Since 1982, when it first launched, AutoCAD has been helping architects, engineers, interior designers, urban planners, and students. Today, it’s an application with a massive user base, and users from various industries utilize its powerful features every day. CAD, of course, stands for “Computer Assisted Design,” and, wow, can it assist.
As if vanilla AutoCAD wasn’t powerful enough, AutoDesk, the company behind the application, has significantly improved it each year. In 2023, AutoCAD received massive updates, and one such update was the architecture toolset, making architects’ jobs more effortless than ever.
Stay with us to learn what has been added and what’s new in AutoCAD 2023, and how you can use these new features.
Architecture toolset
The 2023 update combines seven AutoCAD applications into one, each application becoming a specialized toolset inside the main app. Once known simply as AutoCAD architecture, a standalone application specifically designed for architects, today is only a part of AutoCAD 2023.
AutoDesk created the architecture toolset to make and modify architectural designs and documentation. As such, it includes various features that help architects, which makes the new toolset extremely interesting.
These features have been tested, and the results have been compared between regular AutoCAD and AutoCAD with the new architecture toolset. An increase in productivity and speed of various architects is only one part of the findings.
Features
You might wonder what these features are and how they effectively increase an architect’s productivity. Don’t worry – we’ll review all the essential ones below.
Architectural Library
We must first mention the massive library of premade building objects and architectural components. The update adds over 8000 objects, including walls, windows, doors, etc., which behave just like in the real world. Even multi-level blocks were added, which can support different layer standards.
Faster Renders
The new 3D graphics system allows users to use CPU and GPU power to render drawings much faster. 3D renders can now be as much as ten times quicker. The setting is on by default, offering a much faster experience when rendering architectural drawings, especially those large ones.
Markup Import & Assist
AutoCAD is often used as a collaboration tool with multiple users working simultaneously on the same drawings and projects. That’s why the new Markup Import & Markup Assist features are so powerful.
These features automatically apply feedback from your colleagues, and you don’t need any additional steps to add changes to the drawings.
Moreover, safely sending and sharing your drawings with colleagues and working on the same projects is much easier.
Automatic Generation of Objects
You can save even more time by automatically generating the objects you use the most. Whether we’re talking about floor plans, elevations, or sections, these objects can now be created much quicker, saving the architect time to focus on what’s important.
Continuity
AutoDesk has made an excellent little ecosystem for its apps. Today, they have desktop, mobile, and web apps. With all these apps and a cloud to sync everything to, you can use AutoCAD from whichever device you prefer. That’s why you’re no longer bound to your office and can take your drawings anywhere.
Honorable Mentions
The features we mentioned are only some of the new ones included in the architecture toolset with the AutoCAD 2023 update. Mentioning each element would take much longer, but if you’re interested, you can always check out AutoDesk’s website for detailed documentation of each new feature and update.
Nevertheless, here are some features we believe are also worth mentioning:
- Drawing history – You can now see overtime changes;
- Quick measure – Displaying all measurements is now much quicker;
- Shared views – You can publish your drawings in a browser for colleagues to comment;
- My Insights – Gives you tips for new features;
- Count – Automatically counts blocks or geometric objects.
These are just some of the many new improvements and features that make an architect’s job much more manageable.
Conclusion
The new 2023 AutoCAD update incorporates seven specialized apps into specialized toolsets in the main AutoCAD app. One such toolset is the architecture toolset, which brings many new features to the table.
These features increase the architect’s productivity, speeding up how they generate objects, automating tasks, and allowing them to render faster. Architects can now enjoy massive libraries of premade objects and easily collaborate with colleagues.
