Trust your takeoffs & finish them faster
Count symbols across multiple PDF drawings as quickly and accurately as possible with our automated takeoff software for electrical estimators.
Hundreds of symbols counted with one click
Precise measurements for accuracy
Instant coverage area visualisation
Handle drawing revisions with ease
What is takeoff software?
Takeoff software lets you measure and auto-count everything on a PDF drawing digitally, instead of working through printed plans manually.
For electrical estimators, that means automating counting sockets, luminaires, containment, cable runs and equipment across a full drawing set, then turning those quantities into a priced estimate. Good takeoff software removes the repetitive counting work and reduces the risk of missed items, so you can price more tenders in less time.
Count hundreds of symbols in seconds
With a single selection, automatically detect and count symbols and text references across multiple drawings — dramatically speeding up your takeoffs and reducing manual work.
Measure lengths with ultimate accuracy
Easily measure any length on your drawing, including bends or turns, and use snap adjustments so you can accurately count what's needed.
Easily visualise coverage areas to ensure compliance
In-built coverage area tools check devices across your drawings and enable you to manually add new items where needed.
Switch off and customise backgrounds to remove distractions
Automatically hide busy PDF backgrounds with a single click, and clean up your drawing, so you are only left with the items to be counted.
Ensure accuracy with in-built checks
Built-in quality checks ensure complete, accurate takeoffs — giving you peace of mind.
Work with incomplete drawings
Handle incomplete drawings by adding symbols, editing selections, and managing false positives.
Overlay drawings and create floorplans
Easily overlay drawings from different disciplines and stitch them together to create a floor plan.
Add notes and bring clarity to your takeoff drawings
Create notes on your drawings to highlight details and share key information effectively.
Split quantities in your estimate by zones
Divide your quantities however you'd like by creating zones, even after you've finished counting.
Export your takeoff quantities into Excel
Create an Excel document with a full breakdown of every item in your takeoff.
Frequently asked questions
Who is Countfire for?
Countfire is built for electrical and mechanical estimators.
Globally, our customers range from small contractors pricing a handful of tenders a month to large teams handling high volumes of bids. Contractors including Safezone Electrical and Minlec use Countfire to take off full drawing sets in a fraction of the time manual counting takes.
If you spend hours clicking through PDFs counting symbols, or you're still working from printed drawings, Countfire is designed for you.
Built for various projects
Countfire handles takeoffs across the project types our customers work on most:
- Commercial: offices, retail and mixed-use developments with large, repetitive drawing sets
- Healthcare: hospitals and clinical settings where accuracy and audit trails matter
- Education: schools, colleges and university campuses with multi-building drawing packages
- Industrial and logistics: warehouses, manufacturing plants and distribution centres
- Residential: apartment blocks and housing schemes with repeated floor plates
How to use electrical takeoff software
Here's how a typical takeoff works in Countfire:
- Upload your drawings. Drag in the full tender drawing set as PDFs. There's no limit on drawing count, so upload everything at once.
- Select a symbol. Click one example of a symbol, a twin socket for instance, and Countfire finds every matching instance across all drawings automatically.
- Review the results. Countfire highlights everything it has counted so you can visually check the takeoff against the drawings. Anything missed or miscounted can be adjusted in a couple of clicks.
- Measure your runs. Take off cable, containment and pipework lengths with on-screen measurement tools, scaled to each drawing.
- Export your quantities. Send totals straight into Countfire Estimate or export to Excel, organised by drawing, zone or symbol type, ready to price.
Because the counting is automated, the time saved scales with project size. A drawing set that would take days to count manually can be taken off in hours, with a full audit trail showing exactly what was counted and where.
Why electrical estimators choose Countfire
Estimators tend to stay with Countfire once they've used it on a live tender. A few reasons come up again and again in reviews and case studies:
- Accuracy they can evidence. Every count is marked on the drawing, so checking a takeoff, or handing it to a colleague, takes minutes rather than hours.
- Speed on large drawing sets. Automated counting means the biggest, most repetitive projects are where Countfire saves the most time.
- Nothing to install. Countfire is cloud-based, so teams can work from anywhere and drawings stay in one place.
- Support from people who know estimating. Help comes from a team that understands electrical estimating.
Read our customer case studies to see how contractors like Minlec use Countfire day to day.
Handle drawing revisions with ease
Visually compare drawings — quickly spot what's changed between revisions and stay on top of updates.
Count revised drawings — reuse existing work to automatically count revised drawings.
Streamline your entire estimating process
Build flexible estimates directly from your takeoff
Speed up how you estimate, all in one secure cloud-based platform.
Instantly detect changes between PDF specifications
Side-by-side specification comparisons, so you can see what's changed at a glance.
Loved by customers
"Being able to spend less time and resources on this aspect of the job really helps us to keep our costs down and lowers our risk. We can focus our time better."
"Countfire really helps - we know it's going to be accurate. The built-in checks are excellent and picked up everything."
David Leslie
Designplan Lighting
"With Countfire you would quickly save the initial investment you have to make because of the time you save."
Chad Baumgartner
Wesco
"If my company were to pull the plug on Countfire, I'd pay for it myself - that's how valuable it is to me."
Ronan Carroll
Lucid Electric
"If you want something that is agile, accurate and is economical then you have to go with Countfire."
Eric Bronson
Anixter
"Countfire is extremely easy to use. It's quick, no wasted paper, and you've got records of what you've done."
Mike Tydd
ROC Group
