tldr: Most "AI estimating" tools either do beams well and columns poorly, or aren't built for steel at all. This is a straight comparison of the real options in 2026: SketchDeck, Steel Genie, Beam AI,
bidferra.com10 min read
Refreshing to see a founder admit where his own tool falls short. The columns thing is so real. We trialed two of these last year and both nailed the beams in the demo, then choked the second we threw a job at them with no column schedule. Bookmarking this.
Jake Morrison
DevOps engineer. Terraform and K8s all day.
The "run the same set through all of them" advice is spot on, wish I'd done that before we signed a seat-based contract that got expensive fast. Curious where you'd put the line between misc steel a tool should handle vs what's still on the estimator?