLIDWORKS article here.
🔹 Your design needs are advanced.

SOLIDWORKS makes exceptional design communication tools trusted by companies like IKEA.

You've shown a need for some CAD capabilities that are beyond Onshape to handle. SOLIDWORKS remains the more powerful tool for many applications. When SOLIDWORKS reaches its limits, you can also turn to cross-compatible CATIA/3DEXPERIENCE CAD tools on a supplementary basis.

It's important to have tools that are fit for purpose and work well with each other. Workarounds can fail, waste time, or produce lower quality results.

Be advised:
- Don't assume that there's no targeted solution to your CAD challenges. CAD software is always adding user-requested features, and Dassault Systèmes in particular has been especially aggressive with releasing new CAD software that models in nontraditional ways.
- When using 3DEXPERIENCE CLOUD PDM for your SOLIDWORKS design data, you have the freedom to use many different CAD tools in the same product assemblies and the same CAD management structure. This includes competitive CAD, like NX or Creo, and EDA software like OrCAD or Altium.
- CATIA truly excels with extremely large assemblies, advanced surfacing, composites, and more.
- 3DEXPERIENCE offers topology optimization, lattice design, node-based modeling, and more.
- Compare CAD capabilities in our Onshape vs. SOLIDWORKS article here.
🔹 Your work has a fluid flow component.

SOLIDWORKS offers CFD capabilities. Onshape does not.

When designing for fluid flow, SOLIDWORKS puts everything in one place: great solid and surface modeling tools for fluid flow, plus robust CFD simulation in the CAD interface. Onshape will need third-party CFD from the open market.
🔹 You're doing electrical.

SOLIDWORKS Electrical 3D and Schematic are powerful additions to your portfolio.

As an ECAD user, SOLIDWORKS is the simple choice -- it has SOLIDWORKS Electrical, which offers schematic design, 3D mechanical CAD integration, and excellent routing and harnessing tools. Onshape is not focused on this.
🔹 You're integrating electronics into your designs.

SOLIDWORKS integrates with CST Studio Suite, which offers emag simulation and sim-driven antenna & filter design.

Both SOLIDWORKS and Onshape have EDA-MCAD integrations, but only the SOLIDWORKS portfolio has electronics-oriented analysis with thermal CFD and high-frequency electromagnetic simulation.
🔹 You're doing systems engineering.

No Magic Cameo is a first-party integrated MBSE solution for SOLIDWORKS and CATIA companies.

Model-based systems engineering can vastly improve the speed and reliability of complex product development. This is outside of Onshape's scope, but not so for SOLIDWORKS, since its developer, Dassault Systèmes, also offers Cameo No Magic and CATIA Magic, the aerospace industry standard for MBSE.
🔹 You're doing sheet metal.

Onshape and SOLIDWORKS are both strong in sheet metal. Onshape may offer a couple extra conveniences in the CAD experience, while SOLIDWORKS offers structural and manufacturing analysis that Onshape does not. The use case of your products may determine which is more important.

Be advised:
- A sheet metal structure may include many connectors, increasing the benefit of good FEA-CAD integration.
- SOLIDWORKS can easily upgrade to Abaqus FEA technology for extremely fast and accurate sheet metal assembly analysis at maximum scale. Consider connector analysis, vibration, fatigue, springback, design studies, large deformation, etc.
- SOLIDWORKS xDesign, a cloud-only CAD software from the SOLIDWORKS team, has a sheet metal module, which you can see here.
🔹 You're doing injection molding.

Injection molding weld line simulation for a SOLIDWORKS design

SOLIDWORKS is a superior choice for injection molded parts simply due to the time savings of plastic injection simulation. The designer can handle it all themselves in-CAD, verifying manufacturability with no outside help.

Be advised:
- FEA with accurate nonlinear material behavior modeling can also be great for plastic molded part designs. This is easy to get in the SOLIDWORKS ecosystem.
🔹 You're doing additive manufacturing.

A 3D-printable lattice structure generated in specialized CAD software.

Sending machine code to 3D printers is one thing -- both Onshape and SOLIDWORKS can be fine for that -- but designing the "impossible" shapes that represent additive manufacturing's engineering potential is another. This can require CAD software that operates on new principles, in which case, perhaps neither Onshape nor core SOLIDWORKS is the right answer. Such software could be topology optimization software or specialized lattice design software.

Be advised:
- SOLIDWORKS Simulation Professional offers topology optimization based on intermediate-level FEA.
- 3DEXPERIENCE GENERATIVE DESIGN offers topology optimization based on high-end Abaqus FEA and CFD, with CATIA-based surfacing tools to turn optimization results back into CAD.
- 3DEXPERIENCE LATTICE DESIGNER is a specialized CAD software just for creating complex lattice structures. These designs can be integrated into SOLIDWORKS parts directly or, as whole parts, integrated into multi-CAD assemblies shared with SOLIDWORKS CAD.
🔹 You're doing welded structures.

Welded structure design in SOLIDWORKS.

Onshape and SOLIDWORKS are both highly capable at modeling welded structures. However, such structures could have serious performance requirements for which robust FEA is necessary.

Be advised:
- Fairly sophisticated FEA, like that of Abaqus, will be necessary for validating weldment designs with fatigue analysis, buckling analysis, crack initiation prediction, welding process simulation, etc.
🔹 You're working with composite materials.

The composite material design approaches CATIA offers.

Neither Onshape nor SOLIDWORKS is a truly complete solution for working with composite materials, where composite layup must be configured and performance must be well understood. SOLIDWORKS users can easily integrate industry-standard first-party composite design and simulation tools like CATIA and Abaqus.

Be advised:
- CATIA is the leader in composite design. A SOLIDWORKS company can take advantage by adding one seat of CATIA for composite part design, and those parts can share an assembly with SOLIDWORKS data using 3DEXPERIENCE PDM's multi-CAD capabilities.
- Accurate composite material FEA can be very tricky. Abaqus has special material behavior modeling just for this.
🔹 You're integrating manufacturing & enterprise planning software.

Onshape will require you to figure out the integration situation with third-party solutions in MES, ERP, APS, etc. and the Onshape API. SOLIDWORKS has first-party solutions for everything, already connected to 3DEXPERIENCE as the shared data source.

Be advised:
- SOLIDWORKS goes well with DELMIAWorks, the mid-market ERP & MES software.
- For larger enterprises, there is the larger squite of DELMIA Apriso, Quintiq, and Ortems.
- Onshape users will look to third-party solutions.
🔹 Your data management can be simple.

Onshape and SOLIDWORKS both have great but different data management systems.

Given your limited need for PDM customization and offline access, a quick-deploy, one-size-fits-all, cloud-based SaaS solution is perfect. Onshape's cloud PDM is simpler to setup than SOLIDWORKS's 3DEXPERIENCE cloud PDM, but not quite as powerful.

Be advised:
- Consider how you plan to scale up and what your future PDM/PLM requirements will be. Changing such a foundational system is extremely costly (and possibly risky), so if you can, prepare for your future growth.
🔹 You have regulatory and compliance requirements.

Onshape, SOLIDWORKS PDM, and SOLIDWORKS 3DEXPERIENCE all have their strengths for regulation, compliance and certification.
- For basic needs, Onshape and 3DEXPERIENCE, as cloud solutions, offer the most out of the box. SOLIDWORKS PDM can get there with some setup.
- For intermediate needs, SOLIDWORKS and 3DEXPERIENCE offer more than Onshape, with some effort.
- For enterprise needs, 3DEXPERIENCE is a clear leader due to its basis in ENOVIA and CATIA, which have been aerospace and automotive industry standards for years.
Be advised:
- Consider movement of data from CAD into downstream aspects of the business. Will a unified data source for everyone make compliance easier?
- High-end FEA software (like Abaqus) may also be required. Its data will also need to be appropriately controlled.
🔹 You are interested in cloud options.

Onshape's CAD & PDM is fully on-cloud and in the browser. It offers the simpler user experience but lacks niche/high-end capabilities.

SOLIDWORKS's CAD is a local install. SOLIDWORKS's PDM can be either fully on-cloud and in-browser (3DEXPERIENCE CLOUD PDM) or on-premise (SOLIDWORKS PDM). SOLIDWORKS & 3DEXPERIENCE tend to require more implementation work, but they can also do more.

Be advised:
- Many tasks downstream of CAD require a local app installation, regardless of which brand you go with.
- Many tasks downstream of CAD require product data to leave its original cloud, but this is less the case for the SOLIDWORKS/3DEXPERIENCE environment, which has a much larger first-party software portfolio.
- 3DEXPERIENCE FEA/CFD tools can also leverage cloud PDM and cloud compute.
- The SOLIDWORKS brand does offer browser-based CAD with SOLIDWORKS xDesign. Despite the name, it is entirely independent of traditional SOLIDWORKS, but parts from both softwares can share an assembly.
- Read more about cloud vs. on-premise in our Onshape vs. SOLIDWORKS article.
🔹 You are interested in on-premise options.

Only SOLIDWORKS offers local, offline software and on-premise data management.

Be advised:
- There are hybrid options for SOLIDWORKS/3DEXPERIENCE that mix locally installed software with cloud resources for data management and engineering compute.
- Read more about cloud vs. on-premise in our Onshape vs. SOLIDWORKS article.

Should be Empty:

Onshape	SOLIDWORKS xDesign

SaaS-based, in-browser CAD software	SaaS-based, in-browser CAD software
Includes PDM in the cloud	Includes PDM in the cloud
Focus on the basics & ease-of-use	Focus on diverse CAD & PLM capabilities
Not compatible with Creo or other CAD formats	Native multi-CAD assemblies with SOLIDWORKS, CATIA, Creo, NX, etc.
Public market for simulation & manufacturing tools	First-party market of integrated simulation & manufacturing tools.

Quiz Complete! Ready for Your CAD Solution Report?

🔹 Your near-term cost focus.

🔹 Your long-term cost focus.

🔹 You do CAD and only CAD.

🔹 You're doing simulation.

🔹 You're doing machine programming.

🔹 Your design needs are mainstream.

🔹 Your design needs are advanced.

🔹 Your work has a fluid flow component.

🔹 You're doing electrical.

🔹 You're integrating electronics into your designs.

🔹 You're doing systems engineering.

🔹 You're doing sheet metal.

🔹 You're doing injection molding.

🔹 You're doing additive manufacturing.

🔹 You're doing welded structures.

🔹 You're working with composite materials.

🔹 You're integrating manufacturing & enterprise planning software.

🔹 Your data management can be simple.

🔹 You have regulatory and compliance requirements.

🔹 You are interested in cloud options.

🔹 You are interested in on-premise options.

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